AP English Lit exam terms 38 words

a short moral story (often with animal characters)

consisting of or characterized by the telling of a story

an imaginary person represented in a work of fiction (play or film or story)

use of the same consonant at the beginning of each stressed syllable in a line of verse

the repeated use of the same word or word pattern as a rhetorical device

address to an absent or imaginary person

a narrative poem of popular origin

a fixed number of lines of verse forming a unit of a poem

the lines spoken by characters in drama or fiction

correspondence in the sounds of two or more lines (especially final sounds)

the arrangement of spoken words alternating stressed and unstressed elements

a unifying idea that is a recurrent element in literary or artistic work

balance among the parts of something

the decisive moment in a novel or play

the final resolution of the main complication of a literary or dramatic work

the story that is told in a novel or play or movie etc.

the manner in which something is expressed in words

a mournful poem; a lament for the dead

a long narrative poem telling of a hero's deeds

the context and environment in which something is set

descriptive word or phrase

(used of the meanings of words or text) not literal; using figures of speech

extravagant exaggeration

the act of making something more noticeable than usual

incongruity between what might be expected and what actually occurs

limited to the explicit meaning of a word or text

of or relating to a category of poetry that expresses emotion (often in a songlike way)

a figure of speech in which an expression is used to refer to something that it does not literally denote in order to suggest a similarity

a figure of speech that expresses a resemblance between things of different kinds (usually formed with `like' or `as')

conjoining contradictory terms (as in `deafening silence')

(logic) a statement that contradicts itself

a literary work idealizing the rural life (especially the life of shepherds)

a quality that arouses emotions (especially pity or sorrow)

using language effectively to please or persuade

witty language used to convey insults or scorn

a (usually long) dramatic speech intended to give the illusion of unspoken reflections

something visible that by association or convention represents something else that is invisible

a brief literary description