Terms Flashcards
Allegory
A form of extended metaphor in which the objects, persons, places and
actions in a narrative are equated with meanings outside the narrative itself
Alliteration
the repetition of initial sounds in successive or neighboring words
Allusion
a figure of speech that makes brief reference to a historical or literary figure,
event, or object
Anachronism
assignment of something to a time when it was not in existence
Analogy
A comparison of two things that are alike in certain aspects. Often used to use
something familiar to explain the unfamiliar
Antithesis
A figure of speech characterized by strongly contrasting words, clauses,
sentences, or ideas. It is the balancing of one term against another.
Archetype
an image, a descriptive detail, a plot pattern, or a character type that occurs
frequently in literature, myth, religion, or folklore
Asyndeton
omission of connecting words in a list
Anaphora
the same expression (word or words) is repeated at the beginning of two or
more lines
Apostrophe
the speaker addresses a dead (or absent) person or an abstraction or
inanimate object – it provides the speaker an opportunity to think aloud
Verse
metrical language (writing using a meter); the opposite of prose
Meter
the measurable repetition of accented and unaccented syllables in poetry
Prose
the ordinary form of spoken or written language, without metrical structure; not
poetry
Structure
The internal organization of a poems content
Form
The external pattern or shape of the poem, describable without reference to its
content
