LITERARY/POETRY TERMS

Tone

The WRITER’S ATTITUDE toward his or her audience and subject. Can be described in a single adjective: formal, informal, serious, playful, bitter, ironic, etc.

Alliteration

When two or more words sound the same in a verse/sentence. It is a literary device that often enhances rhythm and can create a musical effect in poetry and prose.

Imagery

The use of figurative language (simile, metaphor, symbol, etc.) to create a mental image or appeals to the other senses.

Onomatopoeia

Words that sound like their meaning

Hyperbole

A deliberate exaggeration or overstatement, thats often used for comic effect.

Stanza

A group of verse (poetry) lines that make up a section of a poem.

Metaphor

a comparison that doesn't use like or as

Simile

a comparison using like or as

Mood

The feeling created IN THE READER by a work or passage. 

Mood is suggested by descriptive details.

Often mood can be described in a single word: lighthearted, frightening, depressing, etc.

Personification

giving human characteristics to non-humans

Allusion

A reference to a person, place, poem, book, event, ect., which is not part of the story, but that the author expects the reader will recognize.

Dramatic Irony

when the readers know more than the characters in the text.

Verbal Irony

when a character says one thing and means another.

Situational irony

when both the readers and the characters are surprised by an event in the text.

Metaphor

a comparison that doesn't use like or as

Oxymoron

A combination of words or parts of words that contradict each other. 

Ex: “deafening silence,” “honest thief,” “bittersweet” 

Symbol

A symbol is a person, place, thing or event that stands for both itself and something beyond itself in the story.

Tragedy

A serious play representing the disastrous downfall of a central character.

Tragic flaw

The defect of character that brings about the protagonist's downfall in a tragedy.

Motivation

The reason that explains why a character acts, thinks, or feels a certain way.