Literary Terms and Concepts Glossary

Literary Terms and Concepts

Poetry

TB page 256

• Meter: Systematic arrangement of stressed/unstressed syllables.
• Foot: One stressed and one or more unstressed syllables.

TB page 407

• Exact Rhyme: Two or more words with identical sounds.
• Slant Rhyme: Two or more words with similar sounds.
• Paradox: A statement that seems contradictory but actually presents the truth.

Literary Devices

TB page 270

• Parable: A story that teaches a moral lesson.
• Ambiguity: Uncertain meaning in a story created by using a symbol with different interpretations.

TB page 364

• Figures of Speech: Language used imaginatively, but not literally.
• Synecdoche: The use of a part of something to stand for the whole.

Literary Movements and Schools

Gothic Literature (TB page 291)

Five Elements of Gothic Literature:

• Bleak/remote settings
• Macabre/violent incidents
• Characters in psychological/physical torment
• Supernatural elements
• Strong language/dangerous meanings

American Romanticism

Five Features of American Romanticism:

• Individualism
• Imagination
• Emotion
• Nature
• Distant settings

Four Characteristics of American Romanticism:

• People were naturally benevolent.
• The mind was a tabula rasa at birth.
• Individuals are corrupted by institutions that seek to dehumanize them.
• People worth highlighting are those closest to nature.

Noble Savage: A man born in an "uncivilized" context, yet pure at heart and faithful to the true and honest cause of his people.

Realism

Realism: "The faithful representation of reality" or "verisimilitude." Realism is a literary technique practiced by many schools of writing.

Naturalism

Naturalism: Constituted a variation of the realism themes, although authors aligned their creativity with scientific and rational views of the world.

Modernism

Modernism: The artistic movement in which the artist's self-consciousness about questions of form and structure is prominent.

Four Aspects of Modernism:

• Dramatization of the plight of women
• Creation of a literature of the urban experience
• Continuation of the pastoral or rural spirit
• Continuation of regionalism and local color

Vocabulary

TB page 256

• Efface: If I could efface all of my sad memories, I would be a very happy person.
• Eloquence: His sermons were not remarkable for eloquence, but a certain solidity and balance of judgment.
• Pensive: We were pensive as we tried to figure out what was occurring.

TB page 270

• Pathos: His fervor and dramatic action held them spellbound, and his homely pathos soon broke down all barriers of resistance.
• Obstinacy: The heroic obstinacy of the defense was equal to the perseverance of the attack.

TB page 291

• Munificent: Akbar was a munificent patron of literature. (TB page 376: Dilapidated: Preserved)
• Specious: This argument is rather specious than logical. (TB page 376: Expedient: Reluctant)
• Sentience: Without one, she had existed in a state of sentience without feeling, a world of permanent grey. (TB page 376: Magnanimity: Cruelty)

TB page 334

• Inarticulate: Speechless (TB page 407: Surmised: Always knew)
• Inscrutable: Incomprehensible (TB page 407: Interposed: Removed)
• Prescient: Visionary

TB page 364

• Dictum: Informal rule
• Aversion: Preference (TB page 407: Apprised: Misinformed)
• Absolve: Condemn

TB page 478

• Maledictions: Damnation (TB page 506: Deference: Disrespect)

TB page 506

• Decorum: Shame (TB page 506: Aggregation: Separation)
• Disdainfully: Respectfully