| A | B |
|---|
| acts | a major division of the action of a play or drama |
| allegory | representation of abstract ideas or principles through more concrete means |
| alliteration | the repetition of sounds in a sequence of words, generally consonant sounds |
| allusion | an indirect reference to a person, event, statement or theme |
| anagnorisis | in Greek tragedy, the point of recognition or discovery |
| anapest | a foot of three syllables, two short followed by one long (two unstressed, one stressed) |
| antithesis | the placing of a sentence or one of its parts against another to which it is opposed to form a balanced contrast of ideas |
| archetype | an original model or type after which other similar things are patterned; a prototype |
| aside | a part of an actor's lines supposedly not heard by others on the stage and intended only for the audience |
| assonance | a rhyme in which the same vowel sounds are used in different consonants in the stressed syllables of rhyming words |
| black comedy | a comedy that employs morbid, gloomy, grotesque, or calamitous situations in its plot |
| canon | the works of an author that have been accepted as authentic |
| caricature | a representation, especially pictorial or literary, in which the subject's distinctive features or peculiarities are deliberately exaggerated to produce a comic or grotesque effect |
| catharsis | the purging of the emotions or relieving of emotional tensions, esp. through certain kinds of art, as tragedy or music |
| caesura | a pause in a line of verse dictated by sense or natural speech rhythm rather than by metrics |
| chorus | a lyric poem, believed to have been in dithyrambic form, that was sung and danced to, originally as a religious rite, by a company of persons; an ode or series of odes sung by a group of actors in ancient Greek drama |
| comedy of manners | a comedy satirizing the manners and customs of a social class, esp. one dealing with the amorous intrigues of fashionable society |
| comic relief | an amusing scene, incident, or speech introduced into serious or tragic elements, as in a play, in order to provide temporary relief from tension, or to intensify the dramatic action |
| connotation | the set of associations implied by a word in addition to its literal meaning |
| conventions | a widely used and accepted device or technique, as in drama, literature, or painting |
| dactyl | a metrical foot consisting of one accented syllable followed by two unaccented or of one long syllable followed by two short, as in flattery |
| decorum | dignified propriety of behavior, speech, dress, etc. |
| denotation | the most specific or direct meaning of a word, in contrast to its figurative or associated meanings |
| dues ex machina | a phrase referring specifically to the intervention of a nonhuman force to resolve a seemingly irresolvable conflict |
| dialogue | a conversation between two people |
| diction | choice and use of words in speech and writing |
| direct monologue | the author seems not to exist and the interior self of the character is given directly, as though the reader were overhearing an articulation of the stream of thought and feeling flowing through the character's mind |
| distortion | a changing or twisting or manipulating of the truth |
| double entendre | the deliberate use of ambiguity in a phrase or image--especially involving sexual or humorous meanings |
| dramatic irony | (the most important type for literature) involves a situation in a narrative in which the reader knows something about present or future circumstances that the character does not know |
| dramatic monologue | a poem in which a poetic speaker addresses either the reader or an internal listener at length. It is similar to the soliloquy in theater, in that both a dramatic monologue and a soliloquy often involve the revelation of the innermost thoughts and feelings of the speaker |
| dramatis personae | a list of the complete cast, i.e., the various characters that will appear in the play. This list usually appears before the text of the main play begins in printed copies of the text. In late periods of drama, the dramatis personae often included a brief description of the character's personality or appearance |
| episodia | the Greek word for episode. A scene involving the actors' dialogue and action rather than the chorus's singing, or sections of such scenes in a Classical Greek tragedy. Divisions separating the episodes were called stasima |
| euphemism | the substitution of a mild, indirect, or vague expression for one thought to be offensive, harsh, or blunt |
| exodus | the departure of the chorus and the end of the play |
| farce | a light dramatic composition marked by broadly satirical comedy and improbable plot |
| figure of speech | a form of expression (as a simile or metaphor) used to convey meaning or heighten effect often by comparing or identifying one thing with another that has a meaning or connotation familiar to the reader or listener |
| foil character | a character that contrasts with another character, usually the protagonist and, in so doing, highlights various facets of the main character's personality |
| foot | the basic unit of verse meter consisting of any of various fixed combinations or groups of stressed and unstressed or long and short syllables |
| genre | a category of artistic, musical, or literary composition characterized by a particular style, form, or content |
| hamartia | a flaw in character that brings about the downfall of the hero of a tragedy |
| high burlesque | a form of satire which takes a subject matter that is generally regarded as lowly or immaterial and treats it in a literary, elevated manner |
| apostrophe | a figure of speech in which the speaker directly and often emotionally addresses a person who is dead or otherwise not physically present |
| hubris | exaggerated pride or self-confidence |
| hyperbole | extravagant exaggeration |
| iamb | a metrical foot consisting of one short syllable followed by one long syllable or of one unstressed syllable followed by one stressed syllable (as in above) |
| imagery | figurative language that produces mental images; especially the products of imagination |
| incongruity | not being the same, consistent, not conforming |
| indirect monologue | the author serves as a selector, presenter, guide, and commentator |
| internal rhyme | rhyme that occurs within a line of verse |
| irony | a contradiction or incongruity between appearance or expectation and reality |
| juxtaposition | the act or an instance of placing two or more things side by side |
| literary ballad | a story told in verse in which a known writer imitates a folk ballad |
| low burlesque | works in which a lofty subject is degraded by an inappropriately |
| malapropism | the usually unintentionally humorous misuse or distortion of a word or phrase; especially: the use of a word sounding somewhat like the one intended but ludicrously wrong in the context |
| meditative poem | one the aim of which is to give instruction |
| metaphor | a figure of speech in which a word or phrase literally denoting one kind of object or idea is used in place of another to suggest a likeness or analogy between them (as in drowning in money); broadly |
| metaphysical conceit | an extended figure of speech most commonly associated with metaphysical poetry. This involves the use of paradox, images from arcane sources not usually drawn upon poets, and an original and usually complex comparison between two highly dissimilar things |
| meter | systematically arranged and measured rhythm in verse |
| miracle play | a medieval dramatic form dealing with religious subjects such as Biblical stories or saints' lives, usually presented in a series or cycle by the craft guilds |
| mock heroic | of or pertaining to a form of satire in which trivial subjects, characters, and events are treated in the ceremonious manner and with the elevated language and elaborate devices characteristic of the heroic style |
| monologue of the villain | a literary cliché where the villain takes some time from the action to gloat to the hero, often pontificating on how the hero will soon inevitably die |
| morality play | an allegorical form of the drama current from the 14th to 16th centuries and employing such personified abstractions as Virtue, Vice, Greed, Gluttony, etc |
| mystery play | a medieval dramatic form based on a Biblical story, usually dealing with the life, death, and resurrection of Christ |
| narrative pace | generally, the amount of detail in a piece determines the pace. More detail means a slower pace. Less detail means a faster pace |
| ode | a lyric poem typically of elaborate or irregular metrical form and expressive of exalted or enthusiastic emotion |
| onomatopoeia | the formation of a word, as cuckoo or boom, by imitation of a sound made by or associated with its referent |
| ottava rima | an Italian stanza of eight lines, each of eleven syllables (or, in the English adaptation, of ten or eleven syllables), the first six lines rhyming alternately and the last two forming a couplet with a different rhyme: used in Keats' Isabella and Byron's Don Juan |
| oxymoron | a figure of speech by which a locution produces an incongruous, seemingly self-contradictory effect, as in “cruel kindness” or “to make haste slowly.” |
| paradox | a statement or proposition that seems self-contradictory or absurd but in reality expresses a possible truth |
| parallelism | the state of having the same direction, course, nature, or tendency; corresponding; similar; analogous |
| parodos | an ode sung by the chorus at the entrance |
| parody | a humorous or satirical imitation of a serious piece of literature or writing |
| pastoral | having the simplicity, charm, serenity, or other characteristics generally attributed to rural areas |
| pathos | the quality or power in an actual life experience or in literature, music, speech, or other forms of expression, of evoking a feeling of pity or compassion |
| pentameter | a line of verse consisting of five metrical feet |
| peripeteia | a sudden turn of events or an unexpected reversal, esp. in a literary work |
| personification | the attribution of a personal nature or character to inanimate objects or abstract notions |
| point of view | the position of the narrator in relation to the story, as indicated by the narrator's outlook from which the events are depicted and by the attitude toward the characters |
| prologue | a preliminary discourse; a preface or introductory part of a discourse, poem, or novel |
| pun | the humorous use of a word or phrase so as to emphasize or suggest its different meanings or applications, or the use of words that are alike or nearly alike in sound but different in meaning; a play on words |
| quatrain | a quatrain is a four line stanzas of any kind, rhymed, metered, or otherwise |
| repartee | a succession or interchange of clever retorts : amusing and usually light sparring with words |
| revenge tragedy | form of Elizabethan and Jacobean drama in which revenge provides the mainspring of the action |
| rhetorical devices | technique that an author or speaker uses to evoke an emotional response in the audience |
| rhetorical question | a rhetorical question is a figure of speech in the form of a question posed for rhetorical effect rather than to receive an answer |
| sarcasm | stating the opposite of an intended meaning especially in order to sneeringly, slyly, jest or mock a person, situation or thing |
| scansion | describing the rhythms of poetry by dividing the lines into feet, marking the locations of stressed and unstressed syllables, and counting the syllables |
| scenes | a division of a play or of an act of a play, usually representing what passes between certain of the actors in one place |
| setting | the surroundings or environment |
| Shakespearean sonnet | a 14-line verse form usually having one of several conventional rhyme schemes |
| skene | the background building which connected the platform stage, in which costumes were store |
| simile | a comparison using “like” or “as” |
| situational irony | irony of a situation is a discrepancy between the expected result and actual results when enlivened by "perverse appropriateness" |
| soliloquy | a reflective monologue given by a character when he or she is alone on the stage |
| Spenserian sonnet | rhyme scheme is, a-b a-b, b-c b-c, c-d c-d, e-e. |
| spondee | two stressed syllables |
| spoonerism | a play on words in which corresponding consonants, vowels, or morphemes are switched. They’re commonly heard as slips of the tongue resulting from unintentionally getting one's words in a tangle, they are considered a form of a pun |
| stasimon | a stationary song, sung after the chorus has taken up its station in the orchestra |
| style | result of a successful blending of form with content. Suggests objective presentation, formal structure, and clear yet ceremonious language |
| symbol | an arbitrary sign (written or printed) that has acquired a conventional significance |
| syntax | the study of the rules for the formation of grammatical sentences in a language |
| terza rime | a verse form of Italian origin consisting of tercets of 10 or 11 syllables with the middle line rhyming with the first and third lines of the following tercet |
| theme | a unifying or dominant idea, motif, etc., as in a work of art |
| thesis | a proposition stated or put forward for consideration, esp. one to be discussed and proved or to be maintained against objections |
| tone | quality or character of sound or work |
| tragedy | a drama or literary work in which the main character is brought to ruin or suffers extreme sorrow, especially as a consequence of a tragic flaw, moral weakness, or inability to cope with unfavorable circumstances |
| tragic flaw | a flaw in the character of the protagonist of a tragedy that brings the protagonist to ruin or sorrow |
| tragic irony | dramatic irony in tragic drama |
| trochee | a foot of two syllables, a long followed by a short in quantitative meter, or a stressed followed by an unstressed in accentual meter |
| turn | to change or alter the course of; divert |
| understatement | to state or represent less strongly or strikingly than the facts would bear out; set forth in restrained, moderate, or weak terms |
| verbal irony | a figure of speech in which what is said is the opposite of what is meant |
