Literary Terms

Question 1

Allusion

Answer 1

A reference in a artistic work to another artistic work.

Question 2

Antagonist

Answer 2

The bad guy

Question 3

Ballad

Answer 3

A story poem, often sung aloud

Question 4

Beat movement

Answer 4

A group of American poets and artists whose expressions of alienation in the 1950’s became a calling card of the underground.

Artists: Ginsberg or Kerouac

Question 5

Blank verse

Answer 5

Non rhyming verse consisting of 10 lines

Question 6

Canto

Answer 6

A subdivision of an epic poem

Question 7

Classicism

Answer 7

Artistic movement aesthetically based on the Greeks and Romans

Question 8

Climax

Answer 8

The point of the story where the action peaks

Question 9

Couplet

Answer 9

Two rhyming lines of poetry in succession, often of a similar meter.

Question 10

Denouement

Answer 10

The conclusion or resolution following the climax

Question 11

Elegy

Answer 11

A poem of remembrance

Question 12

Existentialism

Answer 12

French philosophical idea where people live in an indifferent world and people must take responsibility for themselves.

Ex. Satre and Camus

Question 13

Allegory

Answer 13

Written word where ideas or morals are represented by individuals or things

Question 14

Genre

Answer 14

A category of work within art or letters, usually of a distinctive style.

Question 15

Haiku

Answer 15

A Japanese poem containing three lines and 17 syllables. (5-7-5).

Question 16

Irony

Answer 16

A literary style in which a situation is shown with the intent of representing its opposite.

Question 17

Lost generation

Answer 17

A group of expatriate writers and artists in Paris in the 1920’s centered around Gertrude Stein.

Ex. Hemingway and FitzGerald

Question 18

Metaphor

Answer 18

The comparison of two things in which one item represents another.

Question 19

Modernism

Answer 19

High intellectual movement whose goal was the examination of pure art.

Ex. Pound, Stein, Woolf.

Question 20

Motif

Answer 20

A recurring element or theme in an artistic work.

Question 21

Ode

Answer 21

A lyric poem of rigidly structured stanzas.

Question 22

Parable

Answer 22

A story depicting a message of moral or religious themes.

Question 23

Pathos

Answer 23

Evoking pity in a literary work.

Question 24

Realism

Answer 24

An artistic and literary style in which society and events are depicted as they appear in real life.

Question 25

Romantic Movement

Answer 25

Predominantly English movement in the 19th century whose basic belief was that passion should supersede logic and whose main opposition was Classicism.

Ex. Keats, Wordsworth, Byron, and Coleridge

Question 26

Restoration

Answer 26

The period of intensely active literary and artistic activity in England in 1660-1688 when Charles ll returned to the throne.

Question 27

Satire

Answer 27

A literary work which, through the use of irony, sarcasm, and wit, the absurd in humanity is brought to light.

Ex. Swift

Question 28

Sonnet

Answer 28

A verse of 14 lines and written in one of several rhyme schemes.

Ex. Shakespeare and Petrarch

Question 29

Stanza

Answer 29

One division within a poem, usually of commonly metered verse.

Question 30

Stream of Consciousness

Answer 30

A literary device in which a character’s thoughts emerge on the page as they occur.

Question 31

Transcendentalism

Answer 31

An American movement in which insight and experience took precedence over logic and reason and that held the belief that all things coexist in nature.

Ex. Thoreau and Emerson

Question 32

Victorian Age

Answer 32

19th century England, considered the height of the British industrial revolution and the apex of the British Empire. Characterized by rigid social manners and conservatism.

Ex. Dickens and Hardy.