Name ________________________________
Elements of LITERATURE
Character Terms
CHARACTERS: The people/actors in a story
a. PROTAGONIST: The main character of the story, around whom the plot revolves. While s/he is usually the reader empathizes with, s/he is not in all cases a likeable person.
b. ANTAGONIST: The person, place, or thing in conflict with the protagonist. The antagonist may take many forms including another person, a force of nature, fate, society, or the protagonist him/herself.
CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT/CHARACTERIZATION: The process by which writers reveal their characters’ traits (qualities)
a. DIRECT CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT: The author directly describes the character, taking away the reader’s option to visualize the character in the reader’s own terms.
b. INDIRECT CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT: The author allows the reader the freedom to create the character in the reader’s mind. This can be accomplished with any of the following:
a. Appearance: What the character looks like; How s/he carries her/himself
b. Speech: What the character says and how s/he says it
c. The Opinions of Others
d. The Character’s Thoughts
e. Actions: What the character does in certain situations
CHARACTER TYPES
a. FLAT CHARACTER: A one-dimensional character; one or two personality traits only
b. ROUND CHARACTER: A three-dimensional character with many sides to his/her personality
c. STATIC CHARACTER: A character who does not undergo a change during the story
d. DYNAMIC CHARACTER: A character who does undergo an important change during the story
CHARACTER FOILS: A character who provides a striking contrast, calling attention to certain traits possessed by a main character or simply enhance a character by contrast
CHARACTER MOTIVATION: The reason for a character’s behavior. This requires you to make inferences based on characterization!
Conflict
• A struggle between opposing forces; conflicts can be external (outside forces) or internal (within a character’s mind).
Point Of View
POINT-OF-VIEW: The vantage point from which a narrative is told. The point-of-view in a story affects how we perceive “reality” in the story and understand what happens in it.
a. FIRST-PERSON POINT-OF-VIEW: Told by one of the characters in the story; uses the pronoun “I”
b. THIRD-PERSON LIMITED POINT-OF-VIEW: The narrator, who is almost never a character in the story, zooms in on the thoughts of just one or a select few characters.
c. THIRD-PERSON OMNISCIENT POINT-OF-VIEW: The narrator is able to look into the hearts and minds of all characters at all times. The Greek prefix omni means “all,” and scient means “seeing.”
Setting
• The time and the place of the story or novel.
• A story can be set in a realistic or imaginary place and can occur in the past, present, or future.
Foreshadowing
• An author’s way of hinting or giving clues to the reader of events or developments that might come later in the story.
Flashback
· A device that allows the writer to present events that happened before the time of the current narration or the current events in the fiction. Flashback techniques include memories, dreams, stories of the past told by characters, or even authorial sovereignty.
· Flashback is useful for exposition, to fill in the reader about a character or place, or about the background to a conflict.
Plot
• What happens 1st, 2nd, 3rd, and so on.
• The plot centers on at least one major problem called a conflict.
Five Main Parts of the Plot
Theme
• The main idea or underlying meaning of a literary work. The theme includes the topic of the writing and a viewpoint or opinion about the topic. .” In short, the theme is the statement or observation about life that theFor example:
• Greed might be the subject. The theme might be, “Greed is destructive and evil.”
• Fighting might be the subject. The theme might be, “Fighting solves nothing.”
• It can be Universal; applying to you and the world.
MOTIF: a pattern of recurring objects, concepts, or structures in a work of literature
Mood
• A feeling or emotion that a writing or piece of literature stirs in the reader.
Tone
• The approach or attitude that the writer takes toward the subject of the writing.
Irony
• IRONY: is the contrast between what is expected to happen and what actually happens.
THREE TYPES OF IRONY
a. SITUATIONAL IRONY: A discrepancy between the expected result and the actual result
b. VERBAL IRONY: When an individual says one thing but really means another (or, when a character says one thing, but the opposite is true)
c. DRAMATIC IRONY: When the audience/reader knows what is happening before the characters do. Horror movies and soap operas are known for their heavy use of dramatic irony.
SUSPENSE: Suspense is created through the reader’s uncertainty about the character’s ability to solve a problem, conflict, or crisis.
Figurative Language
• Figurative language uses comparisons to express a relationship between essentially unlike things
• Simile: Compares two unlike things using like or as:
• Metaphor: Am implied comparison between two relatively unlike things without using like or as:
• Hyperbole: The comparison by using an exaggerated statement:
• Personification: Compares by giving human characteristics to non-human things.
SYMBOLISM: The use of something concrete that stands for or represents something abstract.
IMAGERY: The use of words that appeal to one (or more) of the five senses.
Clichés
A word or phrase that has become overly familiar or commonplace.
Ex.amples: No pain, no gain.
Quiet as a mouse.
Don’t judge a book by its cover.
Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.
Idioms
Idioms are groups of words that really don’t mean what they say. Each idiom has a special meaning.
Examples: In a pickle.
Sitting on top of the world.
Open a can of worms.
Allusion
ALLUSION: A brief, indirect reference to a historical or literary figure, event, or object
a. MYTHOLOGICAL ALLUSION: an allusion to a character or event in mythology
b. LITERARY ALLUSION: an allusion to a work or literature or a part of that work of literature
c. HISTORICAL ALLUSION: an allusion to an historical event, person, place, or object
d. BIBLICAL ALLUSION: an allusion to something in the Bible
Alliteration
The repetition of the same consonant sounds in two or more neighboring words.
Examples: Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers….
She sells seashells by the seashore…
Mary, Mary, quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
Onomatopoeia
The use of words or sounds which resemble the sounds which they describe. Some words are themselves onomatopoeic, such as:
snap, crackle, pop, boom, gasp, boo, splash.
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