| A | B |
|---|
| Act | A division within a play, like a chapter of a novel |
| Scene | A part of an act in a play – action takes place in a single place without a break in time |
| Chorus | A person or group who act as a narrator, commentator, or audience |
| Comedy | A drama, usually humorous, that has a happy ending for the main characters |
| Tragedy | A drama that depicts the downfall of a hero, usually because of his or her own actions |
| Tragic hero | A protagonist who experiences a downfall that is partly of his or her own making |
| Stage directions | Comments in a script that give further direction for the staging and acting of a play |
| Soliloquy | Thoughts spoken aloud by a character when he or she is alone (or thinks this is the case) |
| Monologue | A long speech spoken by a character to himself, another character, or the audience |
| Foil | A character designed to contrast with another character |
| Drama | A work designed to be performed for an audience |
| Cast of characters | List of characters depicted in a play |
| Aside | Lines spoken by a character to an audience – other characters don't hear |
| Allusion | A reference, often to myth or history, that invites a reader to make connections |
| Comic relief | Humorous action and dialogue that engages the audience and lightens the mood in a tragedy |
| Extended metaphor | A metaphor (direct comparison–no "like" or "as"–extended over a number of lines |
| Foreshadowing | Hints that foretell what will happen later (the outcome) |
| Verbal irony | A character speaks with meanings beneath the literal surface of the words—the listener may miss the deeper meaning. |
| Dramatic irony | A speaker says something ironic without realizing it because the audience knows what the character does not. |
| Irony of Situation | A situation ironically turns out differently from what was expected. |
| Motif | Imagery that recurs throughout a work—like images of light and dark in the play |
| Oxymoron | A two-word apparent contradiction |
| Paradox | An apparent contradiction that contains a truth, unfolded in more than two words. |
| Personification | Figurative language that gives human qualities to something that isn't human. |
| Pun | A play on words that sound alike – Mercutio's forté |
| Sonnet | A 14-line poem written in iambic pentameter, with a set rhyme scheme |
