Literary Terms

Masks

"A thing through which sound comes"

Deus ex Machina

"God out of the machine," when an actor was lowered or lifted to the stage by machine

In medias res

A Latin phrase meaning "in the midst of thins'; refers to the narrative vice of beginning a story in midway in the events it depicts before explaining the context or preceding actions

Summary

A brief condensation of the main idea or plot of a literary work

Dynamic

A changing character

Episodes

Acts or scenes of a drama

Hamartia

An error or transgression

Hubris

Extreme pride, leading to overconfidence (usually a tragic flaw)

Skene

In staging, the "stage house"

Impartial omniscience

Point of view employed when an omniscient narrator, who presents the thoughts and actions of characters, does not judge them or comment on them.

Irony of Fate/Cosmic Irony

Suggests that some malicious fate is deliberately frustrating human efforts

Dramatic Irony

When the speaker does not realize the ironic dimension of his words

Historical fiction

When the story is set in a time and place in history

Fable

A brief, often humorous narrative told to illustrate a moral. The characters in fables are traditionally animals whose personality traits symbolize human traits.

Parable

A brief, usually allegorical narrative that teaches a moral. In parables, unlike fables, the moral themes are implicit and can often be interpreted in several ways

Burlesque

A broadly humorous parody or travesty of another play or kind of play

Farce

A broadly humorous play whose action is usually fast-moving and improbable

Flat Character

A character that has only one outstanding trait or feature, or at most a few distinguishing marks. They tend to stay the same throughout the story.

Round character

A character that presents more the reader with more facets, and they change throughout the story.

Innocent (naive) narrator

A character who fails to understand all the implications of the story he or she tells. The innocent narrator-- often a child or childlike adult-- is frequently used by an author to generate irony, sympathy, or pity by creating a gap between what the narrator perceives and what the reader knows.

High Comedy

A comic genre evoking thoughtful laughter from an audience in response to the play's depiction of the folly, pretense, and hypocrisy of human behavior

Low Comedy

A comic style arousing laughter through jokes, slapstick antics, slight gags, boisterous clowning, and vulgar humor

Observer

A first-person narrator who is relatively detached from or plays only a minor role in the events described.

Static character

A fixed character

Tragic Flaw

A flaw leading to the hero's downfall

Romantic Comedy

A form of comic drama in which the plot focuses on one or more pairs of young lovers who overcome difficulties to achieve a happy ending (usually marriage)

Satiric Comedy

A genre using derisive humor to ridicule human weakness and folly or attack political injustices and incompetence. Satiric comedy often focuses on ridiculing overly serious characters who resist the festive mood of comedy

Tragic Hero

A hero having a tragic flaw

Tall tale

A humorous short narrative that provides a wildly exaggerated version of events. Originally an oral form, the tall tale usually assumes that its audience knows the narrator is distorting the events. The form is often associated with American frontier.

Slapstick Comedy

A kind of face. Featuring pratfalls, pie-throwing, fisticuffs, and other violent action, it takes its name from a circus clown's prop--a bat with two boards that loudly clap together when one clown swats another

Comedy

A literary work aimed at amusing an audience. In traditional comedy, the protagonist often faces obstacles and complications that threaten disaster but are overturned at the last moment to produce a happy ending

Epiphany

A moment of profound insight or revelation by which a character's life is greatly altered.

Initiation story

A narrative in which the main character, usually a child, undergoes an important experience that prepares him or her for adulthood.

Nonparticipant (third-person) narrator

A narrator who does not appear in the story as a character but is usually capable of revealing the thoughts or motives of one or more character.

Omniscient (all knowing) narrator

A narrator who has the ability to move freely through the consciousness of any character. The omniscient narrator also has complete knowledge of all the external events in a story.

Participant (first person) narrator

A narrator who is a participant in the action. Such a narrator refers to himself or herself as "I" and may be a major or minor character in the story.

Unreliable narrator

A narrator who--intentionally or unintentionally--relates events in a subjective or distorted manner. The author usually provides some indication early on in such stories that the narrator is not to be completely trusted.

Tragedy

A play that portrays a serious conflict between human beings and some superior, overwhelming force. It ends sorrowfully and disastrously, an outcome that seems inevitable.

Prologue

A preparatory scene in drama

Short story

A prose narrative too brief to be published in a separate volume--as novellas and novels frequently are. The short story is usually a focused narrative that presents one or two characters involved in a single compelling action.

Antihero

A protagonist conspicuously lacking in one or more of the usual attributes of a traditional hero. An ordinary, unglorious citizen of the modern world.

Hero

A protagonist containing attributes of bravery, skill, idealism, and sense of purpose.

Comedy of Manners

A realistic form of high comic drama. It deals with the social relations and romantic intrigues of sophisticated upper-class men and women, whose verbal fencing and witty repartee produce the principal comic effects

Allusion

A reference to some famous person, place, or thing

Flashback

A scene relived in a character's memory

Tale

A short narrative without a complex plot. Tales are an ancient form of narrative found in folklore, and traditional tales often contain supernatural elements. A tale differs from a short story by its tendency toward lesser-developed characters and linear plotting.

Motivation

A sufficient reason for the character to behave as he/she does

Fairy tale, folktale

A traditional form of short narrative folklore, originally transmitted orally, which features supernatural characters such as witches, giants, fairies, or animals with human personality traits. Fairy tales often feature a hero or heroine who strives to achieve some desirable fate-- such as marrying royalty or finding great wealth.

Stream of consciousness

A type of modern narration that uses various literary devices, especially interior monologue, in an attempt to duplicate the subjective and associative nature of human consciousness.

Regional writer

A writer who usually sets stories (or their works) in one geographic area.

Reversal/Peripety

An action that turns out to have the opposite effect from the one its doer had intended

Interior monologue

An extended presentation of a character's thoughts in a narrative. Usually written in the present tense and printed without quotation marks, an interior monologue reads as if the character were speaking aloud to himself or herself, for the reader to overhear.

Character

An imagined person who inhabits a story

Foreshadowing

An indication of events to come in a narrative. The author may introduce specific words, images, or actions in order to suggest significant later events.

Odes

Danced choral songs separating the episodes in drama

Recognition

Discovery; the revelation of some fact not known before

Naturalism

Fiction of grim realism, in which the writer observes human characters like a scientist observing ants, seeing them as the products and victims of environment and heredity.

Cothurni

High, thick-soled elevator shoes that made them appear taller than ordinary men

Conclusion

In plotting, the logical end or outcome of a unified plot, shortly following the climax. Also called resolution or dénouement, as in resolving--or untying the knots created by--plot complications earlier in the narrative.

Orchestra

In staging, a level circular "dancing space"

Editorial omniscience

Point of view employed when an omniscient narrator goes beyond reporting the thoughts of his characters to make a critical judgment or commentary, making explicit the barrator's own thoughts or attitudes.

Total omniscience

Point of view in which the narrator knows everything about all of the characters and events in a story. A narrator with total omniscience can move freely from one character to another. (Written in third person)

Limited (selective) omniscience

Point of view in which the narrator sees into the minds of some but not all of the characters. Most typically, limited omniscience sees through the eyes of one major or minor character.

Objective point of view

Point of view in which the third-person narrator merely reports dialogue and action with little or no interpretation or access to the characters' minds.

Conflice

The central struggle between two or more forces in a story.

Diction

The choice of words in a story

Atmosphere

The dominant mood or feeling that pervades all parts of a literary work.

Purgation/Katharsis

The feeling the reader/viewer has after reading the story (usually one of satisfaction)

Time

The hour, year, or century of a story

Style

The individual traits or characteristics of a piece of writing

Complication

The introduction of a significant development in the central conflict between characters. Complications may be internal or external.

Écodos

The last scene in drama

Protagonist

The main or central character in a narrative. The protagonist usually initiates the main action of the story.

Climax

The moment of greatest intensity in a story, which almost inevitably occurs towards the end of the work.

Antagonist

The most significant character or force that opposes the protagonist in a narrative.

Exposition

The opening portion of a narrative. In the exposition, the scene is set, the protagonist is introduced, and the author discloses any other background information necessary for the reader to understand the events as follow

Place

The physical environment of the story

Setting

The place, time, weather, and atmosphere of a story

Crisis

The point in a narrative when the crucial action, decision, or realization must take place.

Párodos

The song for the entrance of the chorus in drama

Weather

The weather of the story

Theme

Whatever general idea or insight the entire story reveals

Tone

Whatever leads us to infer the author's attitude. Implies feelings of the author, so far as we can sense them

Sarcasm

When irony is found in a somewhat sour statement tinged with mockery

Verbal Irony

When the reader understands the speaker's meaning to be far from the usual meaning of the words

Ironic Point of View

When we sense a sharp distinction between the narrator of a story and the author

Minimalists

Writers of realistic fiction who give an unemotional tone and give nothing but facts and detail