Literary Terms Modern Texts

Question 1

Archetype

Answer 1

A character, action, situation or pattern that seems to represent a universal aspect or quality of human life

Question 2

Dialogue

Answer 2

Fictional conversation, words being spoken

Question 3

Foreshadow

Answer 3

To give an anticipatory indication, or to hint at what will follow later in the narrative

Question 4

Irony

Answer 4

The quality of an utterance or event which appeared to signify one thing but in fact convays a meaning other than the obvious

Question 5

Metaphor

Answer 5

Describing one thing as being another

Question 6

Mythic

Answer 6

Belonging to the myth, that is to stories that lay claim to truth behind the influence of historical circumstances

Question 7

Narrative

Answer 7

An account of events and actions or events and action that tell a story

Question 8

Narrator

Answer 8

Voice within a written account or story that communicated the account or story to its readers

Question 9

Oxymoron

Answer 9

A figure of speech which combines two apparently contradictory terms for example a wise fool

Question 10

Pastoral

Answer 10

Literally genre in which a simple way of life is compared favourably with a more complex way

Question 11

Realism

Answer 11

Set of conventions which enables representation of knowable communities and characters

Question 12

Romance

Answer 12

A narrative that departs from the dictates of reality as is known to common sense in order to evoke a magical world

Question 13

Tragedy

Answer 13

A play or other literary work depicting the downfall of its main character, due to an error of judgement, moral flaw or adverse circumstances

Question 14

Anecdote

Answer 14

Secret or unpublished narratives

Question 15

Archetype

Answer 15

A standard character Thor showing typical traits

Question 16

Byronic hero

Answer 16

Characteristically both glamorous and dangerous, haunted by guilt of mysterious crimes

Question 17

Destabilising

Answer 17

To make uncertain, to unsettle meaning

Question 18

Eponymous

Answer 18

Relating to or being the person or thing after which something is named

Question 19

Ideology

Answer 19

A set of beliefs about the world which seems both natural and inevitable

Question 20

Metaphysical

Answer 20

Visionary writing, generally associated with the seventeenth century, incorporeal, abstract

Question 21

Palimpsest

Answer 21

A text that is overwritten with other narratives and messages

Question 22

Parable

Answer 22

A story which explains something that cannot easily be deceived otherwise

Question 23

Pathetic fallacy

Answer 23

The attribution of human feelings to objects in nature and, commonly, weather systems, so that thew mood of the narrator or character can be discerned form the behaviour of he surrounding environment

Question 24

Pseudonym

Answer 24

An adopted name under which to write

Question 25

Semiotics

Answer 25

Study of signs and sign systems

Question 26

Symbolism

Answer 26

Invests material objects with abstract powers and meanings greater than their own. Allowing a complex idea to be represented by a single object

Question 27

Transcendent

Answer 27

Often synonymous with metaphysical - that which is beyond the limits of human knowledge; exceeding or surpassing the ordinary

Question 28

Ambivalence

Answer 28

The coexistence in one person of two different attitudes to the same object or wish