Ap Literature & Composition

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Apostrophe

A figure of speech in which someone absent or dead or something nonhuman is addressed as if it were alive and present.

Connotation

What a word suggests beyond its basic definition; a word's overtones of meaning.

Denotation

The basic definition or dictionary meaning of a word.

Ekphrasis

The poetic representation of a painting or sculpture in words.

Epigram

A short, witty poem expressing a single thought or observation; a concise, clever, often paradoxical statement.

Extended figure

A figure of speech (usually metaphor, simile, personification, or apostrophe) sustained throughout a poem.

Juxtaposition

Positioning opposites next to each other to heighten the contrast.

Metaphor

A figure of speech in which an implicit comparison is made between two things essentially unlike.

Metonymy

A figure of speech in which some significant aspect or detail of an experience is used to represent the whole experience.

Onomatopoeia

The use of words that supposedly mimic their meaning in their sound (for example, boom, click, plop).

Personification

A figure of speech in which human attributes are given to an animal, an object, or a concept.

Rhythm

Any wavelike recurrence of motion or sound.

Sentimentality

Unmerited or contrived tender feeling; the quality in a story that elicits tears through oversimplification.

Simile

A figure of speech in which an explicit comparison is made between two things using the words like, as, than, similar to, resembles, or seems.

Synecdoche

A figure of speech in which a part is used for the whole.

Syntax

Word organization and order.

Alliteration

The repetition at close intervals of the initial consonant sounds of accented syllables or important words.

Anapest

A metrical foot consisting of two unaccented syllables followed by one accented syllable.

Anapestic meter

A meter in which a majority of the feet are anapests.

Approximate rhyme

Words in a rhyming pattern that have some kind of sound correspondence but are not perfect rhymes.

Assonance

The repetition at close intervals of the vowel sounds of accented syllables or important words.

Ballad meter

Stanzas formed of quatrains of iambs with specific stress patterns.

Blank verse

Poetry with a meter, but not rhymed, usually in iambic pentameter.

Consonance

The repetition at close intervals of the final consonant sounds of accented syllables or important words.

Couplet

Two successive lines, usually in the same meter, linked by rhyme.

Dactyl

A metrical foot consisting of one accented syllable followed by two unaccented syllables.

Dactylic meter

A meter in which a majority of the feet are dactyls.

End rhyme

Rhymes that occur at the ends of lines.

End-stopped line

A line that ends with a natural speech pause, usually marked by punctuation.

Enjambment

A line which has no natural speech pause at its end, allowing the sense to flow into the next line.

English (or Shakespearean) sonnet

A sonnet rhyming ababcdcdefefgg, structured into three quatrains and a concluding couplet.

Feminine rhyme

A rhyme in which the stress is on the penultimate syllable of the words.

Foot

The basic unit used in the scansion or measurement of verse.

Free verse

Nonmetrical verse arranged in lines with no fixed metrical pattern.

Half rhyme

Consonance on the final consonants of the words involved.

Heroic couplet

Poems constructed by a sequence of two lines in iambic pentameter.

Iamb

A metrical foot consisting of one unaccented syllable followed by one accented syllable.

Iambic meter

A meter in which the majority of feet are iambs.

Internal rhyme

A rhyme in which one or both of the rhyme-words occur within the line.

Italian (or Petrarchan) sonnet

A sonnet consisting of an octave rhyming abbaabba and a sestet using additional rhymes.

Masculine rhyme

A rhyme in which the stress is on the final syllable of the words.

Meter

Regularized rhythm; an arrangement of language in which the accents occur at equal intervals.

Octave

An eight-line stanza, or the first eight lines of a sonnet.

Perfect rhyme

A rhyme where the later part of the word is identical sounding to another.

Pentameter

A metrical line containing five feet.

Quatrain

A four-line stanza; a four-line division of a sonnet.

Refrain

A repeated word, phrase, line, or group of lines in a poem.

Rhyme

The repetition of an identical or similarly accented sound or sounds in a work.

Rhyme scheme

Any fixed pattern of rhymes characterizing a whole poem.

Scansion

The process of measuring verse by marking accented and unaccented syllables.

Sestet

A six-line stanza or the last six lines of a sonnet structured on the Italian model.

Spondee

A metrical foot consisting of two syllables equally or almost equally accented.

Stanza

A group of lines whose metrical pattern and rhyme scheme is repeated throughout a poem.

Syntax

The arrangement of words to form phrases, clauses, and sentences.

Terza Rima

A three-line stanza form borrowed from Italian poets, with rhyme scheme aba, bob, cdc.

Tetrameter

A metrical line containing four feet.

Trimeter

A metrical line containing three feet.

Triple meter

A meter in which a majority of the feet contain three syllables.

Trochaic meter

A meter in which the majority of feet are trochees.

Trochee

A metrical foot consisting of one accented syllable followed by one unaccented syllable.

Genre

A category of literature distinguishable by style, form, or content.

Ballad

A narrative folk song tracing back to the Middle Ages, often created by common people.

Elegy

A type of literature expressing sorrow or lamentation, usually for someone who has died.

Epic

A long poem about the exploits of heroic figures, often originating from oral tradition.

Lyric

A song-like poem mainly to express feelings or emotions from a particular person.

Narrative poem

A poem that tells a story, which can come in many forms and styles.

Ode

Usually a lyric poem of moderate length, with a serious subject, an elevated style and an elaborate stanza pattern.

-A lyric poem praising people, the arts, natural scenes, or abstract concepts.

Ex: Ode to the mets, Ode on a Grecian Urn

Sonnet

A fixed form of fourteen lines, typically in iambic pentameter, with a rhyme scheme conforming to or approximating one or two main types- the Italian or the English

-14 line poem that has a certain rhyme scheme and structure