50 Literary Terms

What is a vantage point from which a narrative is told?

What is a reference to a person, place, event, or literary work, which the writer expects the author to recognize?

What are hints given by the author to prepare the reader for future events?

What is a series of events that occur in a story?

What is a dramatic convention where a character turns to speak to another character or directly to the audience?

What is to hear or read and them assume.

What is time and place in a narrative?

What is defect in a tragic hero/heroine which leads to his/her downfall?

What is a word having two or more meanings; not clear

What is a dramatic moment where a character makes an extended speech alone, usually of private thoughts?

What is literary work that mocks the stupidity or vices of individuals, groups, institutions, or society in general?

What is a long speech by a character delivered in front of one or more other characters?

What is a person or force who opposes something else?

What is a very brief story to illustrate a lesson using animals as characters.

What is a tragedy, the release of strong emotions in the audience. (from Greek: “cleanse”)

What is serious literary work in which a dignified character meets destruction usually through some personal flaw?

What is the use of a word whose sound initiates or reinforces its meaning?

What is a method(s) used to present the personality of a character in a work of literature?

What is a tale in verse or prose in which characters, actions or settings represent abstract or moral qualities?

What is a language which helps one see more clearly and vividly, a person, feeling or thing.

What is shifting by the author to earlier events in the story?

What is a character who remains the same throughout the story?

What is the highest emotional point in a story?

What is a conversation/speech among two or more characters?

What is a pair of successive rhymed lines of poetry?

What is an event/detail that is chronologically out of its proper time in history?

What is general mood/feeling established in the story?

What is happening that turns out to be quite different from what we had expected.

What is verse written in unrhymed iambic pentameter

What is a re-wording of a text passage for purposes of clarification?

What is an attempt in literature to represent life as it is, without sentimentalizing or idealizing it?

What is the author’s attitude toward his/her characters and subject?

What is amusing literary work, which ends happily when the hero/heroine overcomes obstacles?

What is repetition of consonant sounds, usually the initial consonant?

What is a lyric poem which expresses mourning, usually over the death of an individual?

What is a comparison between two dissimilar things intending to add meaning to one?

What is background material usually presented at the beginning of a work?

What is a characteristic way of writing?

What is a story written to be acted out on stage?

What is a figure of speech in which something non-human is given human characteristics?

What is the main idea of literary work?

What is the all-knowing author?

What is the problem that must be solved; the struggle?

What is the central character?

What is a speech/writing praising a person; especially a funeral oration?

What is a sensationalist entertainment with excessively virtuous or evil characters, sordid realism, violence?

What is imitation of a piece of literature/music/art for amusement or instruction?

What is a situation in which the reader or audience knows things, which the characters do not?

What is something in a literary work that maintains its own meaning and represents something else?

What is a type of comic play in which ridiculous situations characters and physical buffoonery use to make us laugh?