4th Q

• A literary device is any specific aspect of literature, or a particular work, which we can recognize, identify, interpret and/or analyze. Both literary elements and literary techniques can rightly be called literary devices.
• Literary techniques are specific, deliberate constructions of language which an author uses to convey meaning. An author’s use of a literary technique usually occurs with a single word or phrase, or a particular group of words or phrases, at one single point in a text. Unlike literary elements, literary techniques are not necessarily present in every text.
• Literal language say exactly what you mean
• Figurative language compares, exaggerate, understate the situation
• Simile compares uses like or as
• Hyperbole exaggeration
• Alliteration initial consonant sound (tongue twisters)
• Metaphor compare
• Personification giving human characteristics
• Onomatopoeia describe or imitate a natural sound
• Oxymoron contradictory or opposite terms
• FORMAL ANALYSIS OF POETRY

  • content
  • structure
  • style
  • poetic effects
  • hermeneutic questions
• Scheme patterns of rhymes
• Anthropomorphism: Where animals or inanimate objects are portrayed in a story as people, such as by walking, talking, or being given arms, legs and/or facial features. (This technique is often incorrectly called personification.)
• Blank verse: Non-rhyming poetry, usually written in iambic pentameter.
• Creative license: Exaggeration or alteration of objective facts or reality for the purpose of enhancing meaning in a fictional context.
• Dialogue: Where characters speak to one another; may often be used to substitute for exposition.
• Dramatic irony: Where the audience or reader is aware of something important, of which the characters in the story are not aware.
• Exposition: Where an author interrupts a story in order to explain something, usually to provide important background information.
• Foreshadowing: Where future events in a story, or perhaps the outcome, are suggested by the author before they happen. Foreshadowing can take many forms and be accomplished in many ways, with varying degrees of subtlety.
• Iambic pentameter: Poetry written with each line containing ten syllables, in five repetitions of

  a two-syllable pattern wherein the pronunciation emphasis is on the second syllable.
• Imagery: Language which describes something in detail, using words to substitute for and create

  sensory stimulation, including visual imagery and sound imagery. Also refers to specific and

  recurring types of images, such as food imagery and nature imagery.
• Irony (a.k.a. Situational irony): Where an event occurs which is unexpected, and which is in

  absurd or mocking opposition to what is expected or appropriate.
• Paradox: Where a situation is created which cannot possibly exist, because different elements of

  it cancel each other out.
• Parallelism: Use of similar or identical language, structures, events, or ideas in different parts of

  a text.
• Personification (I) Where inanimate objects or abstract concepts are seemingly endowed with

  human self-awareness; where human thoughts, actions and perceptions are directly attributed to

  inanimate objects or abstract ideas.
• Personification (II) Where an abstract concept, such as a particular human behavior or a force

  of nature, is represented as a person.
• Repetition: Where a specific word, phrase, or structure is repeated several times, to emphasize a

  particular idea.
• Symbolism: The use of specific objects or images to represent abstract ideas.
• A symbol must be something tangible or visible, while the

  idea it symbolizes must be something abstract or universal.
• Verbal irony: Where the meaning is intended to be the exact opposite of what the words

  actually mean.
• Literary elements are aspects or characteristics of a whole text. They are not “used,” per se, by

  authors; we derive what they are from reading the text.
• Allegory: Where every aspect of a story is representative, usually symbolic, of something else,

  usually a larger abstract concept or important historical/geopolitical event.
• Antagonist: Counterpart to the main character and source of a story’s main conflict. The person

  may not be “bad” or “evil” by any conventional moral standard, but he/she opposes the

  protagonist in a significant way.
• Characterization: The author’s means of conveying to the reader a character’s personality, life

  history, values, physical attributes, etc. Also refers directly to a description thereof.
• Climax: The turning point in a story, at which the end result becomes inevitable, usually where

  something suddenly goes terribly wrong; the “dramatic high point” of a story.
• Conflict: A struggle between opposing forces which is the driving force of a story. The outcome

  of any story provides a resolution of the conflict(s); this is what keeps the reader reading.
• Context: Facts and conditions surrounding a given situation.
• Mood: The atmosphere or emotional condition created by the piece, within the setting.
• Motif: A recurring important idea or image.