English literary terms

Point of View

Narrator…… the person who tells a story

First-person narrator……. a narrator who uses first-person pronouns, “I” or “we”

   First-person observer…… if the story is told from the periphery of the action

   First-person participant…… if the narrator is in the midst of the action

Unreliable narrator…… if we have reason to doubt the information; for example, if the narrator is naïve or dim-witted or mentally handicapped or dishonest or extremely prejudiced

Third-person narrator…… when the narrator is not a character

   Omniscient…… if there is no limit to what the third-person narrator knows, if they can eavesdrop on the minds of characters and reveal their unspoken thoughts

   Limited omniscience…… if there are limits to the narrator’s omniscience; for example, if the narrator can tell us the thoughts of only one character but not the thoughts of others

(Interior monologue)…… when the reader witnesses the story through the character’s mind

Character

Protagonist…… the main character of a story, the person you would say the story is about

Dynamic characters…… characters who change

Static characters…… characters who do not change

Antagonist…… a character who opposes or impedes the protagonist; not all stories have a character who is an antagonist

Sympathetic character….. characters who appeal to us and have our good wishes

Foil*…… a character who contrasts with another character, usually the protagonist, to highlight qualities of the other character

Plot

In media res…… when a story’s narration begins in the middle of the plot arc; literally, “in the middle of things”

Flashbacks…… a jump back in the narration to an earlier point in the story arc

Equilibrium…… a state of relative order and calm in the protagonist’s life; if you rearrange the incidents of the story into chronological order, every story begins here

Complication…… a disruption to the equilibrium/status quo that introduces the story’s conflict

Conflict…… a struggle between the protagonist and some other person (the antagonist) or force; *common categories of conflict = person vs. person, person vs. nature, person vs. society, person vs. self 

Rising action…… events in the story that raise the tension in the conflict to a breaking point

Climax…… the point in a story where the conflict is decided

Resolution/denouement…… after the climax, a new situation of equilibrium is established

Reversal…… a reversal of fortunes for the protagonist (one possibility in the denouement)

Epiphany…… a dramatic personal insight that comes upon the protagonist suddenly

Setting

Atmosphere/mood…… can be established by the description of setting; the emotional state the writer wants you to be in while you read the story

Projection…… when the writer projects the emotions of the character onto the setting; a window into the emotional state of a character

Enveloping action…… when the setting alludes to events in the world beyond the little circuit of the characters; the drama of the protagonist’s story is surrounded by a larger drama involving all society

Symbolism

Symbol…… an object (or action, or event) that represents something else, sometimes another object but more often an abstract idea

Literary symbol…… an object with symbolic meaning limited to the context of a particular work of literature

Allegory…… when characters or objects in a story have a one-to-one correspondence with whatever they represent; all the characters/objects participate in a web of symbolism

Motif

Motif…… an image, object, character, situation, theme, even a word that the writer uses repeatedly throughout a work

Theme...... what the story is about on an abstract level, those generalized issues dramatized in or embodied by the literal level

Meaning…… what a story has to say about its theme(s)

Interpretation…… your statement of what you think the story means