Lit Terms 61-80

61. farce: A kind of comedy that depends on exaggerated or improbable situations, physical disasters, and sexual innuendo to amuse the audience. Many situation comedies on television today might be called farces. Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, Brandon Thomas’ Charley’s Aunt, Woody Allen’s Bullets Over Broadway

62. figurative language: Unlike literal expression, figurative language uses figures of speech such as a metaphor, simile, metonymy, personification, hyperbole. Figurative language appeals to one’s senses.

63. first person: Point of view (POV) is vital to all works of literature---prose and poetry. A character in the story tells the story, using the pronoun I. This is a limited point of view since the narrator can relate only events that he or she sees or is told about.

64. flashback: Interruption of a narrative by the introduction of an earlier event or by an image of a past experience.

65. flat character: A simple one dimensional character who remains the same, and about whom little or nothing is revealed throughout the course of the work. Flat characters may serve as symbols of types of people, similar to stereotypical characters.

• Mrs. Micawber in Dickens’ David Copperfield, is the ever- loyal wife who repeatedly says “I neverwill desert Mr. Micawber.”

• Mme. Ratignolle is portrayed as a Mother Earth figure throughout Kate Chopin’s The Awakening.

• Tom Buchanan in The Great Gatsby- morally

66. foil: A character whose contrasting personal characteristics draw attention to enhance, or contrast with those of the main character. A character who, by displaying opposite traits, emphasizes certain aspects of another character. For example, Tybalt serves as Romeo’s foil.

67. foot: the basic unit used in the scansion or measurement of metrical verse. A foot usually contains one accented syllable and one or two unaccented syllables.

68. foreshadowing: Foreshadowing hints at what is to come. It is sometimes noticeable only in hindsight, but usually it is obvious enough to set the reader wondering.

69. free verse: poetry that does not have regular rhythm or rhyme.

70. genre: The category into which a piece of writing can be classified- poetry, prose, drama. Each genre has its own conventions and standards.

71. hamartia: a tragic flaw

72. heroic couplet: In poetry, a rhymed couplet written in iambic pentameter (five feet, each with one unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable). Alexander Pope used this form almost exclusively in his poetry: “The bookful blockhead, ignorantly read,/ With loads of learned lumber in his head.”

73. hubris: Insolence, arrogance, or pride. In Greek tragedy, the protagonist’s hubris is usually the tragic flaw that leads to his or her downfall.

74. hyperbole: An extreme exaggeration for literary effect that is not meant to be interpreted literally.

75. iambic pentameter: A five foot line made up of an unaccented followed by an accented syllable. It is the most common metric foot in English-language poetry.

“When I have fears that I may cease to be/ Before my pen has gleaned my teeming brain.” (John Keats)

76. imagery: Anything that affects or appeals to the reader’s senses: sight, sound, touch, taste, or smell.

77. in medias res: In literature, a work that begins in the middle of the story.

The Odyssey, Medea, and Oedipus Rex all begin in medias res.

78. interior monologue: A literary technique used in poetry and prose that reveals a character’s unspoken thoughts and feelings. An interior monologue may be presented directly by the character, or through a narrator. (See also stream of consciousness)

79. internal rhyme: A rhyme that is within the line, rather than at the end. The rhyming may also be within two lines, but again, each rhyming word will be within its line, rather than at the beginning or end.

80. inversion: A switch in the normal word order, often used for emphasis or for rhyme scheme.