Some Important Literary Terms

1- Ambiguity – Multiple meaning / plurisignation – In ordinary usage ‘ambiguity’ is applied to a fault in style.

2- Conceit – The term indicated and particularly fanciful expression f wit. ( Term is related to concept) :

( sonnet 130 – My Mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun. )

Sidney’s Arcadia – My true love hath my heart , and I have his .

3- Paradox:  “ A situation or phrase that appears to be contradictory but which contains a truth worth considering “ In order to preserve peace, we must prepare for war”.

4- Pathetic fallacy – John Ruskin ( Invented 1856)

-         Representation of inanimate natural objects that ascribes to them human capabilities , sensation and emotion( modern painters) .

5- Synecdoche – ( Greek taking together)

           A part of something is used to represent whole

( Ten hands for ten works men)

6- Transferred Epithet – ( Interchange, Exchange) – Happy Morning , restless night .

7- Metonymy – Greek ( Change of name)

8- Antithesis –

                   Antithesis is a contrast or opposition – the rape of the lock (1714) – Belinda resolved to win , he meditates the way by force to ravish , or by fraud betray.

-         May be a small step for men but giant step for mankind.

-         Charles Dicken’s A Tale of Two Cities – unforgettable antithesis

“ It was the best of time, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom and it was the age of foolishness.”

9- Morality Plays –

                   Dramatized allegories of a representative Christian life in a plot form of a quest for salvation.( The best known M.P is 15^th Cent. Everyman.)

10- Interlude – ( Latin “Between the Play” )

                   Is a term applied to a variety of short stage entertainments , such as secular farces and witty dialogues with a religious or political point.

11- Oxymoran, Paradox, Antithesis-

                   If the paradoxical utterance conjoins two terms that in ordinary usage are contraries, is called oxymoran.

Alfred Lord Tennyson-

“O, Death in life, the days that are no more.”

12- Rhetorical Question:

                   A rhetorical question is a sentence in the grammatical form of a question which is not asked in order to request information but to achieve a greater expressive force than a direct assertion.

I- Alexander Pope’s The Rape of the Lock( 1714) asks Belinda-

                   Gods ! Shall the ravishes display your hair,

                   While the folps envy , and ladies stare?

II – Shelly’s ode to west wind (1820) …. Closes with –

                   O, wind

          If winter , comes , can spring be far behind?

III- Irony: A contradiction of expectation between what is said and what is meant .

I) Verbal Irony

II) Situational Irony- What is expected in particular situation.