Key Literary Terms

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Key Literary Terms

• A Brief Overview

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Whats the point?

• Alabama/Auburn game
• Your favorite song
• Your favorite movie

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Terms contd

• Theme

• Moral

• A central message or insight into life revealed
  through the literary work
• The underlying, unifying idea in a text
• This is NOT a plot summary.
• Examples
• The Adventures of Tom Sawyer? growing up
• Finding Nemo ? determination
• Harry Potter? good vs. evil friendship

• A lesson taught by a literary work
• Example
• Aesops fable of the Tortoise and the Hare? slow
  and steady wins the race

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Terms contd

• Character

• Characterization

• A person (or animal) who takes part in the action
  of a literary work
• Round exhibits many different traits (faults and
  virtues)
• Flat one dimensional lack of detail minor
  characters often stereotypes
• Dynamic develops and grows during the course of
  the story
• Static does not change throughout the story

• The act of CREATING and DEVELOPING a character
• Presented through
• Actions
• Thoughts
• Description
• Dialect
• Other characters reactions toward character
  being examined

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Terms contd

• Conflict

• Figurative Language

• A struggle between two opposing forces
• Natural (man vs. nature) character(s) against
  natural elements
• External (man vs. man) conflict between or among
  characters
• Internal (man vs. self) conflict that exists
  within a character (a decision, etc)
• Mechanical (man vs. machine) man against machine

• Writing or speech that is not meant to be
  interpreted literally
• Used to create vivid impressions by setting up
  comparisons between dissimilar things
• Similes
• Metaphors
• Life is a highway
• Personification

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Terms contd

• Novel

• Prose

• A long work of fiction
• Have a plot
• Explore many conflicts and themes within one work

• The ordinary form of written language
• Most writing that is NOT poetry or drama is
  considered prose
• Novels, short stories, memoirs, biography,
  sci-fi, etc.

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Terms contd

• Plot

• Setting

• The sequence of events in a literary work
• Exposition or initial situation the beginning
  the first incident that makes the story move
• Rising action or complication conflicts or
  obstacles the main character has to overcome
• Climax highest point of interest turning point
  in the story
• Falling action tensions begin to unravel and
  resolve
• Resolution (denouement) what happens to the
  character at the end in regard to conflicts
  examined in the story

• The time AND place of the action of a literary
  work
• Gone with the Wind? 1860s during the Civil War
  Georgia
• A Separate Peace? 1940s at the Devon School in
  New England
• Harry Potter series? present-day England
  Hogwarts

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Terms contd

• Imagery

• Tone

• The descriptive or figurative language used in
  literature to create word pictures for the reader
  
• Appeals the senses
• DETAILS!

• The writers attitude toward his or her audience
  or subject
• Revealed through choice of words, detail, mood
• Formal, informal, solemn, serious, sarcastic,
  ironic, playful, bitter, nostalgic
• Diary of a Young Girl? tone is emotional and
  insecure
• Ellen Foster? tone is informal as it is written
  from the perspective of a young girl

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Terms contd

• Protagonist

• Irony

• The main character of a literary work
• Harry in Harry Potter
• Scout Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird
• Frodo in The Lord of the Rings

• The general term for the literary techniques that
  portray differences between appearance and
  reality, expectation and result
• Verbal words are used to suggest the opposite of
  what is meant
• Dramatic the audience or reader knows something
  that the character does not
• Situational When one event is expected to occur
  but the opposite happens.

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Terms contd

• Mood/ atmosphere

• Antagonist

• The feeling created in the reader by a literary
  work or passage
• Horror, mystery, sadness, holiness,
  contemplation, etc.

• The character or force in conflict with the
  protagonist
• Malfoy in Harry Potter
• Danglars in The Count of Monte Cristo

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Terms contd

• Suspense

• Symbol

• The feeling of curiosity or uncertainty about the
  outcome of events in a literary work
• Create suspense by raising questions in the minds
  of readers

• Anything that stands for or represents something
  else
• Symbols have 2 meanings
• 1. their practical function
• 2. deeper meaning (abstract)
• Examples
• American flag? freedom
• Heart ? love
• Dove ? hope or peace
• Wedding rings ? commitment

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Terms contd

• Climax

• Description

• The highest point of interest or suspense in a
  literary work
• Think the most dramatic part of the story

• A portrait of a person, place, or object in words
  
• Mademoiselle Eugenie Danglars was dressed, with
  elegant simplicity, in a figured white silk
  dress. A white rose half lost in her jet-black
  hair was her only ornament she wore no jewels.

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Terms contd

• Dialect

• Dialogue

• The form of language spoken by people in a
  particular region or group
• yall versus you guys
• fixin and likta

• A conversation between characters
• He said, she said, etc.

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Terms contd

• Drama

• Essay

• A story written to be performed by actors
• Shakespeare!

• A short, non-fiction work about a particular
  topic
• Generally thoughtful and interpretative
• Presents authors own ideas on a particular
  subject

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Terms contd

• Fiction

• Flashback

• Prose writing that tells about imaginary
  characters and events

• A device by which a work represents material that
  occurred prior to the opening scene of the work
• Harry Potters flashback to when he was a baby.

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Terms contd

• Genre

• Foreshadowing

• A category or type of literature
• 3 major categories prose, poetry, drama
• Poetry lyric, concrete, narrative
• Prose fiction, nonfiction
• Science fiction, fantasy, adventure, historical,
  romantic, mystery, horror
• Drama tragedy, comedy, melodrama

• The use of clues in a literary work that suggests
  events that have yet to occur
• Dantes tells his friends at his wedding that he
  is afraid his happiness will not last.

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Terms contd

• Hero/ heroine

• Hubris

• The central character in a work is its hero
• Represent the values or ideals of a culture
• Who is the hero in The Count of Monte Cristo? Is
  there a hero at all?

• Arrogance or pride that results in the misfortune
  of the protagonist of a tragedy
• Refers to the emotions in Greek tragic heroes
  that led them to ignore warnings from the gods
  and thus invite catastrophe

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The Count of Monte Cristo

• Author Alexandre Dumas
• Born in 1802 near Paris
• Fused his works with his political beliefs
• Forerunner of the French Romantic movement
• Wrote plays, travel literature, and novels
• Other famous works by Dumas The Three Musketeers
  and The Man in the Iron Mask

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The Count Based on True Events

• His inspiration for the novel was an anecdote he
  read in a collection of intriguing criminal
  cases.
• The anecdote relates that in 1807, a man named
  François Piçaud became engaged to a pretty and
  wealthy girl, inspiring the envy of his friends.
  One of these friends, Loupian, persuaded the
  others to join him in denouncing Piçaud as an
  English spy. Though innocent of the charge,
  Piçaud was arrested and kept in prison for seven
  years. While in prison, he befriended a rich
  Italian cleric who left Piçaud his vast fortune
  when he died. Piçaud returned to Paris in 1815 as
  a wealthy man. Using his wealth, as well as
  numerous disguises, he enacted a complex plan to
  avenge himself on his enemies, murdering several
  of them.
• Though this real-life story has the all the
  essential plot elements of Dumass novel, it
  lacks the fantastical, epic proportions of great
  melodrama.

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What makes The Count melodramatic?

• Published in serial format ()
• Exaggerated emotion
• Page 143
• Emphasis on plot and action rather than on
  character
• Think musical cues at the appropriate time
• Page 393-394
• Page 473
• Page 522

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A Separate Peace

• Author John Knowles
• Attended Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire
• Many of his experiences are portrayed in A
  Separate Peace
• The only elements in A Separate Peace which were
  not in that summer were anger, violence, and
  hatred. There was only friendship, athleticism,
  and loyalty.
• Attended Yale University
• Served in the Air Force during World War II

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Title A Separate Peace

• Look to the title to determine a theme or an
  underlying meaning of text
• What does Knowles mean by a separate peace?
• Page 137
• Page 123

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Themes

• Jealousy
• Denial
• Loss of innocence
• Growing up? a coming of age novel?