Dictionary of Literary Terms - Unit 1? Flashcards
Hypotaxis
Where the details of the plot are portrayed sequentially and explicitally.
Parataxis
Where only some details are portrayed, connections are not explicit.
Quatrain
4-lined stanza.
Enjambment
Where a line continues onto the next.
Repetition (example)
Again, again.
Personification
Where non-humans, are given human attributes (physical, emotional).
Rhyme (example)
Weather, together.
Internal Rhyme
Rhyme unbroken by a line.
Alliteration
Where separate words begin with the same sound.
Simile
Comparison including ‘I’ and ‘as’
1st Person
‘I’
2nd Person
‘You’
3rd Person
‘He’ ‘She’ ‘They’
Textual Self-reference
The text references textual stuff.
Hyperbole
Exaggerate Expression.
Chiasmus
Rearranging of words to become exact opposites.
eg. see the leaves, leaves the sea.
Polysemy
Words/phrases with multiple meanings.
Ekphrastic Poetry
Vivid description of an artwork.
Free Indirect Style
The phrase/passage could be read as belonging to the narrator or a charcter.
Metatextuality
Where the author/narrator reveals themselves and their actions/interactions. ie. Fourth wall break.
Intertextuality
Where a text references or inferences another text.
Indirect speech/dialogue
“Hi”
“Hi!”
Direct speech/dialogue
“Hi”, said Joe
Interior Focalisation
Where a character’s thoughts are represented in the text. “I’m hungry”, thought Alvoli.
Metre
How many syllables per line?
Tone
How is it read?
Consonance
Consonant sounds in alliteration “bees knees.”
Assonance
Where separate words have (at any point) with same sound “bees knees.”
Anaphora
Starts with the same word/phrase:
No more, I wept,
No more, she stood.
Epistrophe
Ends with the same word/phrase:
I wept, no more
She stood, no more.
Aposiopesis
Where speech or thought is cut off, often with a -
Iamb
Da dum.
Trochee
Dum da.
Epistolary Form
A story/book comprised of letters.
Limited Omniscience
The narrator/storyteller doesn’t know everything about/in the story.
Stream of Conscience
Thoughts fall onto the page.
Aphorism
A statement of some general principle expressed memorably by condensing to a few words.
eg. ‘Give a man a mask and he will tell you the truth.’
Epigram
A short poem with a witty turn of thought, or a wittily condensed expression of prose.
eg. Preface for ‘The Painting of Dorian Grey.’
Apophasis
The declaration you will not define something, then proceed to define it.
eg. I will not define apophasis.
Bildungsroman
A coming of age story.
Ellipses
…
Gothic
Morbid. Overtly dark themes or settings. Usually with a hint of death.
Hypen vs Dash
Hyphen brings 2 things together, and dashes separate them.
Italics
Slanty writing. Emphatic writing.
Sibilance
Repeated ‘s’ sound.
eg. she sold seashells by the seashore.
Mimesis
To show.
Diegesis
To tell.
High Romanticism - Period
1790 - 1850
High Romanticism - Movement
People
- Wordsworth (The Solitary Reaper)
- Coleridge
- Keats
Definition
- ‘Spontaneous overflow of powerful feeling’ - William Wordsworth
- Away from Enlightenment obsession with reason
Ideals
- Love
- Hope
- Beauty
High Romanticism - Style
- Natural analysis
- Metaphor
- Hyperbole
- Odes
- Sonnet
- Lyrical ballads
Gothic Romanticism - Period
- 1810-1830,
- 1880-1940
Gothic Romanticism - Movement
People
- R.L. Stevenson
- Stoker
- Mary Shelly
- Edgar Allan Poe (The Raven)
Definition
- ‘Spontaneous overflow of powerful feeling’ - William Wordsworth
- Away from Enlightenment obsession with reason
Ideals
- Love
- Hope
- Beauty
Gothic Romanticism - Style
- Novel
- Epistolary
- Grotesque
- Medievalism
The Fantastic/Uncanny - Period
1810-1900
The Fantastic/Uncanny - Movement
People
- ETA Hoffman (Sandman)
- Gogol? (possible, depending on how you interpret ‘The Overcoat’)
Critic
- Sigmund Freud
Definition
- Incredible events can be explained as the products of the narrator’s or protagonist’s dream, hallucination, or delusion.
The Fantastic/Uncanny - Style
Gothic with a psychological focus
Realism - Period
1850-1914
Realism - Movement
Definition
- Away from the idealism of romanticism.
- Towards presentation of others, especially common experience.
People
- Moby Dick
- Tolstoy (The Death of Ivan Ilyich)
- Charles Dickens
Realism - Style
- Prose
- Description
- Expressive
- Experience as a time
Bush Realism - Period
1850-1914
Bush Realism - Movement
Definition
- Away from the idealism of romanticism.
- Towards presentation of others, especially common experience.
People
- Henry Lawson (The Drover’s Wife)
Bush Realism - Style
- Prose
- Description
- Expressive
- Experience as a time
Social Realism - Period
1890-1914
Social Realism - Movement
Definition
- Presentation of lives, especially common experiences in social, political or economic circumstances.
People
- Charlotte Perkins Gilman (The Yellow Wallpaper)
Social Realism - Style
Aims to display the short comings of society in order to compel improvement.
Naturalism - Period
1870-1914
Naturalism - Movement
People
- Emile Zola
- Jack London (To Build a Fire)
- Charles Darwin
Definition
- A style and theory of representation based on the accurate depiction of detail.
Naturalism - Style
Scientific process; determinism as opposed to romanticism, objectivity.
Aestheticism - Period
1880-1900
Aestheticism - Movement
People
- Oscar Wilde (Preface, The Picture of Dorian Grey)
- Dante Rosetti
- Whistler
Critic
- Wilde
- William Morris
Description
- Art should be made because art is beautiful
- No other reason is required.
Aestheticism - Style
Peacocks and a mix of Western and Eastern Styles
Aestheticism - Style
Peacocks and a mix of Western and Eastern art forms.
Impressionism - Period
1870-1914
Literary Impressionism - Period
1880-1920
Impressionism - Movement
Definition
- Saves painting especially after the invention of photography.
People
- Monnet
- Van Gough (post impressionism)
Literary Impressionism - Movement
Definition
- A concentration on the perceptions of characters and authors rather than external descriptions.
Impressionism - Style
- Sense of movement
Literary Impressionism - Style
In Prose
- Limited omniscience
- Free indirect style
- Interior focalisation
- Defamiliarisation
- Symbolism
In Poetry
- Physiologies
- Emotional
- Intertextuality
- Experiential
- Fervent
- Short
- Direct
Hope is the Thing with Feathers - Emily Dickinson
- 1861 (Period)
- Transcendentalism (doubt this is going to come up as the ism, don’t worry about remembering it too much)
- Metaphor and Symbolism (Style)
The Solitary Reaper - William Wordsworth
- 1807 (Period)
- High Romanticism (Movement)
- Hyperbole and alliteration (Style)
The Raven - Edgar Allan Poe
- 1845 (Period)
- Gothic Romanticism (Movement)
- Alliteration, internal rhyme, repetition, and onomatopoeia (Style)
The Sandman - ETA Hoffman
- 1816 (Period)
- The Fantastic/Uncanny (Movement)
- Strongly narrated and generally rewriting mythology, fairytale and literature and devising fantasy worlds (Style)
The Overcoat - Nikolai Gogol
- 1842 (Period)
- Realism or Romanticism (Movement)
- Conspiratorial, familiar, conversational (Style)
The Drover’s Wife - Henry Lawson
- 1892 (Period)
- Bush Realism (Movement)
- Determined, contemplative, threatening, lonely, barren, melancholic, suspenseful (Style)
The Yellow Wallpaper - Charlotte Perkins Gilman
- 1892 (Period)
- Social Realism (Movement)
- Imagery, metaphor, simile, personification, repetition, and connotative diction. (Style)
To Build a Fire - Jack London
- 1908 (Period)
- Naturalism (Movement)
- Third-Person Omniscient POV (Style)
Preface, The Picture of Dorian Grey - Oscar Wilde
- 1890 (Period)
- Aestheticism (Movement)
- Metaphor, simile, personification, symbol, exaggeration and parallelism (Style)
The Flowers of Evil - Charles Baudelaire
- 1857 (Period)
- Impressionism (Movement)
- Symbolism, contrast, and foreshadowing. (Style)
The Bet - Anton Checkov
- 1889 (Period)
- Impressionism (Movement)
- Concise two-part story structure, ample metaphors and similes, and frequent foreshadowing. (Style)
Street Haunting - Virginia Woolf
- 1927 (Period)
- Impressionism + Art Writing (Movement)
- People watching, escapism, individuality, urban anonymity (Style)
Allegory
- Sustained metaphor
- ‘the story behind the story’
- Literal
- Overt meaning
