Glossary

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Words (or words that have the same definition)	The definition is case sensitive	(Optional) Image to display with the definition [Not displayed in Glossary, only in pop-up on pages]	(Optional) Caption for Image	(Optional) External or Internal Link	(Optional) Source for Definition
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Glossary Entries
Word(s)	Definition	Image	Caption	Link	Source
Abstract	referring to ideas or concepts that we think with our minds
Action	the physical movements of actors
Actors	people performing a play
Allegory	a kind of story in which abstract concepts (such as love, war, or death) became objects, characters, or places in the story; usually didactic (meant to impart a lesson)
Alliteration	multiple words in a row which start with the same sound (vowel or consonant)
Allusion	an indirect reference, usually to another work, outside of the text, without explicitly naming the reference point
Anagnorisis	the scene of recognition in a Tragedy, as described in Aristotle’s Poetics
Analysis	the breaking apart of anything into its composite parts for close examination
Anapest	a metrical foot with two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed syllable
Annotated Bibliography	a tool to help you keep track of your research by creating a Works Cited page in which every source is summarized after the bibliographical entry
Antagonist	an opposing force to the protagonist
Anthropomorphism	imbuing a nonhuman entity with human behaviors or attributes
Antihero	a type of protagonist who may not have the moral uprightness required of a hero; this character usually elicits the sympathy of their audience, but may be morally unscrupulous in their methods
Archetype	an original pattern or model for a type of character, object, narrative, etc.
Audience	people viewing a play or reading a literary work
Ballad	a poem that tells a story and is written in quatrains, most commonly with an A B C B rhyme scheme; the first and third lines contain eight syllables, while the second and fourth lines contain six
Beat	a stressed syllable
Caesura	a pause or break within the line of a poem
Canonical	referring to a work that is officially decided to constitute literature, making it part of the Literary Canon (a collection of works that are considered by the powers that be to constitute literature)
Catharsis	the purgation of emotion, usually pity and fear, at the end of a play
Character	an imaginary personage who acts, appears, or is referred to in a story
Characterization	the strategies that an author uses to present and develop the characters in a narrative
Claim	an argument backed up with evidence that supports the idea
Classical Unities	in drama, the unities of action, time, and place
Climax	the turning point of a story; the incident that allows the main conflict of a story to resolve
Concrete	referring to specific, individual things we can feel with our five senses and that call an exact image into our mind’s eye
Conflict	the tension in a literary work created by opposition between one or more of the following: (1) protagonist vs. antagonist (2) protagonist vs. self (3) protagonist vs. environment (4) protagonist vs. society, or some other oppositional relationship
Connotation	the non-literal meaning we associate with words
Content	the message that is written in a literary work
Couplet	two adjoining lines of poetry which share an end rhyme
Creative Nonfiction	true stories that contain all of the literary adornments that fiction does (literary devices, skilled writing, etc.)
Crossed Rhyme	the rhyming of one word in the middle of a verse line with a word in the middle of the following line
Dactyl	a metrical foot with a stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables
Denotation	the dictionary definition of a word
Dénouement	the unraveling of a plot, a resolution to a story; in the dénouement, the central conflict is resolved
Dialogue	a conversation between two or more people
Diction	word choice
Double Rhyme	a rhyme on two syllables, the first stressed, the second unstressed
Drama	literature in which action is performed and all words are spoken before an audience by actors impersonating the characters
End Rhyme	rhyme occurring on stressed syllables at the ends of verse lines
End-stopped	when a line of poetry ends with a form of punctuation, or with a complete phrase
Enjambed	when a line of poetry does not end with punctuation
Evidence	in a literature essay, quotes or paraphrasing from authoritative primary or secondary sources, which supports the paragraph main idea, as well as the thesis main idea; usually, one quote or paraphrase per paragraph is an effective use of evidence
Exposition	the part of a story that introduces the setting and the main characters; the exposition also hints at the themes and conflicts that will develop later in the story
External Conflict	when two individuals or groups of individuals clash
Eye Rhyme	a visual-only rhyme; i.e. when spellings match but in pronunciation there is no rhyme
Falling Action	the events that take place after the climax of a story; these events show the results of the climax, and they act as a bridge between the climax and the dénouement
Fiction	a story invented from the imagination of a writer
Figurative Language	the use of words or expressions not meant to be taken literally
Flashback	a device used to give the reader background information that happened in the past
Focalisation	the perspective through which a narrative is presented
Foil	a character which, through juxtaposition, reveals something about another character; a kind of shadow character
Foot	each complete unit of stressed and unstressed syllables in a line of poetry
Form	how a literary work is arranged; the language used to send the message
Genre	a means of categorization for works of literature based on the style of writing; the most common genres of literature are creative nonfiction, fiction, drama and poetry
Hamartia	the “fatal flaw” which brings about the downfall of a tragedy’s hero
Hyperbole	an exaggeration for rhetorical effect
Iamb	the most common metrical foot in English with an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one
Iambic Pentameter	a style of poetic meter in which five sets of iambs (or ten syllables) appear per line of poem
If-then Statement	a strategy for making inferences by establishing a cause-and-effect relationship
Imagery	descriptive, immersive details meant to paint a picture in the reader’s mind; the five kinds of description follow the five senses: auditory (sound), tactile (touch), gustatory (taste), olfactory (smell), and visual (sight)
Inciting Incident	the event that sets the main conflict into motion in a story
Inference	a conclusion you reach by applying logic to the evidence you are given
Internal Conflict	a struggle that takes place within an individual
Internal Rhyme	rhyme occurring within a single verse line
Internalized Setting	a setting in which an aspect of the story external to a character represents the character's internal development
Inverted Syntax	when writers disrupt the grammatical order of words in unusual ways
Irony	a meaning or outcome contrary to what is expected; the three types of irony are dramatic (when the reader or audience knows something characters don’t), situational (when a character holds a position or has an expectation that is reversed or fulfilled in an unexpected way), and verbal (when a speaker or narrator says one thing and means the reverse)
Kairos	the temporal and cultural context of a piece of rhetoric
Line	in poetry, one of the units of structure in verse; lines/rows work as both a unit of sensibility and music
Literary Critic	a person who studies and analyzes literature
Literary Criticism	scholarship produced by literary critics, such as articles analyzing literature
Literary Devices	literary techniques used by authors, such as metaphor, simile, personification, and imagery
Love Interest	a character who is a (potential) partner in love for the protagonist
Meme	an image or video containing cultural values or ideas, often represented through allusion
Messenger	a character who delivers news
Metaphor	the use of figurative language to describe one object using another for rhetorical effect, without using the words "like" or "as"
Meter	the rhythmical pattern of a poem, determined by stressed and unstressed syllables
Metonymy	when one thing is represented by another thing associated with it
Minor Character	a secondary or side character in a story who sometimes supports the protagonist or antagonist in their struggles
Monologue	when one character delivers a speech to convey his or her thoughts
Mood	the general feeling conveyed by a story
Motif	a recurring element in a story
Narrative	a story, an account of a series of related events or experiences
Narrator	the speaker of the story, who may be a character within the story or an objective, unnamed narrator; the perspective from which the story is told
Objectively	in an impartial manner, free of individual biases, interpretations, feelings, and imaginings
Ode	a poem written in praise of its subject
Omniscient Narrator	a narrator who has a God's eye view and can get into different characters' heads and perspectives, seeing the story in a way that would not be possible in real life
Para-rhyme	a form of half rhyme when all the consonants of the relevant words match, not just the final consonants
Pentameter	a line of five feet in poetry
Penultimate	second to last
Peripeteia	the reversal of fortune which occurs to a tragic hero
Personification	giving human qualities to animals or objects for the sake of imagery
Play	a work of literature which is meant to be performed by actors rather than simply read
Playwright	an author who writes plays
Plot	the events or action of a story, and the order in which the events are told
Poetry	patterned arrangement of language to generate rhythm and thereby both express and evoke specific emotions in a concentrated way
Prewriting	activities used by writers to get their ideas for writing
Props	articles or objects on a stage during a play that are sometimes symbolic
Prose Poem	a literary work that isn’t broken into verse but contains many of the elements of poetry: figures of speech, musical language, internal rhyme, repetition, condensed syntax, and imagery
Prosody	the musical component of language that projects the speaker’s voice and breath
Protagonist	the main character of a story, who is often but not always the hero of the story
Quatrain	a stanza of four lines
Reasonable Conclusion	an inference that is the result of reasoned thinking, not emotional reactions
Repetition	a powerful rhetorical device that involves intentionally using similar events in the plot, similar descriptions, or the same word or phrase multiple times
Revision	making changes to major elements in a paper and improving the overall argument
Rhetorical Devices	words that serve a special function in the text in order to convey meaning to the reader
Rhyme Scheme	the pattern of rhymes at the end of each line of a poem
Rhythm	patterns of sound caused by the way some words or syllables are stressed more than others in speech
Rising Action	a series of events that build up to the climax of a story by introducing secondary conflicts and creating tension in the story
Roundel	an English form of poetry consisting of eleven lines in three stanzas with no set meter; the first part of line one repeats at the end of the first stanza and again as the last line of poem, with a rhyme scheme of A B A R–B A B–A B A R (in which R stands for “refrain”)
Sets	the design, decoration, and scenery on a stage during a play
Setting	the place(s) where the action of the story or poem takes place
Simile	a figurative use of language in which one thing is compared to another using the words, similar to a metaphor except it uses the words “like” or “as”
Slant Rhyme	also known as a half rhyme, an incomplete form of rhyme in which final consonants match but vowel sounds do not
Soliloquy	a speech made by one character but delivered when he or she is alone on stage
Sonnet	a fourteen-line poem that contains a volta, or a turn in thought, which can sometimes be indicated with the words “but” or “yet”
Spondee	a two-syllable metrical foot that has two equally stressed beats
Stage	the physical space upon which actors move in a play
Stage Directions	written instructions in a script that inform how to stage, perform, or imagine a play
Stanza	a poem paragraph: that is, a poem may be divided into clumps of lines for rhetorical effect
Story	an account of imaginary or real people and events
Subjectively	in a biased manner based on personal perspectives, feelings, beliefs, and desires
Symbolism	the use of a physical object to represent an abstract idea
Synecdoche	figurative language in which a part stands in for the whole
Syntax	the order of words in a sentence
Tercet	a stanza of three lines
Tetrameter	a line of four feet
Theme	the main idea(s) of a work of literature
Tone	the attitude or mood of a literary work, and the style of narration
Topic Sentence	a one-sentence summary at the beginning of a body paragraph that explains the main idea and suggests generally what the paragraph will talk about to support the essay's overall thesis; often includes a transition from previous paragraphs
Tragic Hero	the focal character of a tragedy, who is mostly good but due to some flaw (hamartia) is doomed to fall; the character must go through plot elements such as peripeteia, anagnorisis, and ultimately result in catharsis
Trochee	the second most common metrical foot in English with a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed one
Unreliable Narrator	a first-person narrator of a work of literature who is not to be trusted; they may be morally questionable or dishonest, or have a flaw which makes them difficult to understand for the reader
Verse	lines of poetry
Villanelle	a French form of poetry that consists of five tercets and a final quatrain; the first stanza’s first and third lines repeat in an alternating pattern as the last line in the subsequent stanzas, and in the final quatrain, the two lines that have been repeating throughout the poem form the final two lines of the poem
Volta	a turn in thought, emotion, or rhetoric
Wise Elder	an old man or figure of wisdom who guides the protagonist in a play
Writing Process	the steps involved in writing an essay, which may include reading, prewriting, researching, outlining, drafting, revising, seeking feedback, re-revising, and publishing
Zeitgeist	spirit of the times