| A | B |
|---|
| An emphasis or stress on a syllable in speech | accent |
| A meter that uses the same number of strong speech stresses per line | accentual meter |
| a poem in which the first letters of each line spell out a word or name | acrostic |
| a narrative in which events mirror a parallel sequence of symbolic ideas | allegory |
| the repetition of consonant sounds | alliteration |
| a brief reference implying shared knowledge between reader and writer | allusion |
| examination of a piece in order to understand it | analysis |
| a metrical foot with two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed one | anapest |
| words or phrases set in deliberate contrast to one another | antithesis |
| A direct address to someone | apostrophe |
| a recurring symbol, character, landscape or event found in myth and literature across different cultures and eras | archetype |
| the repetition of two or more vowel wounds in successive words | assonance |
| a song that tells a story (usually in quatrains) | ballad |
| four lines rhymed abcb, in which the 1st & 3rd lines have four feet and the 2nd & 4th have 3 feet. | ballad stanza |
| anunintentional lapse from the sublime to the ridiculous or trivial | bathos |
| unrhymed poetry in lines of five iambic feet | blank verse |
| verse of 3-line stanzas in which the first 2 are identical, followed by a 3rd rhyming line | blues |
| a harsh discordant sound mirroring the meaning of the context in which it is used | cacophony |
| a pause within a line of verse | caesura |
| lyric poetry concerned with mortality and the passing of time | carpe diem |
| 2-line poetry starting with the name of a person, humorous and often insulting | clerihew |
| two rhymed lines containing a complete thought, with the 2nd line end-stopped | couplet |
| closed couplet in rhymed iambic pentameter | heroic couplet |
| A generic term describing poetry written in any pre-existing pattern | closed form |
| analysis using careful step-by-step explication of a poem | close reading |
| casual but correct language of ordinary native speakers | colloquial |
| highly regular ballad meter with rhyme scheme abab | common meter |
| placing two works together to point out their similarities | comparison |
| poetic device of elaborate comparison | conceit |
| visual poetry which uses letters and words to form an image | concrete poetry |
| a meaning a word, image, or phrase carries apart from its literal denotation or dictionary definition | connotation |
| rhyme in which linked words share similar consonant sounds but different vowel sounds | consonance or slant rhyme |
| placing two works side by side to point out their differences | contrast |
| any established feature or technique in literature that is commonly understood by both authors and readers | convention |
| literary symbols that have a conventional or customary effect on most readers | conventional symbols |
| a two-line stanza in poetry, usually rhymed, with lines of equal length | couplet |
| a metrical foot with one stressed syllable followed by two unstresesed syllables | dactyl |
| school which believes that literary texts have no single meaning. Concentration on how language is used | deconstructionist criticism |
| propriety or appropriateness of diction | decorum |
| the literal dictionary meaning of a word | denotation |
| word choice or vocabulary | diction |
| a variety of language spoken by a regional group or socal class | dialect |
| poetry intended to teach or instruct | didactic poetry |
| meter of two metrical feet per line | dimeter |
| crude, clichéd, obvious, inept verse | doggerel |
| situation in which the reader understands the meaning of the situation but the character does not | dramatic irony |
| a poem speech made by a character at a decisive moment | dramatic monologue |
| poetry written for the stage | dramatic poetry |
| a form in which final syllables are repeated back as a reply or commentary | echo verse |
| a lament or sadly meditative poem, often about death, usually formal | elegy |
| additionl information included at the end of a paper | endnote |
| rhyme that occurs at the ends of lines, rather than within them | end rhyme |
| a linen of verse that ends in a full pause | end-stopped line |
| a short summarizing stanza at the end of forms such as the sestina, chant royal, and French ballade | envoy |
| a long narrative poem telling the adventures of a legendary or mythic hero | epic |
| a short poem, ending with a sharp turn of meaning | epigram |
| a brief quotation preceding a poem | epigraph |
| a pleasing, harmonous effect between word sound and meaning | euphony |
| a full rhyme in which only the initial letters of the words are diffrent | exact rhyme |
| explaining an entire poem in detail | explication |
| A sonnet with rhyme scheme abab cdcd efef) followed by a couplet (gg) | English sonnet |
| rhyme in which spelling appears alike but pronunciation is different | eye rhyme |
| any meter with an accented first syllable (dactyl or trochee) | falling meter |
| a rhyme of two or more syllables with the last syllables unstressed | feminine rhyme |
| any expression or comparison which relies on connotation or suggestion (includes metaphor, metonymy, simile, synecdoche) | figure of speech |
| any traditional verse form with predetermined structure | fixed form |
| the unit of measurement in metrical poetry | foot |
| additional information at the foot of the page | footnotes |
| the way in which an artist expresses meaning | form |
| poetry made by arranging bits of prose from other sources | found poetry |
| poetry without meter | free verse |
| verse form with three unrhymed lines of 5, 7, and 5 syllables | haiku |
| verse meter with 7 feet | heptameter |
| verse meter with 6 feet | hexameter |
| overstatement to prove a point | hyperbole |
| metrical foot with an unaccented syllable followed by an accented one | iamb |
| meter with 5 iambic feet per line | iambic pentameter |
| a word or phrase referring to a sensory experience | image |
| the set of images in a work | imagery |
| a metaphor which uses neither connectives nor the verb to be | implied metaphor |
| a refrain whose words change slightly each time | incremental refrain |
| a refrain that appears within a stanza | internal refrain |
| rhyme within a line of poetry, rather than the end | internal rhyme |
| A writer saying one thing but meaning the opposite | irony |
| a discrepancy between words and meaning | verbal irony |
| events occurring to a character when he or she expects the opposite | situational irony |
| discrepancy between actions and results, between what is deserved and what results | irony of fate |
| sonnet with first 8 lines abba,abba, and final sestet in any pattern of rhymes except ending couplet | Italian sonnet |
| vulgate, colloquial, general, formal | levels of diction |
| short verse form of 5 anapestic lines aabba, 1-2-5 trimeter/3-4 dimeter | limerick |
| a short poem expressing the thoughts and feelings of a single speaker | lyric poem |
| a short secular song for several voices arranged in counterpoint | madrigal |
| rhyme of 1-syllable words or with the last syllable stressed | masculine rhyme |
| a statement that one thing is something else, which literally it is not | metaphor |
| a regular rhythmic pattern in verse | meter |
| figure of speech substituting the name of one thing for another associated with it | metonymy |
| a metaphor that trips over another metaphor | mixed metaphor |
| an extended speech by a single character | monologue |
| verse meter of one metrical foot | monometer |
| An element that recurs significantly throughout an artistic work | motif |
| A traditional narrative from a culture's oral narrative. | myth |
| four traditional modes of poetry | narrative, dramatic, lyric, and didactic |
| mode of poetry that tells a story | narrative |
| verse meter of 8 metrical feet | octameter |
| a stanza of eight lines, usually used to refer to the first section of a sonnet | octave |
| a literary device using a word sounding like the thing it describes | onomatopoeia |
| verse with no set formal scheme, always in free verse | open form |
| A brief, usually allegorical narrative that teaches a moral | parable |
| a self-contradictory statement that reveals deeper sense | paradox |
| arranging words or phrasis side by side in a similar grammatical or structural way | parallelism |
| restating in your own words | paraprase |
| a mocking imitation of a work or style | parody |
| verse meter of 5 metrical feet | pentameter |
| a fictitious character created by an author to be the speaker or narrator | persona |
| a figure of speech in which a nonhuman thing is given human characteristics | personification |
| Synonym for Italian sonnet | Petrarchan sonnet |
| An artificial word combining other words to express a combination of their qualities | portmanteau word |
| poetic language printed in prose paragraphs but with the characteristics of poetry | prose poem |
| The study of metrical structures in poetry | prosody |
| a play on words in which one word is substituted for another with similar sound but different meaning | pun |
| Meter constructed on the principle of vowel length | quantitative meter |
| stanza consisting of four lines | quatrain |
| spoken or chanted rhythmic music with a steady beat | rap |
| word or phrase repeated at intervals in a song or poem | refrain |
| two or more words that contain an identical or similar vowel sound, usually accented, with following consonant sounds identical | rhyme or rime |
| Any recurrent pattern of rhyme within an individual poem or fixed form, usually shown with small letters | rhyme scheme |
| the rhyme scheme abab | common or hymn meter |
| Teh pattern of stresses and pauses in a poem | rhythm |
| A meter which goes from an unstressed to a stressed syllable, such as iambic or anapestic | rising meter |
| A thirteen-line verse form of three stanzas rhymed with a refrain | rondel |
| line of verse not ending in punctuation, carrying on to the next line | run-on line or enjambment |
| bitter irony intended to hurt or mock | sarcasm |
| describing rhythmic patterns in poetry in terms of feet, syllables, accents, and pauses | scansion |
| tone that tries to convey great emotion but does not give reader grounds for sharing it | sentimentality |
| poem or stanza of six lines | sestet |
| complex verse form in which six end words are repeated in a prescribed order through six stanzas, followed by envoy | sestina |
| synonym for Shakespearian sonnet | English sonnet |
| A comparison of two things indicated by like, as, than, or resembles | simile |
| A rhyme in which final consonant sounds are the same but vowel sounds are different | slant rhyme |
| term for near, off, or imperfect rhyme | slant rhyme |
| monologue in which solitary character utters his thoughts aloud | soliloquy |
| poem of 14 lines, usu. iambic pentmeter. Either octave/sestet or 3 quatrain/couplet | sonnet |
| metrical foot of verse containing two stressed syllables | spondee |
| recurring pattern of two or more lines of verse | stanza |
| emphasis or accent plced on a syllable in speech | sress |
| All the distinctive ways in which an author or type of author uses language to create a literary work | style |
| a verse form with a pattern of syllables per line | syllabic verse |
| person, place or thing which has meaning beyond its literal sense | symbol |
| action whose significance goes well beyond its literal meaning | symbolic act |
| using part of a thing to stand for the whole of it (or vice versa) | synecdoche |
| a group of 3 lines of verse, usually ending in the same rhyme | tercet |
| a refrain that apepars at the end of each stanza of a poem | terminal refrain |
| verse form of 3-line stanzas with overlapping rhyme scheme (aba, bcb, cdc) | terza rima |
| verse meter of four metrical feet or stresses per line | tetrameter |
| the central thought of a poem | theme |
| the attitude toward a subject in a literary work | tone |
| figure of speech in which the poet attributes some characteristic of a thing to another thing associated with it | transferred epithet |
| verse meter of 3 metrical feet or stresses per line | trimeter |
| short lyric form of 8 rhymed lines with 2 opening lines repeated | triolet |
| metrical foot with stressed syllable followed by unstressed syllable | trochee |
| the opposite of hyperbole | understatement |
| any single line of poetry, or any composition in lines or more or less regular rhythm. Not prose | verse |
| synonym for free verse | vers libre |
| fixed form of six rhymed stanzas in which two lines are repeated in a prescribed pattern | villanelle |
| the lowest level of formality in language | vulgate |
