Literary Terms

Dipak Kumar Hazra

Literary Terms

Action : Action refers to events or incidents that occur in a literary work.

Adventure : Adventure is a remarkable or unexpected journey, experience, or event that a person participates in as a result of chance.

Allegory : An allegory is a story within a story. It has a “surface story” and another story hidden underneath. For example, the surface story might be about two neighbors throwing rocks at each other’s homes, but the hidden story would be about war between countries.

Alliteration : Alliteration is a figure of speech based on sound in which consonant sounds in two or more neighboring words or syllables are repeated to make a melodious effect. For an example "She sells sea shells on the sea shore."

Allusion : Allusion is basically a reference to something else. In literature, allusion is frequently used by the writers. For example, if someone says “he was acting like a modern-day Romeo,” they are making an allusion to Shakespeare’s play “Romeo and Juliet,” in which Romeo is a passionate and tragic young lover.

Ambiguity : Ambiguity is an idea or situation that can be understood in more than one way. For an example - "I saw a man on the hill with a telescope," because it's unclear if the man is holding the telescope or if the person is using the telescope to see the man.

Analogy : An analogy is a literary technique. It is a comparison between things that have similar features. For example, "A teacher is like a good captain". Unlike a simile or a metaphor, an analogy is not a figure of speech, though the three are often quite similar. An analogy is for explanation, whereas a metaphor is for expression.

Anaphora : Anaphora is a figure of speech in which a certain word or phrase is repeated at the beginning of clauses or sentences especially for rhetorical or poetic effect. For an example "To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield."

Antagonist : In a story, the antagonist is the opposite of the protagonist, or main character. Typically, this is a villain of some kind, but not always! It’s just the opponent of the main character.

Antithesis : Antithesis literally means “opposite” – it is usually the opposite of a statement, concept, or idea.

Archaism : An archaism is an old word or expression that is no longer used.

Assonance : Assonance is a figure of speech based on sound in which vowel sounds in two or more neighboring words or syllables are repeated to make a melodious effect. For an example "The rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain."

Autobiography : 'Auto' means 'self', 'Bio' means 'life' and 'graph' means 'print or written'. An autobiography is a self-written life story.

Bathos : Bathos is a literary device that creates a sudden often humorous, shift from a serious or grand topic to a trivial or ordinary one.

Buzzword : A buzzword is a word or expression that has little meaning but becomes popular during a specific time.

Ballad : Ballads are almost always narrative poems. A ballad is a song or poem that tells a story. Samuel Taylor Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner is one of the best examples of a ballad.

Bildungsroman : A literary genre that focuses on the psychological and moral growth and change of the protagonist from childhood to adulthood. For an example David Copperfield by Charles Dickens.

Cacophony : Cacophony means unpleasant mixture of loud, rough and harsh sounds. Cacophony is considered the opposite of euphony which is the use of beautiful, melodious-sounding words.

Caesura : Caesura refers to a break or pause in the middle of a line of verse.

Catharsis : Catharsis is the process of releasing strong emotions, such as anger or sadness, to achieve a sense of relief or healing.

Character : A character is a person, animal, being, creature, or thing in a story.

Characterization : Characterization or characterisation is the representation of characters in narrative and dramatic works.

Chiasmus : Chiasmus is a figure of speech in which words, grammatical constructions, or concepts are repeated in reverse order. For an example - "It's good to be lucky, but it's lucky to be good."

Climax : Climax is the highest point of tension or action in a narrative’s plot.

Consonance : Consonance is the repetition of similar consonant sounds in words, creating a rhythmic effect. For an example - "He struck the clock with a quick flick.

Comedy : Comedy is a broad genre of film, television, and literature in which the goal is to make an audience laugh with a happy or cheerful ending.

Comic Relief : The meaning of Comic Relief is a relief from the emotional tension especially of a drama. Comic relief is used to break tension. Authors use humorous characters, clever dialogue, and funny scenes to create comic relief.

Dialogue : Dialogue means “conversation.” Dialogue is the exchange of spoken words between two or more characters in a book, play, or other written work.

Drama : In literature, drama is defined as a genre or writing style. Drama is a play often performed on theater, radio, or television.

Dystopia : A dystopia is a horrible place where everything has gone wrong. Whereas utopia means a perfect paradise, dystopia means exactly the opposite.

Dialect : A dialect is a form of the language that is spoken in a particular part of the country or by a particular group of people.

Dilemma : A situation in which you have to make a difficult choice between two or more things.

Dramatic Monologue : A dramatic monologue is a literary form where a single character speaks uninterruptedly to reveal their thoughts, feelings, and a critical situation to an implied or absent listener, who is not the reader.

Enjambment : Enjambment is a poetic technique that involves continuing one line from a poem onto the next line or stanza without punctuation.

Epigram : A short poem or phrase that expresses an idea in a clever, amusing witty, paradoxical or funny way.

Epistrophe : Epistrophe is when a certain phrase or word is repeated at the end of sentences or clauses. Epistrophe is also known as epiphora and antistrophe. For an example - "See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil"

Epitaph : An epitaph is a short statement about a dead person, often carved on his/her tombstone. The phrase "here lies one whose name was writ in water" is the epitaph on the gravestone of English Romantic poet John Keats.

Epithet : An Epithet is a glorified nickname. Traditionally, it replaces the name of a person and often describes them in some way. For an example - "Man's best friend" (for a dog)

Essay : An essay is a short piece of writing on a specific topic that presents the author's point of view, argument, or exploration of an idea, supported by evidence and examples.

Etymology : Etymology is the study of the origin and history of words, including their evolution over time and how their meanings change.

Euphemism : A euphemism is a figure of speech that replaces a harsh, direct, or unpleasant term with a milder, more indirect and polite expression. An example of euphemism in the Lucy poems is the phrase "She ceased to be" from "\"She Dwelt among the Untrodden Ways\"" which avoids directly stating the harshness of death.

Excursus : An excursus is a moment where a text moves away from its main topic.

Elegy : A poem or song that expresses sadness, especially for somebody who has died. For an example - Thomas Gray's "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard"

Ellipsis : The act of leaving out a word or words from a sentence deliberately, when the meaning can be understood without them. Three dots (…) used in place of a word or words to show that they have been left out deliberately.

Epilogue : A short piece that is added at the end of a book, play, etc. and that comments on what has gone before. The epilogue for She Stoops to Conquer is a short speech spoken by the character Miss Hardcastle (as Mrs. Bulkley) after the play's conclusion.

Fable : In literature, a fable is a short story that teaches a lesson or moral and that often has animals as the main characters.

Fantasy : Fantasy is a literary genre that uses magic and other supernatural or magical elements to tell a story, often in a fictional world.

Farce : A farce is a comedy in which everything is absolutely absurd. This usually involves some kind of deception or miscommunication.

Figures of Speech : A figure of speech is a word or phrase using figurative language—language that has other meaning than its normal definition.

Flashback : Flashback is a device that moves an audience from the present moment to the past.

Folklore : Folklore refers to the tales people tell. Folklore is typically passed down by word of mouth, rather than being written in books. The key here is that folklore has no author – it just emerges from the culture and is carried forward by constant retelling.

Foreshadowing : Foreshadowing gives the audience hints or signs about the future.

Foreword : A foreword is an introductory section of a book written by someone other than the author.

Genre : The meaning of Genre is a category of artistic, musical, or literary composition characterized by a particular style, form, or content.

Haiku : A haiku is a specific type of Japanese poem.

Hamartia : A fatal flaw or crucial error that leads to the downfall of a tragic hero or heroine.

Homophone : Homophone is when two or more words have the same sound, but different meanings.

Horror : In literature, horror is a genre of fiction whose purpose is to create feelings of fear, dread and terror in the audience.

Hyperbaton : Hyperbaton is a figure of speech in which the typical, natural order of words is changed as certain words are moved out of order.

Hyperbole : Hyperbole is a figure by which things are represented as much greater or lesser, better, than they really are. Hyperbole has two aspects: (1) Overstatement (2) Understatement. When we speak more of a thing, it is an Overstatement; when we speak less of a thing, it is an Understatement.

Hubris : Hubris means extreme or excessive pride or dangerous overconfidence.

Idiom : An idiom is a phrase that conveys a figurative meaning different from the words used.

Imagery : Imagery is language used to create images in the mind of the reader.

Innuendo : A remark or remarks that suggest something unpleasant but do not refer to it directly.

Irony : The definition of Irony as a literary technique or rhetorical device is a situation in which there is a contrast between expectation and reality. Types of Irony - 1.Verbal Irony is a figure of speech in which a person says or writes one thing and means another, or uses words to convey a meaning that is the opposite of the literal meaning. 2.Irony of Situation or Incident is the Irony of something happening that is very different to what was expected. 3. Dramatic irony, also known as tragic irony, is a irony when the audience seems to know more about an event, a situation, or a conversation than the characters do.

Iambic Pentameter : Iambic pentameter is a rhythmic pattern in poetry and verse that has ten syllables per line, with an alternating pattern of unstressed and stressed syllables.

Jargon : Jargon is the specific type of language used by a particular group or profession.

Juxtaposition : Juxtaposition is the placement of two or more things side by side, often in order to bring out their differences. For example, in Charles Dickens' A Tale of Two Cities, the famous opening sentence, "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times," juxtaposes opposing ideas to set a tone of extreme contrasts and complex societal conditions.

Kairos : Kairos in Ancient Greek meant “time” – but it wasn’t just any time. It was exactly the right time to say or do a particular thing. In modern rhetoric, it refers to making exactly the right statement at exactly the right moment.

Limerick : A limerick is a five-line poem with a strict rhyme scheme (AABBA)

Literary Device : A literary device is a technique writers use to add depth, meaning, and emotional impact to their work, creating a specific effect beyond the literal interpretation of words.

Litotes : Litotes is an understatement in which a positive statement is expressed by negative statement. The classic example of litotes is the phrase “not bad.” By negating the word “bad,” you’re saying that something is good, or at least OK.

Metaphor : Metaphor is a comparison between two unlike things in a speech where the point of similarity is not clearly stated.

Metonymy : Metonymy is a figure of speech, it means 'change of names'. When we use the name of a thing for the name of another thing with which there is a certain relation, it is a figure of speech, named Metonymy. The word metonymy is derived from the Greek phrase 'metōnymía' meaning 'a change of name.' For an example - "He reads Tagore."

Monologue : A monologue is a speech given by a single character in a story.

Mystery : Mystery is a genre of literature whose stories focus on a mysterious crime, situation or circumstance that needs to be solved.

Melodrama : Melodrama is a story, play, or film in which the characters show stronger emotions than real people usually do.

Memoir : A historical account or biography written from personal knowledge.

Myth : A myth is a traditional story, often with supernatural elements, that explains natural phenomena, the history of a people, or the origins of a culture's beliefs and practices.

Melancholy : Melancholy is the feeling of sadness which lasts for a long time. Melancholy is a feeling and theme often found in literature, art, and film.

Narrative : A narrative is a story. The term can be used as a noun or an adjective. As a noun, narrative refers to the story being told. As an adjective, it describes the form or style of the story being told.

Nemesis : Nemesis refers to a punishment or defeat that somebody deserves and cannot avoid. Nemesis was the Greek goddess of vengeance, a deity who doled out rewards for noble acts and punishment for evil ones.

Neologism : Neologism is new word or phrase that is not yet used regularly by most speakers and writers.

Narrator : The person who tells a story or explains what is happening in a play, film, etc.

Nostalgia : Nostalgia is sentimental longing for the past, typically for a period or place with happy personal associations.

Ode : An ode is a type of lyric poem, that praises or glorifies a person, place, thing, or idea.

Onomatopoeia : Onomatopoeia is a figure of speech that uses words to describe the sounds made by all living things including people, animals, birds and all inanimate objects. Example includes animal sounds like "meow" and "buzz," nature sounds like "splash" and "crackle," mechanical sounds like "beep" and "clang," and human sounds like "giggle" and "cough".

Oxymoron : An oxymoron is a figure of speech that combines two words that seem to be the opposite of each other. For an example - "horrible beauty".

Plot Twist : A plot twist is a narrative technique that introduces an unexpected change in the outcome of a story.

Polysyndeton : Polysyndeton is the use of repeated conjunctions between words or clauses in a sentence. For an example - "She ran and jumped and laughed and danced."

Pseudonym : A name used by somebody, especially a writer, instead of their real name.

Palindrome : A palindrome is a word, phrase, number, or sequence that reads the same forwards and backwards. Examples include the words "level" and "madam"

Parable : A parable is a short story used to illustrate a moral or spiritual lesson.

Paradox : A paradox is a statement that contradicts itself, or that must be both true and untrue at the same time.

Parallelism : Parallelism, also known as parallel structure, is when phrases in a sentence have similar or the same grammatical structure.

Paraphrase : Paraphrase means expressing someone else's ideas in your own words without changing the original meaning.

Parody : A parody is a piece of writing, speech or music that copies the style of somebody/something in a funny way.

Pathetic Fallacy : The pathetic fallacy is a figure of speech in which Nature or inanimate objects of nature are made to behave like human beings or made to express the emotions and feelings of human beings.

Personification : When an abstract idea, or an inanimate object or an element of nature are made to behave like a living being, it is a case of Personification. Thus, Personification is a figure of speech in which human qualities and abilities are applied to nonhuman objects or ideas. For an example - "The clouds cried."

Pathetic fallacy and Personification : Pathetic fallacy and Personification are quite similar to each other. However, pathetic fallacy is a form of personification. Personification simply means giving human characteristics to animals or inanimate objects. Pathetic fallacy, on the other hand, focuses on endowing human emotions to inanimate objects, especially in the context of nature.

Persona /Poetic Persona : A poetic persona is the narrative voice or character that a poet uses to tell a poem, which is not necessarily the poet themselves.

Plot : A plot is the sequence of events that make up a story, whether ii is told, written, filmed, or sung.

Poetry : Poetry is a type of literature based on the interplay of words and rhythm.

Prologue : A prologue is a short introductory section that gives background information or sets the stage for the story to come.

Prose : Prose is just non-verse writing. Prose is a writing style that doesn't follow a structure of rhyming or meter but a structure arranged into sentences and paragraphs.

Protagonist : Protagonist is just another word for “main character.” The story circles around this character. In a story, the Protagonist is the opposite of the antagonist.

Proverb : A proverb is a short saying or piece of folk wisdom.

Pun : A pun is a figure of speech that includes a play of words that have more than one meaning.

Rhyme Scheme : A rhyme scheme is the pattern of rhymes at the end of each line of a poem or song.

Red Herring : A red herring is a misleading clue. It’s a trick used by storytellers to keep the reader guessing about what’s really going on.

Repetition : Repetition is a literary device in which a word or phrase is used multiple times to create rhythm or emphasize a word or phrase.

Rhetoric : Rhetoric refers to the study and uses of written, spoken and visual language. It means the art of speaking or writing effectively.

Rhetorical Device : A rhetorical device is a technique used in language to convey meaning or create an emotional effect beyond the literal meaning of words.

Rhetorical Question : A rhetorical question is a question that is not asked in order to receive an answer, but rather just to make a point.

Romance : A romance or romantic novel is a genre fiction novel that primarily focuses on the relationship and romantic love between two people, typically with an emotionally satisfying and optimistic ending.

Romantic Comedy : A romantic comedy is a literary and dramatic genre that blends elements of romance and humor, focusing on the development of a love relationship.

Story : A story or narrative is a connected series of events told, written or spoken through words.

Synesthesia : In literature, synesthesia is a figure of speech where one sensory experience is described using words that typically relate to another sense. For an example - "Loud dress"

Sarcasm : The use of words or expressions to mean the opposite of what they actually say.

Satire : Satire is the use of humor, irony, sarcasm, or ridicule to criticize something or someone.

Setting : Setting is the time and place (or when and where) of the story. It may also include the environment of the story.

Simile : Simile is a comparison between two unlike things in a speech where the point of similarity is clearly stated. For an example - "Your are as brave as a lion."

Soliloquy : A soliloquy is a speech delivered by a character who is alone on stage or who believes themselves to be alone.

Sonnet : A sonnet is a 14-line poem with a specific rhyme scheme and structure, traditionally written in iambic pentameter.

Style : Style is the way in which an author writes and/or tells a story.

Symbol : A symbol is any image or thing that stand for something else.

Synecdoche : A synecdoche is figure of speech in which a part is made to represent the whole. For an example - "All hands on deck!" – "Hands" refers to the entire sailors.

Synonym : A synonym is a word that has the same or nearly the same meaning as another word.

Synopsis : A synopsis is a brief summary that gives audiences an idea of what a composition is about.

Tragedy : Tragedy is a literary genre where a central character, often a heroic figure, experiences a downfall due to a personal flaw or a series of misfortunes.

Theme : In literature, a theme is the main idea, central message that is explored in a narrative work, such as a novel or poem.

Thriller : A thriller is a genre of literature, film, and television whose primary feature is that it induces strong feelings of excitement, anxiety, tension, suspense and dear.

Tone : In literature, tone is the author's attitude toward the subject, which is conveyed through their word choice, sentence structure, and style.

Wit : Wit is a biting or insightful kind of humor.

Zeugma : Zeugma is when you use a word in a sentence once, while conveying two different meanings at the same time.