AP Literature and Composition Terminology
Allegory: a story or tale with two or more levels of meaning – a literal level and
one or more symbolic levels.
Alliteration: repetition of initial consonant sounds
Allusion: a reference to another work of literature, person, or event
Antagonist: a character in conflict with protagonist
Antithesis: the juxtaposition of contrasting words or ideas
Apostrophe: direct address of an inanimate object, dead or absent person, or an
Idea
Archetype: universal symbols that evoke deep, unconscious responses
Assonance: the repetition of similar vowels in the stressed syllables of successive
Words
Blank Verse: unrhymed iambic pentameter
Claim: assertion that requires support (thesis or topic sentence)
Cacophony: an arrangement of sounds that are unpleasing
Caesura: a pause in a speech within a line
Canto: a major division in a long poem or epic poem
Climax: the high point/ turning point in a story
Colloquial diction: conversational, slang word choices
Comedy: a type of drama with a happy ending that focuses on human limitation
Concrete Poetry: poetry that is created by the physical arrangement of words in
Patterns
Connotation: associations/implications beyond word definition
Consonance: identical consonant sounds preceded by similar vowels
Couplet: two lines in the same meter—usually rhyming
Dactyl: a metrical foot consisting of a stressed syllable followed by two unstressed
syllables/ words Mer-il-ly
Denotation: the basic definition of a word.
Didactic Literature: writing primarily to teach
Denouement: the outcome/ solution to a complex sequence of events (French
for the action of untying
Dialogue: a conversation between two or more persons/ lines of characters in a
drama or fiction
Details: the facts described by the author or speaker that contribute to tone or
Meaning
Dialect: diction that reveals characters' geographic or social connections
Diction: word choice that contributes to tone and meaning
Dramatic irony: reader is more aware of a plot event than a character
Dramatic Monologue: a poem or speech in which an imaginary character speaks
to a silent listener.
Dynamic character: a character that undergoes a permanent change in
response to plot events
Elegy: a mournful poem, said at a funeral.
Enjambment: a line of poetry in which the grammatical and logical sense run on,
without pause, into the next line or lines
Epic: a long narrative poem telling story of a hero's activities
Epigraph: a quotation at the beginning of some piece of writing
Euphony: a pleasant combination of sounds
Exposition: a setting forth of information
Fable: a short moral story
Falling Action: the events that follow the climax of a story
Figurative language: writing that is not meant to be taken literally
First-person POV: speaker tells the story as "I" and is a minor or major participant
Flashback: a shift to a previous event that interrupts the chronological
development of the plot line
Flat character: one-sided and often stereotypical character
Foot: Basic unit of measurement in a line of poetry. It represents an instance of a
metrical pattern
Foil: a character who makes a contrast with another, especially a minor
character who helps to set off a major character
Foreshadowing: suggestion or hint of future developments
Free Verse: unrhymed poetry with lines varying in lengths
Hamartia: a flaw in the tragic hero, or an error made by the tragic hero
Hyperbole: extravagant exaggeration
Iamb: a metrical pattern of one unstressed syllable followed by one stressed
syllable.
Imagery: description that appeals to the senses
Irony: a contrast between what is stated and what is meant, or between what is
expected to happen and what actually happens
Limited omniscient POV: speaker shares actions/dialogue of all characters, but the
thoughts of one or two characters only
Litotes: a form of understatement in which an affirmation is made by means of a
Negation
Lyric poem: a melodic poem that expresses the thoughts and feelings of the poet
Metaphor: makes a direct comparison between two unlike things
Meter: a pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables
Metonymy: figure of speech in which a word/phrase is substituted for a closely
associated word/phrase
Mood: a prevailing emotional tone of a literary work
Motif: a recurrent theme within a work, or a theme common to many works
Narrative, narrator: a narrative is a story; a narrator is one who tells a story
Ode: long poems which are serious in nature and written to a set structure
Omniscient POV: all-knowing speaker shares the actions, thoughts, and dialogue
of all characters
Onomatopoeia: words formed in imitation of natural sounds; ex: "hiss"
Oxymoron: pair of contradictory words; compact paradox
Parable: a brief and simple narrative that illustrates a moral or religious lesson
Paradox: contradictory statement that, on closer look, reveals truth
Parallelism: the repetition of a grammatical structure
Parody: a satiric imitation of a work or of an author; something created to mock
Pastoral: peaceful, simple; of or relating to a pastor or shepherd; of rustic life
Personification: attributing human characteristics to abstract ideas or inanimate
Objects
Plot: the sequence of events in a story
Point of view: Perspective from which a story is told
Protagonist: the main character in a literary work
Pun: a play on words -- alike in sound but different in meaning
Quatrain: A stanza of poetry containing four lines
Realism: the presentation in art of the details of actual life
Rhyme: the repetition of sounds in the ends of words or verses
Rhyme Scheme: the pattern of rhyming lines in a poem or song
Rhythm: the pattern of beats, or stresses, in spoken or written language
Round character: complex character displaying the inconsistencies of most
Humans
Saga: narrative telling the adventures of a hero or a family
Satire: writing that ridicules or criticizes individuals, ideas, institutions, social
conventions, or other works of art or literature to get a point across
Scansion: A way to mark the metrical patterns of a line of poetry
Sestina: a poem with six stanzas of six lines each and a concluding stanza of
three lines
Setting: the time and place in which the action of a literary work occurs.
Simile: figurative language comparing two unlike things using like, as, or seems
Situational irony: outcome of events is the opposite of what is expected
Soliloquy: a speech given alone on stage
Sonnet: A lyric poem that is 14 lines long usually in iambic pentameter
Speaker: the voice of the poem
Spondee: a metrical foot consisting of two stressed syllables
Stanza: a group of lines in a poem that are considered to be a unit
Static character: a character that does not change in the course of the work
Stream of consciousness: speaker shares thoughts as they scroll through his or her
Mind
Structure: the arrangement of the text
Style: writer's characteristic manner of using language to convey meaning
Symbol: something that stands for or represents something else
Synecdoche: figure of speech in which a part represents the whole
Syntax: sentence structure; word order
Theme: a central message or insight into life revealed by a literary work
Third-person POV: the teller of a story that does not participate in the happenings
Tone: the writer’s attitude toward his or her subject, characters, or audience
Tragedy: a serious play showing the protagonist moving from good fortune to bad
and ending in death or a deathlike state
Tragic Flaw: a supposed weakness in the tragic protagonist
Trochee: a metrical foot consisting of a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed
syllable