Literary terms 2
Foreshadowing
representing events imperfectly beforehand; prefiguring.
Hyperbole
Exaggeration for the sake of emphasis, not meant literally.
Imagery
A rather vague critical term covering those uses of language in a literary work that evoke sense impression by literal or figurative referance.
Irony
The incrongruity between what appears and what is, or between expectation and result.
"The expression of one's meaning bu using language that normally signifies the opposite, typically for humorous or emphatic effect."
Juxtaposition
"The action of placing two or more things close together or side by side."
Typically, a "juxtaposition" is of two seemingly different things.
Literal Language
"[language] confined to the simplest primary meaning of a word, statement or text"
Distinguished from "figurative language."
Macrocosm
"The world of all nature"
Typically used in opposition to "microcosm"
Metaphor
"the most important and widespread figure of speech, in which one thing, idea, or action is referred to by a word or expression normally denoting another thing, idea, or action"
Microcosm
"a place, situation, etc., regarding as encapsulating in miniature the characteristic qualities or features of something much larger."
Motif
"a situation, incident, idea, image, or character-type that is found in many different literary works, folktales or myths"
When elaborated into a more general notion, a "motif" becomes a "theme"
Motivation
Want a character wants; what drives the behaviour and actions of a character.
Narration
The process of relating a sequence of events.
Narrative
A telling of some true or fictitious event or connected sequence of events, recounted by a narrator.
Narrator
one who tells, or is assumed to be telling, the story in a given a narrative.
Novel
A long fictional prose narrative
Novella
A fictional tale in prose, intermediate in length and complexity between a short story and a novel, usually concentrating on a single event or chain of events
Omniscient Narrator
An 'all knowing' kind of narrator, who has a full knowledge of the story's events and of the motives and unspoken thoughts of the various characters