Literary Terms - Definitions


1. Allegory: - is a literary work that has an implied meaning.


2. Act: - is the major division of a drama.


3. Antithesis: -is contrast or polarity in meaning.


4. Allusion: -is a reference to an idea, place, person or text existing outside the literary work.


5. Auto-Biography: -is the history of one’s life written by one self.


6. Alliteration:-the repetition of a consonant in two or more words.


7. Ballad: -is a song which tells a story.


8. Biography: -is the history of a person’s life by one else.


9. Blank Verse: -Verses written in iambic pentameter without any rhyme pattern is called blank verse.


10. Comedy:-is a play written to entertain its audience ends happily.


11. Classical:-means any writing that conforms to the rules and modes of old Greek and Latin written.


12. Canto:-is a sub-division of an epic or a narrative poem comparable to a chapter in a novel.


13. Chorus:-is a group of singers who stand alongside the stage in a drama.


14. Catharsis:-is emotional release of pity and fear that the tragic incidences in a tragedy arouse to an audience.


15. Comic relief:-a humorous scene in a tragedy to eliminate the tragic effect from audience.


16. Couplet:-To lines of the same material length usually found in Shakespearean sonnet.


17. Catastrophe:-Catastrophe is the downfall of the protagonist in a tragedy.


18. Didactic:-is a literary work which aims at teaching and instructing it readers.


19. Dirge:-is a short functional terms.


20. Diction:-is the selection of words in literary work.


21. Dialect:-is the language of particular district; class or a group of people.


22. Dramatical Monologue:-In a poem when a single person speaks along with or without an audience is called drammatical monologue. 

.Example “My last Duchess”-----Browning.


23. Difference between drama and novel:-A drama is meant to perform whereas a novel is meant to read.


24. Difference between stanza and paragraph:-A stanza contains verses whereas a paragraph contains prosaic lines.


25. Epic:-is a long narrative poem composed on a grand scale and is exalted style. Example “Paradise Last”-------Milton.


26. Epilogue:-is the concluding part of a longer poem or a novel or a drama.


27. Fable:-is a brief story illustrating a moral.


28. Farce:-A form of low comedy designed to provoke laughter.


29. Foot:-A basic unit of meter.


30. Fiction:-A fiction is an imaginative narrative in prose e.g. Lord of the fly—by Golding.


31. Elegy is a poem mourning to the death of an individual or a lament for a tragic event.


32. Genre:-means category or types of literature-epic, ode, ballad etc.


33. Hyperbole:-An overstatement or exaggeration.


34. Image:-is the mental picture connected with metaphor, smile and symbol.


35. Limerick:-is a short poem of a five-line stanza rhyming aaba.


36. Lyric:-A lyric is a short poem expressing a simple mood. It is usually personal and musical e.g. Keats’s odes.


37. Linguistic:-is the scientific and systematic study of language.

38. Melodrama:-A highly sensational drama with happy ending. Example ‘The Spanish Tragedy’ –Kyd.


39. Metaphysical Poetry:-Meta means beyond and physical is related to body .


40. Mock-epic:-It is a long satirical poem dealing with a trivial theme. Example: “The rape of the lock”-Alexander Pope.


41. Metaphor:-A metaphor is an implicit comparison between two different things.


42. Metre:-The recurrence of similar stress pattern in some lines of a poem.


43. Novel:-is a long prose narrative fiction with plot characters etc.


44. Novelette:-is longer than a short story and shorter than a novel.


45. Ode:-is a long narrative poem of varying, line length dealing with serious subject matter.


46. Objectivity:-We have objectivity in a literary piece when the author focuses on an object from broadened point of view.


47. Octave:-is the firs part of Italian sonnet.


48. Oxymoron:-is apparently a physical contrast which oddly makes sense on a deeper level.


49. Prologue:-is the beginning part of a novel or a play or a novel.


50. Prose:-Any material that is not written in a regular meter like a poetry.


51. Prosody:-Prosody is the mechanics or grammar of verse.


52. Protagonist:-Protagonist is the main character in a literary work


53. Plot:-The arrangement of incidents is called plot.


54. Pun:-A pun is playing with words.


55. Periods of English literature:-The Anglo-Saxon, Middle English 

Renaissance, Restoration, Neoclassical Romantic, Victorian, Modern, Post-Modern.


56. Romanticism:-was a literary movement. It stands Opposite to reason and focuses on emotion.


57. Rhetoric:-Rhetoric is the art of persuasive argument through writing.


58. Symbol:-A symbol is anything that stands for something else.


59. Sonnet:-is a lyric poem consisting of fourteen rhymed lines dealing with a lofty theme.


60. Satire:-is ridiculing the vices and follies of an individual or a society with a corrective design. E.g. “The rape of the lock”---Pope.


61. Short-story:-A short story is a prose narrative considerable length. It is shorter than a novel.


62. Stanza:-is a group of verses having a rhyme scheme pattern.


63. Subjectivity:-We find subjectivity in a literary work in which the writer’s personal intrusion takes place.


64. Soliloquy:-It means speaking alone when in a play a character is found speaking alone on the stage it is called soliloquy.

65. Ballad= a kind of short narrative poem.


66. Blank verse= Having no rhyming end.


67. Blue print= final documents having received finished touches.


68. Canto= A subdivision of an epic or narrative poem.


69. Elegy= Song of lamentation.


70. Epic= Apoetry.


51. Prosody:-Prosody is the mechanics or grammar of verse.


52. Protagonist:-Protagonist is the main character in a literary work


53. Plot:-The arrangement of incidents is called plot.


54. Pun:-A pun is playing with words.


55. Periods of English literature:-The Anglo-Saxon, Middle English 

Renaissance, Restoration, Neoclassical Romantic, Victorian, Modern, Post-Modern.


56. Romanticism:-was a literary movement. It stands Opposite to reason and focuses on emotion.


57. Rhetoric:-Rhetoric is the art of persuasive argument through writing.


58. Symbol:-A symbol is anything that stands for something else.


59. Sonnet:-is a lyric poem consisting of fourteen rhymed lines dealing with a lofty theme.


60. Satire:-is ridiculing the vices and follies of an individual or a society with a corrective design. E.g. “The rape of the lock”---Pope.


61. Short-story:-A short story is a prose narrative considerable length. It is shorter than a novel.


62. Stanza:-is a group of verses having a rhyme scheme pattern.


63. Subjectivity:-We find subjectivity in a literary work in which the writer’s personal intrusion takes place.


64. Soliloquy:-It means speaking alone when in a play a character is found speaking alone on the stage it is called soliloquy.

Ballad= a kind of short narrative poem.


Blank verse= Having no rhyming end.


Blue print= final documents having received finished touches.


Canto= A subdivision of an epic or narrative poem.


Elegy= Song of lamentation.


Epic= A long poem


Epilogue= A poem or speech at the end of play.


Epitaph= words that are said about dead person.


Eulogy= Speech or writing i praise of a person.


Fairy talk= folk literature.


Fantacy = an imaginary story.


Hymn=song praise of god.


Jargon= A mixture of two or more language .


Lyric= A poem that could be sung.


Opera= A musical drama.


Parody= Imitation of a poem or writings.


Sonnet= A poem of fourteen lines. long poem


Epilogue= A poem or speech at the end of play.


Epitaph= words that are said about dead person.


Eulogy= Speech or writing i praise of a person.


Fairy talk= folk literature.


Fantacy = an imaginary story.


Hymn=song praise of god.


Jargon= A mixture of two or more language .


Lyric= A poem that could be sung.


Opera= A musical drama.


Parody= Imitation of a poem or writings.


Sonnet= A poem of fourteen lines.

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