English Lit Devices Flashcards
“The sweet smells of heliotrope and night-scented stock.” –The Garden by Moonlight (Amy Lowell)
alliteration
"Those four black girls blown up in that Alabama church remind me of five hundred middle passage blacks..." --American History (Michael S Harper)
allusion
The character Iago, from Shakespeare’s play, Othello
antagonist
“Is she a Capulet?
O dear account! my life is my foe’s debt.”
–Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare)
conflict
“Three civil brawls, bred of an airy word,
By thee, old Capulet, and Montague,
Have thrice disturb’d the quiet of our streets…”
–Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare)
exposition
“Is it even so? then I defy you, stars!
Thou know’st my lodging: get me ink and paper,
And hire post-horses; I will hence to-night.”
—-Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare)
climax
“Poison, I see, hath been his timeless end:
O churl! drunk all, and left no friendly drop
To help me after?”
—-Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare)
denoument
“O brother Montague, give me thy hand:
This is my daughter’s jointure, for no more
Can I demand.”
—-Romeo and Juliet (Shakespeare)
resolution
"You stars that reign'd at my nativity, Whose influence hath allotted death and hell, Now draw up Faustus like a foggy mist Into the entrails of yon labouring clouds..." --Faustus (Christopher Marlowe) VS "Mother dear, may I go downtown Instead of out to play, And march the streets of Birmingham In a Freedom March today?" --Ballad of Birmingham (Dudley Randall)
blank verse
“The wind dug cunningly among the rootlets of the corn, and the corn fought the wind with its weakened leaves until the roots were freed…”
personification
conflict + climax + resolution = _
plot
Christian is the _ in The Pilgrim’s Progress
protagonist
Words at the end of poems often _
rhyme
A pattern of stressess; often found in poetry
rhythm
"What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up Like a raisin in the sun? Or fester like a sore-- And then run? Does it stink like rotten meat? Or crust and sugar over-- like a syrupy sweet? Maybe it just sags like a heavy load. Or does it explode?" --Harlem (Langston Hughes)
simile
