Literary Terms - new terms added frequently

literary terms, or literary terminology, are the technical terms used to describe the "technical" aspects of literature, for instance the techniques that a writer employs to create a specific effect. This also refers to the terms we give to the various parts of a poem or play, such as "character" or "stanza" Learning both what the terminology means and also identifying it in the literature that we read is an important part of any A1 language course in the IB, and always makes up a significant part of the grade for all of the assessment areas of the course

Alliteration most usually found in poetry and song, but sometimes in prose and often in advertising and
newspaper headlines. Alliteration is the repetition of sounds, normally at the beginning of a word or in the first syllable of words in the same or adjacent lines of poetry. For example in the phrase the bigger the better - the b is repeated. Repeated consonants (as in the example I just wrote) is also known as consonance, while the repetition of vowel sounds is known as Assonance. Repeated vowels that create a rhyme within a line of poetry are described as creatinginternal rhyme

Antagonist this is the character or object in a story that the main character, or protagonist, must fight,
either physically or metaphorically. The antagonist does fot have to be a person, it can be an animal, a monster, a political system, society in general or the protagonist's own subconscious (or ego etc etc)

Apostrophe in literary analysis this refers to characters when they are addressing (talking to) people
who are not actually present, or who are dead (!) also speeches directed at animals as if they were human and even inanimate objects such as the earth, the sun, rocks or trees. It may sound strange but I'm sure we've all done this at one time or another (swearing at a computer, for instance)

Conflict this is the struggle that can be found in poems and prose. Conflict gives the reader (and
characters) a focus, as the conflict must be resolved. Conflict can take many forms, as the antagonist in a novel also takes many forms. Conflict may even be found in the structure of texts and the language used, normally done to emphasize the conflicts that the characters face

End Stopping this is the opposite to enjambment (below) and refers to the typical structure of poetry
where each line of a poem is a complete sentence ending with a full stop.

Enjambmant occurs in poetry when a sentence runs from one line of poetry to the next, so that in
other words to read a full sentence the reader must move from one line of poetry to the next. There is more than one reason for this; for instance it may give the effect of meaning flowing through the poem more naturally. On the other hand some poets use this technique in satire, playing on the expectations of the reader. After reading a first line, meaning and expectation are created in the mind of the reader only to be changed on the second line. In other words when the sentence moves from one line to the next the intention of the sentence is perhaps changed in an unexpected way.

Imagery figurative language that adds description to writing. Imagery conjures up "images" in its simplest
terms, and so has the functions of metaphors. Imagery connects to the senses and thus can be categorized accordingly:

visual imagery - colour and shade, the sense of sight auditory imagery - sound and noise, the sense of hearing olfactory imagery - the sense of smell gustatory imagery - the sense of taste tactile imagery - the sense of touch, how things feel kinetic imagery - a sense of movement

Juxtaposition an author uses this technique to compare and "play off" two opposite ideas against
each other, making it easy for the reader to compare and explore the territory where they meet

Metaphor a figure of speech, more technically a form of figurative language. Metaphors compare things,
connecting two ideas in order to for example give a more vivid description of an object. For example "my girlfriend is a saint", obviously not literally but the idea of innocence and selflessness is carried over

Pastiche common in modernist and post modern writing, we have described it as a "cut and paste"
technique. The writer puts a text together from fragments. The effect can be subtle, with the writer simply changing time and language constantly, or extreme where the various fragments seem to come from different sources with no real relation to one another

Onomatopoeia describes words that are used to represent sounds. In other words, the sound of the
word itself should sound like the noise that it is describing. Words such as bang, crash, splat and squelchare onomatopoeic

Plot the plot is the sequence of events that we recognize as the storyline. Traditional story structures have well
defined plots, with a climax and satisfactory conclusion. Other tales may have confusing, multiple plots, some may have no discernible plot at all. In literary analysis and commentary writing giving a summary of the plot is usually unnecessary, and often frowned upon. However discussing the nature of the plot and its structure may be more interesting. Why does the author create a confusing plot? Perhaps to keep the reader in suspense or to imply that the world imagined in the story is complex. A story with little or no plot may suggest a meaningless monotonous existence, for example

Protagonist The main character in a story. Not necessarily the "good guy", but simply the character
who we recognize as being central to the story. The protagonist would also be the character in a story that we can sympathize with somehow, and we "root" for them, even if they are technically a "bad guy" such as Tony Soprano. Occasionally a character who we assume tone the protagonist is killed off, disappears or changes sides, becoming the antagonist. In this case we could say that they are afalse protagonist.

Rhythm this refers to the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables within a text, most often applied to
the analysis of poetry and song, but we can also examine it in prose. To find the rhythm of a piece of writing it needs to be spoken to find the natural rhythm of stressed and unstressed syllables. Poetry with a regular rhythm feels more "poetic" while some poems are composed in a natural rhythm that attempts to emulate the rhythm of natural speech. Finding the rhythm of a text can tell us something about it, whether it is regular and balanced or irregular and thus either free or chaotic

Rhyme the repetition of sounds, usually at the end of lines of poetry, either successive lines or every second
or third line. Rhyme can follow a scheme which can be simple of complicated. Masculine rhyme refers to repetition of the last syllable of the rhyming words, feminine rhyme the second to last syllable, dactylic rhyme the third to last syllable. Poets choose simple or complex rhyming schemes perhaps to reflect the nature of the ideas contained within the poem. A lack of rhyme may represent freedom or even chaos Rhyme on Wikipedia

Structure this refers to the way a poem, a play or a novel is put together or constructed. Identifying certain
aspects of the structure of a text can tell us a lot about the intentions of the author, and also help us understand the text itself. For instance a regular structure, such as a poem with stanzas of equal size and lines of regular length may suggest calm and balance and perhaps even beauty. On the other hand it may suggest monotony, depending upon the content.An irregular structure may on the other hand connote chaos, despair or perhaps even freedom from constraint. Stories may be linear (written chronologically) or non-linear, made up of multiple timelines and parallel histories, each case producing a different effect on the reader and reinforcing other aspects of the written work

Symbol yet another form of figurative language, symbols and symbolism appear in literature in the form of
words that represent greater, abstract ideas. Many are quite "obvious" while others can be more specific. Winter for instance can symbolize death or ending or even sleep. A rose can symbolize feminine beauty and a lion might symbolize strength. Some symbols can be seen as universal, others are culturally defined while some may be specific to a particular piece of literature and part of a plot

Tone identifying the tone of a piece of writing can be difficult until we fully understanding what this means.
Tone refers to the tone of voice we imagine the writer to have at the time of writing, and it denotes the attitude of the writer to the text.. There are many adjectives that may be used to describe tone, and in order to choose we need to imagine what the writer may have been thinking and what they may have been thinking about, and look for words and phrases in the text that can help us identify this. Understanding what a piece of writing may be "about" and identifying the tone often go hand in hand - the one informs the other. So we can describe tone as happy, sad, angry, anxious, puzzled, satirical, depressed, despairing, joyous or any number of other adjectives. Of course when describing the tone of a piece of writing we should always try to explain why we think the tone is so, using examples to illustrate