Literary Language Dictionary – The Count of Monte Cristo
Due November 11, 2013
Writers make DELIBERATE choices about what they put in and leave out of their work.
The details they include are CLUES to the (deeper) meaning of their work.
ANALYZE and INTERPRET WHY the author chooses a particular literary term or device
in order to create a deeper meaning within the text & to give you a clue as to that
meaning.
QUESTION the text!
1) WHY this particular image, color, smell, comparison, adjective?
2) What is he/she trying to help me better understand or reveal about
a. character? or
b. conflict? or
c. the larger message of the text?
Create a “dictionary” of literary language from The Count of Monte Cristo.
Choose at least 20 different examples of literary/figurative language from the novel – no
more than two per chapter and at least six from each section of the novel as we broke it
apart for our reading.
Each page of your dictionary will look like this:
Word (Figurative/Literary Language)
Definition (of the figurative/literary
language)
Quote from the novel that has the
example of the literary device
Explanation of the quote and what it
helps the reader better understand
about the text; needs "helps the reader
better understand" and "because"
Underneath the The Count of Monte Cristo quote (on left), you must have
an explanation of WHAT the device/term HELPS THE READER
BETTER UNDERSTAND. Be sure to EXPLAIN yourself.
1) Begin sentence with author and title
2) Underline the term
3) Underline helps the reader better understand
3) Underline because
Here is an example from chapter 1 of The Count of Monte Cristo.
Personification
Meanwhile the vessel was approaching
the harbor under topsails, jib and foresail,
but so slowly and with such an air of
melancholy that the onlookers,
instinctively sensing misfortune began to
wonder what accident could have
happened on board. (pg. 1)
Representation of a thing as a person or
by the human form
In Dumas’ The Count of Monte Cristo, the
ship is personified as feeling melancholy
which helps the reader understand that
something sad or negative has happened
onboard which might affect the lives of
the people connected to the ship because
the ship itself seems to be sad.
Here is another example from chapter 2 of The Count of Monte Cristo.
Euphemism
“More lips that say one thing while the
heart thinks another,” muttered Edmond.
(pg. 7)
The substitution of an agreeable or
inoffensive expression for one that may
offend or suggest something unpleasant
In Dumas’ The Count of Monte Cristo,
Dantes uses a euphemism when
speaking of Caderousse’s dishonest
actions to help the reader understand that
Dantes’ is non-confrontational because
his unwillingness to confront
Caderousse’s duplicity at this point in the
novel is foreshadowing for the greater
harm Caderousse later causes Dantes.
Final Product
Your final product needs to be a paper booklet although the information may be typed and printed.
Title page: Title of project; your name, date, class period
There must be a total of 20 entries (up to five more for extra credit).
You may put up to three entries of the same type of literary term on the same page without rewriting the
definition each time. (For example: if you find three similes, you only need to write “simile” and the
definition once and then create separate boxes below that for the three examples. No more than three
examples of a single literary term.
Your booklet may be any size, but make it neat and make it Pre-AP-worthy.
Both the cover and each page must have a graphic of some sort. Be creative!