Novels Flashcards
Style
Writers use many, many different techniques to attract reader interest and
attention or to accomplish their literary purpose in short stories, novels, poems and plays
Antithesis
The use of contrast, or opposition, for effect. In creative writing,
antithesis is a rhetorical device where a sentence or two contains a balanced
contrast of ideas, so either the two halves of a single sentence, or the two
sentences placed side-by-side, show complete contrast for powerful effect. For
example, “Give me liberty ,or give me death!”
Chronological Order
Writers often choose to describe plot events in
chronological order, meaning the events happen one after another and are not told
in a mixed-up way. With a chronological approach, first things first, second things
second, and so on…
Diction
An author’s choice and arrangement of words in a literary work.
Diction varies according to the ends a writer wishes to achieve as well as to the
nature of the literary form, the subject, and the style of the day. The ornate style
of much eighteenth-century prose, therefore, was considered elegant in its time
but would be deemed wordy in a contemporary essay
Direct Presentation
Writers who provide information directly to their readers
are using direct presentation. Readers can locate specific information about a
character, for example, by finding it right in the text
Indirect Presentation
Writers often choose indirect presentation in order to
inform their readers about their characters or other story elements. Indirect
presentation of information requires readers to use their inference skills, as the
specific information is shown rather than told to the reader.
Irony
Verbal, Situational, and Dramatic
Verbal irony
occurs when the opposite of what is said is actually meant
(sarcasm is an extreme form of verbal irony).
Situational irony
occurs when an event occurs that is the opposite of what
was expected by the character and/or readerA
Dramatic irony
is when a character says something, but the
audience/reader knows more than the character does about other
characters or events, so the statement comes across with a double meaning
that the audience/reader “gets” and the character doesn’t
Narration
Something that is narrated—an account, a story, a novel–is a
narration. Actually telling the story via the process of narrating is also narration,
so “narration” is a verb as well as a noun.
Narrator
The teller of the story or the person speaking in the story
Paradox
A statement, person, or situation that seems to be contradictory or
opposed to common sense; it is an unusual pairing of non-matching (incongruous)
ideas. Authors use paradox to provoke insight, so while a paradoxical statement
appears to contradict itself, it often, on closer examination, reveals a truth. In
Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, for example, Juliet paradoxically refers to Rome
as her “only love, sprung from [her] only hate.” “The child is the father of the
man” (William Wordsworth) is also a paradoxical statement.
Satire
A style of writing that has the goal of mocking or scorning an individual,
an institution, or society as a whole. Angry and bitter satire is called Juvenalian
satire while gentle mockery is called Horatian satire.
Sarcasm
When a character (or person) uses verbal irony to express bitter or
angry feelings about something. The reverse of what is meant is said. For
example, a person might say, “That’s an act of genius!” when he really means it is
the act of a fool.
