G-L Flashcards
the largest category for classifying lit-erature—fiction, poetry, drama. See kind and subgenre
genre
an unrhymed poetic form, Japanese in origin, that contains seventeen syllables arranged in three lines of five,
seven, and five syllables, respectively.
haiku
the leading male/female character, usually larger than life, sometimes almost godlike. See antihero, protagonist,
and villain
hero/heroine
rhymed pairs of lines in iambic pentameter.
heroic couplet
a line of poetry with six feet: “She comes, | she comes | again, | like ring | dove frayed | and fled” (Keats, The Eve
of St. Agnes).
hexameter
humor that employs subtlety, wit, or the representation of refined life. See low (physical) comedy
high (verbal) comedy
overstatement characterized by exaggerated language.
hyperbole
a metrical foot consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one.
iamb
a metrical form in which the basic foot is an iamb and most lines consist of five iambs; iambic pentameter is the
most common poetic meter in English: “One com | mon note | on ei | ther lyre | did strike” (Dryden, “To the
Memory of Mr. Oldham”)
iambic pentameter
broadly defined, any sensory detail or evocation in a work; more narrowly, the use of figurative language to
evoke a feeling, to call to mind an idea, or to describe an object.
imagery
a textual organization that mirrors as exactly as possible the structure of something that already exists as an
object and can be seen
imitative structure
the guiding personality or value system behind a text; the implied author is not necessarily synonymous with the
actual author.
implied author
language that is not as lofty or impersonal as formal diction; similar to everyday speech. See colloquial diction,
which is one variety of informal diction.
informal dictation
a kind of short story in which a character—often but not always a child or young person—first learns a
significant, usually life-changing truth about the universe, society, people, himself or herself.
initiation story
“in the midst of things”; refers to opening a story in the middle of the action, necessitating filling in past details
by exposition or flashback.
in medias res
a situation or statement characterized by a significant difference between what is expected or understood and
what actually happens or is meant. See cosmic irony, dramatic irony, and situational irony.
irony
see Petrarchan sonnet
Italian sonnet
a species or subcategory within a subgenre; initiation story is a subcategory of the subgenre short story.
kind
a light or humorous verse form of mainly anapestic verses of which the first, second, and fifth lines are of three
feet; the third and fourth lines are of two feet; and the rhyme scheme is aabba.
limerick
a perspective pinned to a single character, whether a first-person-or a third-person-centered consciousness, so
that we cannot know for sure what is going on in the minds of other characters; thus, when the focal character
leaves the room in a story we must go, too, and cannot know what is going on while our “eyes” or “camera” is
gone. A variation on this, which generally has no name and is often lumped with the omniscient point of view, is
the point of view that can wander like a camera from one character to another and close in or move back but
cannot (or at least does not) get inside anyone’s head and does not present from the inside any character’s
thoughts.
limited point of view
the evaluative or interpretive work written by professional interpreters of texts. It is “criticism” not because it is
negative or corrective, but rather because those who write criticism ask hard, analytical, crucial, or “critical”
questions about the works they read.
literary criticism
a figure of speech that emphasizes its subject by conscious understatement. An example from common speech is
to say “Not bad” as a form of high praise.
litotes
humor that employs burlesque, horseplay, or the representation of unrefined life. See high (verbal) comedy
low (physical) comedy
originally, a poem meant to be sung to the accompaniment of a lyre; now, any short poem in which the speaker
expresses intense personal emotion rather than describing a narrative or dramatic situation.
lyric
