English vocab

Allegory

Story, picture, or other piece of art that uses symbols to convey a hidden or ulterior meaning, typically a moral or political one.

Eg. Animal Farm

Alliteration

A series of words that begin with the same consonant sound.
Eg: She sold sea shells by the sea shore; Peter Piper Picked a Peck of Pepper

Analogy

A comparison/similarity between 2 things for the purpose of clarification or explanation.

Anecdote

A short, interesting, or amusing story about a real incident or person.

Eg: A teacher shearing a story about a student who overcame challenges to illustrate perseverance.

Aphorism

A concise statement that expresses a general truth or observation.

Eg: Actions speak louder than words

Archetype

a primordial image, character, or pattern of circumstances that recurs throughout literature and thought consistently enough to be considered a universal concept or situation.

Eg: the hero; the villain; the mentor

Augustan

Refers to the literary period during the 18th century, often associated with satire, wit, and classical ideals. Named after the Roman emperor Augustus.

Eg: A satirical mock-epic, like Alexander Pope's The Rape Lock, which humorously portrays high society with classical references and sharp wit "What dire offence from am' rous causes springs, what mighty contests rise from trivial things"

Ballad

A type of narrative poem or son that tells a story, often quatrains with a rhyme scheme of ABAB.

Eg: "In Scarlet town, where I was born, there was a fair maid dwellin', Made every youth cry a well-a-way! Her name was Barbara Allen"

Blank verse

Poetry that doesn't rhyme but has a consistent rhythm, usually with 10 syllables per line (called iambic pentameter).

Eg: "Tomorrow, tomorrow, and tomorrow, creeps in this petty pace from day to day"

Caesura

a pause or break within a line of poetry, often marked by punctuation.

Eg: "To be or not to be, I pause I that is the question"

Classicism

A style in literature, art, and architecture that draws on the principles of ancient Greece and Rome, focusing on order, clarity, and balance.

Eg: "Of man's first disobedience, and the fruit of that forbidden tree whose mortal taste brought death into the world, and all our woe..." (This reflects *** because it focuses on order, restraint, and themes drawn from ancient Greek and Roman ideals, with formal language.)

Cliché

An overused expression or idea that has lost its originality or impact.

Eg: At the end of the day...

Conflict

A struggle between opposing forces in a story, which drives the plot.

Eg: "Two households, both alike in dignity, in fair Verona, where we lay our scene, from ancient grudge break to new munity...". (This scene from Romeo and Juliet highlights the central conflict between the Montagues and Capulets, whose feud drives the tragic plot.)

Connotation

The implied or associated meaning of a word, beyond its literal meaning.

Eg: The word "Home" connotates warmth, safety, and family, beyond just being a place to live.

Consonance

The repetition of consonant sounds in close proximity, especially at the end of words.

Eg: Pitter-Patter or The ship has sailed to the far off shores

Deism

Denouement

Deus Ex Machina

Dialect

Dialogue

Diction

Elegy

Epic

Epiphany

Fable

Foil

Frame story

Foot

Free verse

Haiku

Harlem Renaissance

Allusion

brief reference to a person, event, or place (real or fictitious) or to a work of art, often without explicit mention.

Eg: He met his Waterloo. (Alluding to Napoleon's defeat at Waterloo.)

Couplet

Two consecutive lines of poetry that typically rhyme and have the same meter.

Eg: "The time is out of joint, O cursed spite / that ever I was born to set it right!"

Antithesis

A rhetorical device where 2 opposing ideas are placed side by side in parallel structure to highlight contrast.

Eg: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times"

Imagery

Descriptive language that evokes sensory experience and creates vivid mental pictures.

In Media Res

A narrative technique where a story begins in the middle of the action, often at a critical point.

Irony

A literary technique where the intended meaning is opposite to the literal meaning, often highlighting a discrepancy between expectation and reality.

Kenning

A compound expression in Old English and Old Norse poetry with metaphorical meaning, often used to describe a person or thing.

Maxim

A succinct expression of a general truth or principle, often a proverb.

Metaphor

A figure of speech that makes a direct comparison between two unrelated things, suggesting they are alike in a significant way.

Mixed metaphor

A combination of inconsistent or incongruous metaphors within a single expression, often leading to a silly or humorous effect.

Metonymy

A figure of speech in which a thing or concept is referred to by the name of something closely associated with it.

Moral tale

A story that conveys a moral lesson, often featuring characters whose actions illustrate right and wrong.

Motif

A motif is a repeated pattern—an image, sound, word, or symbol that comes back again and again within a particular story.

Ode

A lyrical poem expressing emotion or praise, often dedicated to a person or event.

Onomatopoeia

a literary device that uses the letter sounds of a word to imitate the natural sound emitted from an object or action.

Oxymoron

figure of speech that combines contradictory words with opposing meanings (e.g. clearly confusing; deafening silence)

Modernism

Literary movement that emerged in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It was characterized by a rejection of traditional writing styles and a desire to express the new sensibilities of the time.

Neoclassicism

Style of writing that imitates the style of Ancient Greece and Rome. It was a reaction to the Rococo style and was popular in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.

Paradox

Parody

Pastoral

Postmodernism

Proverb

Rationalism

Realism

Rhyme

Rhythm

Satire

Sestet

Simile

Stanza

Suspense

Tercet

Theme

Tragedy