D's And E's Literary Terms

Question 1

Dialogue

Answer 1

a conversation carried on between two or more people in a literary work; dialogue can serve many purposes, including characterization, advancement of the plot, development, of the theme(s), and creation of mood

Question 2

Epiphany

Answer 2

a moment of enlightenment in which underlying truth or essential nature of something is suddenly revealed or made clear to a character

Question 3

Exposition

Answer 3

in fiction, the narrative passages that establish the basic details or the story, including setting, time, and characters (the background information)

Question 4

Ellipsis

Answer 4

deliberate omission of a word or words readily implied

Question 5

Epanalepsis

Answer 5

opening and closing a sentence with the same word or phrase for surprise emphasis

Question 6

Diction

Answer 6

word choice

Question 7

Euphemism

Answer 7

the substitution of a mild or less negative word or phrase for a harsh or blunt one

Question 8

Epithet

Answer 8

characterizing and sometimes abusive word or phrase

Question 9

Dialect

Answer 9

variety of language spoken by a social group or spoken in a certain locality that differs from the standard speech in pronunciation, vocabulary, and grammatical from

Question 10

Denotation

Answer 10

dictionary meaning

Question 11

Eye rhyme

Answer 11

rhyme in which two or more words look the same and are spelled similarly but have different pronunciation

Question 12

Euphony

Answer 12

smooth, pleasant sounding choice and arrangement of sounds

Question 13

Dactyl

Answer 13

a three-syllable metrical foot consisting of a stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables

Question 14

End-stopped line

Answer 14

a line of poetry that contains a complete thought, usually ending with a period, colon, or semicolon, and therefore ends in a full pause; the opposite of a run-on line

Question 15

Enjambment

Answer 15

the employment of run-on lines of poetry, whereby the meaning of the statement is carried from one line to the next without a pause

Question 16

Elegy

Answer 16

a lament or a sadly meditative poem, sometimes written on the occasion of death; usually formal in language and structure and solemn or melancholy in tone

Question 17

Dirge

Answer 17

a funeral hymn; a slow, sad song, or musical composition expressing grief or mourning

Question 18

Epigram

Answer 18

a short poem that ends in a witty or ingenious turn of thought, to which the rest of the composition is intended to lead up

Question 19

Didactic

Answer 19

poetry whose purpose is to teach the reader some kind of lesson

Question 20

Epistle

Answer 20

a literary letter; formal composition written in the form of a letter addressed to a distant person or group of people. Unlike common personal letters, which tend to be conversational and private compositions, epistles are carefully-crafted works of literature, intended for a general audience

Question 21

Epigraph

Answer 21

a motto or quotation at the beginning of a book, poem, or chapter that usually indicates its theme

Question 22

Exposition

Answer 22

scenes that introduce the main characters and introduce the dramatic situation

Question 23

Declining action/return

Answer 23

the falling action of a drama; after the climax, before the denouement

Question 24

Denouement

Answer 24

the resolution of the plot of a literary work; the final unraveling of the complications of a plot; the word “denouement” is French for “unknotting” or “untying”

Question 25

Deus ex machina

Answer 25

a Latin term meaning “the god from the machine”; in ancient dramas, a god would often descent to the stage to rescue the protagonist fro doom; thus, this term is used to refer to any power, event, person or thing that comes in the nick of time to solve a difficulty