| A | B |
|---|
| characters | people and animals who are at the center of a story |
| figures of speech | lively or fresh expressions that vary the expected sequence of sense of words |
| imagery | words or groups of words that refer to any sensory experience |
| irony | the contrast between expectation and reality |
| plot | the arrangement of events in a story |
| conflict | struggle between opposing forces |
| internal conflict | a conflict within a person - struggle with decision or conscience |
| external conflict | a struggle between a person and an outside force |
| foreshadowing | hints or clues of events to come later |
| point of view | the angle from which the story is told |
| narrator | the one who tells the story |
| setting | the time and place of the action of the story |
| symbols | objects, actions or characters that hint at meanings beyond themselves |
| theme | the main insight(s) of a work of literature |
| simile | a comparison using like or as |
| metaphor | a comparison between two unlike things |
| personification | attributing human characteristics to nonhuman things |
| central conflict | primary conflict involving the protagonist and propels the action of the story |
| climax | the turning point of the action of a story |
| idiom | a group of words established by usage as having a meaning not deducible from those of the individual words (e.g., rain cats and dogs, see the light ) |
| hyperbole | extreme exaggeration for effect |
| personification | giving human characteristics to inanimate objects |
| understatement | deliberate downplaying for effect |
| denotation | dictionary definition |
| connotation | words associations |
| onomatapoeia | words that sound like their definition |
| anthesis | direct contrasts |
| rhetorical questions | questions that require no answer, but are used to make the reader think |
| tone | the writer's attitude toward his or her subject |
| mood | the overall feeling the writer creates for the reader |
| diction | words chosen by the writer |
| dialect | words chosen to represent a particular region or way or speaking |
