LITERARY TERM/DEVICE REVIEW



LITERARY TERM/DEVICE REVIEW (NOVELS)

|TERM/DEVICE |DEFINITION |EXAMPLE |

| |A person or animal in a story. *protagonist – main |Harry Potter |

|CHARACTER |character * antagonist – character that opposes the main |Bella Swan |

| |character **dynamic – a character who changes **static –|Max Kincaid |

|(protagonist/antagonist) |a character who stays the same |Buck |

| | |**See separate handout for character words/character |

|(dynamic/static) | |traits.*** |

| |The reason(s) a character behaves in a certain way. |Although money will be tight, a mother moves her family|

|MOTIVATION |Among the many reasons for a person’s behavior are |from a crime-ridden street to another street in the |

| |feelings, experiences, and commands by others. |same town. Her motivation is concern for the safety of|

| | |her children. |

| |The time AND place during which a story is set |Victorian England |

|SETTING | |Bay Shore Middle School, 2nd period, English class, Rm.|

| | |917 |

| |The series of events that make up the plotline (action) of|Bella Swan hates Forks, WA – she meets Edward Cullen, |

|PLOT |a story. Most stories contain the following parts: |falls in love, and finds out he’s a vampire – |

|(FIVE PARTS OF A PLOTLINE!) |exposition/initial situation, rising action, climax, |Bella is attacked by a rival vampire and bitten – |

| |falling action, and resolution |Edward comes to her rescue, sucks the poison from her |

| | |blood – Bella survives and attends the prom with |

| |First book of the Twilight Series: |Edward. |

| |A struggle between opposing characters or opposing forces.|EXTERNAL – a struggle between a character and an |

|CONFLICT | |outside force. |

|(DEFINE ALL TYPES!) | |3 types of external conflict – character vs. character |

| |INTERNAL – a struggle within a character’s own mind over |character vs. nature |

| |feelings or a decision. |character vs. society |

| |Atmosphere – the physical surrounding that adds to the |Atmosphere – “It was a dark and stormy night. The road|

|ATMOSPHERE/MOOD |overall feeling of a story |was desolate at midnight…” |

| |Mood – the way a reader feels as he/she reads a story as |Mood – eerie, ominous, foreboding, etc. . **See |

| |described with one or two adjectives |separate handout on mood words.** |

| |Any element of a story that is repeated in different |The hero always beats the villain. |

|MOTIF |stories at different times. Motifs can be a character, an|The girl/boy from the good side of town falls for the |

| |image, or a storyline! |boy/girl from the bad side of town. |

| |The overall message or truth about life in a piece of |Love comes in all shapes and sizes. *A theme is |

|THEME |literature. |summarized in one SENTENCE not one word!* |

| |The perspective from which a story is told. |Third person limited – the narrator is not part of the |

|POINT OF VIEW | |story’s action and focuses on the thoughts and feelings|

|(THREE TYPES!) |First person – one of the characters, using the personal |of only one character; the reader observes the action |

| |pronoun “I,” tells the story. |through only one of the characters in the story. |

|**also referred to as the NARRATOR** | | |

| |Third person omniscient – the narrator knows (sees) | |

| |everything about all the characters and their problems; | |

| |can tell the reader what characters are thinking and what | |

| |is happening in several places at one time; is not part of| |

| |the story’s action at all. | |

| |The use of clues or hints to suggest events that will |*You will not know something is foreshadowing until the|

|FORESHADOWING |occur later in the story. Foreshadowing is used to build |event actually occurs later on! |

| |suspense or anxiety for the reader. | |

| |The uncertainty or anxiety that a reader feels about what |*Suspense usually builds during the rising action of a |

|SUSPENSE |will happen next in the story. |storyline! |

| |Interruption in the pleasant action of a plot to show |*Flashback IS NOT a memory but a way for a writer to go|

|FLASHBACK |events that happened at an earlier time. |back in time and “fill in the blanks” for a reader. It|

| | |can occur at any point in the plotline of a story. |

| |situational irony – what happens is very different from |situational – a fireman’s house burns down |

|IRONY (THREE KINDS) |what we expected would happen |verbal – calling the batter you just struck out |

| |verbal irony – a contrast between what is said or written |“slugger” |

| |and what is really meant |dramatic – Susie’s friend is hiding in the closet to |

| |dramatic irony – the reader/audience knows something the |scare her, and she is approaching the closet to open |

| |characters don’t know |it. The reader knows, but she doesn’t know! |

| |A condition in which two opposite situations seem to be |A family eating a picnic lunch watch a horrific car |

|PARADOX |happening at the same time. |accident occur. |

| |A reference to a statement, a person, a place, or an event|In the song “Party in the USA,” Miley Cyrus refers to |

|ALLUSION |from literature, the arts, history, religion, mythology, |“and a Jay-Z song/Britney song was on” |

| |politics, sports, or science. | |

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