Honors English 9 - Final - Literary Terms

External Conflict

A problem, antagonism, or struggle that takes place between a character and an outside force.

Internal Conflict

A character’s psychological or emotional struggle within their own mind.

Characterization

The representation of traits, motives, and psychology of a character in a narrative.

Theme

A universal idea, lesson, or message explored throughout a work of literature.

Main Idea

The most important or central thought, what the text is about, what the author wants the reader to take from the text.

Symbol/Symbolism

An object, person, place, or idea that represents something else, often something abstract or complex.

Tone

The general character or attitude, it conveys the author’s feelings towards the subject.

Personification

A type of figurative language in which non-human things are described as having human attributes.

Metaphor

A figure of speech that compares two different things by saying that one thing is the other (no like or as).

Extended Metaphor

A metaphor that unfolds across multiple lines or even paragraphs of text, making use of multiple interconnected metaphors.

Simile

A figure of speech that directly compares two unlike things (using like or as).

Imagery

It refers to descriptive language that engages the human senses.

Understatement

A figure of speech in which something is less expressed strongly than would be expected.

Hyperbole

A figure of speech in which a writer or a speaker exaggerates for the sake of emphasis.

Anaphora

A figure of speech in which words repeat at the beginning of successive clauses, phrases, or sentences.

Allusion

An unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text (famous person, book, movie, shows, etc.).

Connotation

The array of emotions and ideas suggested by a word in addition to its dictionary definition (a secret feeling that a word gives, beyond its dictionary definition, like home versus house).

Denotation

The literal meaning or “dictionary definition” of a word.