Literary Terms and Definitions

literary device that allows writers to show their audience specific events that happened before the current action of the story.

• flashback
• climax
• subplot
• refrain

Tags

CCSS.RL.9-10.5

category system that literature falls into based on specific conventions that develop to characterize the differences.

• tone
• genre
• mood
• allusion

Tags

CCSS.L.11-12.6

CCSS.L.9-10.6

CCSS.W.11-12.2D

CCSS.W.8.2D

CCSS.W.9-10.2D

can be verbal, situational, or dramatic and has the result of the meaning, situation or action being one thing but meaning something different.

• satire
• metaphor
• parody
• irony

Tags

CCSS.RL.11-12.6

a type of literary work that satirizes another work, its author, or the ideas presented.

• parody
• irony
• allusion
• genre

Tags

CCSS.RL.11-12.6

a type of literary device where an author ridicules specific people, groups or some aspect of society.

• irony
• imagery
• satire
• personification

Tags

CCSS.RL.11-12.6

where a story takes place.

• setting
• tone
• mood
• climax

Tags

CCSS.L.11-12.4C

CCSS.L.6.4C

CCSS.L.7.4C

CCSS.L.8.4C

CCSS.L.9-10.4C

a type of poem that has a specific rhyme and meter.

• genre
• subplot
• onomatopoeia 
• sonnet

Tags

CCSS.RL.5.3

CCSS.RL.5.7

CCSS.RL.6.3

CCSS.RL.6.9

a minor story that runs inside the main story.

• subplot
• narrator
• foreshadowing
• theme

Tags

CCSS.RL.9-10.5

a concrete or physical object that represents an abstract concept.

• metaphor
• symbol
• tone
• refrain

Tags

CCSS.L.11-12.6

CCSS.L.8.6

CCSS.L.9-10.6

CCSS.W.11-12.2D

CCSS.W.9-10.2D

how the writer feels about his subject that comes through based upon the types of words chosen.

• tone
• symbol
• theme
• satire

Tags

CCSS.RL.11-12.6