10/7 Literary Terms Flashcards
Alliteration
The repetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of words.
Ex: Laugh, leaning back in my arms for life’s not a paragraph
Allusion
An indirect reference to something.
Characterization
The methods that a writer uses to develop characters.
Conflict
A struggle between opposing forces.
Diction
A writer’s or speaker’s choice of words and way of arranging the words in sentences.
Flashback
A conversation, episode, or event that happened before the beginning of the story.
Foreshadowing
A writer’s use of hints or clues to indicate events and situations that will occur later in the plot.
Hyperbole
A figure of speech in which the truth is exaggerated for emphasis or humorous effect.
Imagery
Descriptive words and phrases that recreate sensory experiences for the reader.
Irony
A special kind of contrast between appearance and reality–usually one in which reality is opposite from what it seems.
Metaphor
A figure of speech that makes a comparison between two things without using “like” or “as.”
Mood
In a literary work, the feeling or atmosphere that the writer creates for the reader is called the mood.
Oxymoron
A figure of speech in which apparently contradictory terms appear in conjunction.
(e.g., faith unfaithful kept him falsely true.)
Onomatopoeia
The use of words such as pow, buzz, and crunch whose pronunciations suggest their meanings.
Personification
A figure of speech in which human qualities are attributed to an object, animal, or idea.
