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Allusion: an expression designed to call something to mind without mentioning it explicitly; an indirect or passing reference Example: When he calls to me, I am ready I’ll wash his feet with my hair if he needs Forgive him when his tongue lies through his brain, Even after three times, he betrays me. Lady Gaga, Judas What does this song allude to? Why? (What is the intention of the songwriter?) Diction: the choice and use of words and phrases in speech or writing Example: “Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard Are sweeter: therefore, ye soft pipes, play on Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed Your leaves, nor ever bid the spring adieu.” John Keats, “Ode to a Grecian Urn” What does the use of the formal diction (ye vs. you; adieu vs. good-bye) convey? Tragedy: a play dealing with tragic events and having an unhappy ending, especially one concerning the downfall of the main character. Aristotle defines Tragedy in his famous work “Poetics” as: “Tragedy is an imitation of an action that is admirable, complete (composed of an introduction, a middle part and an ending), and possesses magnitude; in language made pleasurable, each of its species separated in different parts; performed by actors, not through narration; effecting through pity and fear the purification of such emotions.” From the above definition, we can understand the objective of the Greek tragedies i.e. “…purification of such emotions” also called catharsis.” Catharsis is a release of emotional tension, as after an overwhelming experience that restores or refreshes the spirit. What other tragedies can you think of that align with Aristotle’s definition? Motif: a distinctive feature or dominant idea in an artistic or literary composition Example: The motif of weather in The Great Gatsby unfailingly matches the emotional and narrative tone of the story. Gatsby and Daisy’s reunion begins amid a pouring rain, proving awkward and melancholy; their love reawakens just as the sun begins to come out. Gatsby’s climactic confrontation with Tom occurs on the hottest day of the summer, under the scorching sun (like the fatal encounter between Mercutio and Tybalt in Romeo and Juliet). Wilson kills Gatsby on the first day of autumn, as Gatsby floats in his pool despite a palpable chill in the air—a symbolic attempt to stop time and restore his relationship with Daisy to the way it was five years before, in 1917. What other motifs can you think of in The Great Gatsby? Example: Symbol a thing that represents or stands for something else, especially a material object representing something abstract. In the spring I asked the daisies If his words were true, And the clever, clear-eyed daisies Always knew. Now the fields are brown and barren, Bitter autumn blows, And of all the stupid asters, Not one knows. -Wild Asters by Sara Teasdale What things or objects symbolize abstract ideas in this poem? There are several! What can you uncover? Theme A major theme is an idea that a writer repeats in his work, making it the most significant idea in a literary work.. It is a truth that exhibits universality and stands true for people of all cultures. Through themes, a writer tries to give his readers an insight into how the world works or how he or she views human life. Examples: Love and friendship are frequently occurring themes in literature. They generate emotional twists and turns in a narrative and can lead to a variety of endings: happy, sad or bittersweet. How many works of literature can you remember that share this theme? The theme of war has been explored in literature since ancient times. The literary woks utilizing this theme may either glorify or criticize the idea of war. How many works of literature can you remember that share this theme? Example: Iamb An iamb is a literary device that can be defined as a foot containing unaccented and short syllables followed by a long and accented syllable in a single line of a poem (unstressed/stressed syllables). Much of Shakespeare is written in iambic pentameter: Duh DUH Duh DUH Duh DUH Duh DUH Duh DUH Duh DUH= 1 iamb Pentameter= 5 iambs (penta=5) But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun. Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, Who is already sick and pale with grief, (Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare) Example: Soliloquy A soliloquy is a popular literary device often used in drama to reveal the innermost thoughts of a character. The word soliloquy is derived from Latin word “solo” which means “to himself” and “loquor” means “I speak” respectively. “Peace. It is providence, and no great change; we are only what we always were, but naked now. . . Aye, naked! And the wind, God’s icy wind will blow.” John Proctor in The Crucible Although modern plays hardly use any soliloquies, The Crucible has some used in the second act. This short form of soliloquy comes at the end of Act 2 where John Proctor faces the open sky when talking to Mary Warren. Examples: Aphorism Aphorism is a statement of truth or opinion expressed in a concise and witty manner. The term is often applied to philosophical, moral and literary principles. Shakespeare: “Having nothing, nothing can he lose.” (Henry VI) “Life is a tale told by an idiot — full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” (Macbeth) “Lord, what fools these mortals be!” (A Midsummer Night’s Dream) From “To Kill a Mockingbird”: “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view – until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.” Alexander Pope (18th century essayist) “To err is human, to forgive divine.” (An Essay on Criticism) Question: Resolution If resolution is the removal of conflict at the end of a piece of literature, what is the resolution of Oedipus Rex? Antithesis literally means opposite, is a rhetorical device in which two opposite ideas are put together in a sentence to achieve a contrasting effect. Antithesis emphasizes the idea of contrast by parallel structures of the contrasted phrases or clauses, i.e. the structures of phrases and clauses are similar in order to draw the attention of the listeners or readers. Alexander Pope in his “An Essay on Criticism” says: “To err is human; to forgive divine.” Fallibility is a trait of humans and God, his creator, is most forgiving. Through these antithetical ideas, Pope reveals the basic nature of human beings. He wants to say that God is forgiving because his creation is erring. Parallelism the use of components in a sentence that are grammatically the same; or similar in their construction, sound, meaning or meter. We see William Blake employ Parallelism in his poem “The Tyger”: “What the hammer? what the chain? In what furnace was thy brain? What the anvil? what dread grasp Dare its deadly terrors clasp?” What is the effect of the use of parallelism in this case? Syntax It dictates how words from different parts of speech are put together in order to convey a complete thought. Syntax and diction are closely related. Diction refers to the choice of words in a particular situation while syntax determines how the chosen words are used to form a sentence. “That night I sat on Tyan-yu’s bed and waited for him to touch me. But he didn’t. I was relieved.” (The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan) “They left me alone and I lay in bed and read the papers awhile, the news from the front, and the list of dead officers with their decorations and then reached down and brought up the bottle of Cinzano and held it straight up on my stomach, the cool glass against my stomach, and took little drinks making rings on my stomach from holding the bottle there between drinks, and watched it get dark outside over the roofs of the town.” (A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway) How does the syntax differ between the two examples above, and how does it affect your understanding of the characters? Mood a literary element that evokes certain feelings or vibes in readers through words and descriptions. Usually, mood is referred to as the atmosphere of a literary piece, as it creates an emotional situation that surrounds the readers. “There was no moon, and everything beneath lay in misty darkness: not a light gleamed from any house, far or near all had been extinguished long ago: and those at Wuthering Heights were never visible…” “Gimmerton chapel bells were still ringing; and the full, mellow flow of the beck in the valley came soothingly on the ear. It was a sweet substitute for the yet absent murmur of the summer foliage, which drowned that music about the Grange when the trees were in leaf.” The above are two different places being described in the same novel (Wuthering Heights). How would you describe the difference in mood between the two descriptions? Meter and Stress English poetry employs five basic rhythms of varying stressed (/) and unstressed (x) syllables The meters with two-syllable feet are: IAMBIC (x /) : That time of year thou mayst in me behold TROCHAIC (/ x): Tell me not in mournful numbers SPONDAIC (/ /): Break, break, break/ On thy cold gray stones, O Sea! Meter and Stress Continued!! Meters with three-syllable feet are: ANAPESTIC (/ x x): And the sound of a voice that is still DACTYLIC (x / /): This is the forest primeval, the murmuring pines and the hemlock (a trochee replaces the final dactyl) Meter and Stress Mixing it up!! iambic pentameter (5 iambs, 10 syllables): That time | of year | thou mayst | in me | behold trochaic tetrameter (4 trochees, 8 syllables): Tell me | not in | mournful | numbers anapestic trimeter (3 anapests, 9 syllables): And the sound | of a voice | that is still dactylic hexameter (6 dactyls, 17 syllables; a trochee replaces the last dactyl): This is the | forest pri | meval, the | murmuring | pine and the | hemlocks Sonnet 18 Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Sonnet The word sonnet is derived from the Italian word “sonetto”. It means a small or little song or lyric. Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date: Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimmed, In poetry, a sonnet has fourteen lines and is written in iambic pentameter. And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed: But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Each line has 14 syllables. It has a specific rhyme scheme and a “volta” or specific turn, usually in the third quatrain. Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st, Nor shall death brag thou wand'rest in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st, So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. From Hamlet: Couplet A couplet is a literary device which can be defined as having two successive rhyming lines in a verse and has the same meter to form a complete thought. It is marked by a usual rhythm, rhyme scheme, and incorporation of specific utterances. “The time is out of joint, O cursed spite That ever I was born to set it right!” Dynamic Character A character who experiences changes throughout the plot of a story. Although the change may be sudden, it is expected based on the story’s events. This change is often internal, such as a change in personality or attitude. Note: dynamic character doesn’t describe the character. You can be reeeeally boring and also a dynamic character at the same time! Examples: The Grinch whose heart “grew three sizes.” Ebenezer Scrooge in “A Christmas Carol” Harry Potter! Others? Static Character A character who is largely the same person at the end of the story as he was in the beginning. Any character in a compelling story experiences some life changes and variation in his environment, but what distinguishes a static character is usually his existing persona, confidence and appeal to readers. Heroic and charismatic characters often work better as static characters than ones who must undergo change to appeal to the audience and to significantly affect a story. Examples: Sherlock Holmes (he stays the same, everyone else swirls around him). Tom Sawyer (he remains unaffected by the changes happening around him and within others). Others? Anaphora In writing or speech, the deliberate repetition of the first part of the sentence in order to achieve an artistic effect. This is probably the oldest known literary device. Read the following examples and describe the emotional or artistic effect brought on by the use of anaphora: “This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England This nurse, this teeming womb of royal kings […] This land of such dear souls, this dear, dear land.” -Shakespeare, Richard II “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.” -Charles Dickens, “A Tale of Two Cities” Examples: Satire Satire is a technique employed by writers to expose and criticize foolishness and corruption of an individual or a society by using humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule. It intends to improve humanity by criticizing its follies and foibles. “…that for above seventy Moons past there have been two struggling Parties in this Empire, under the Names of Tramecksan and Slamecksan from the high and low Heels on their shoes, by which they distinguish themselves.” –Jonathan Swift, Gulliver’s Travels “If this is going to be a Christian nation that doesn’t help the poor, either we have to pretend that Jesus was just as selfish as we are, or we’ve got to acknowledge that He commanded us to love the poor and serve the needy without condition and then admit that we just don’t want to do it.”Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report What is being satirized in each of the above examples? Examples: Apostrophe A writer or a speaker, using an apostrophe, detaches himself from the reality and addresses an imaginary character in his speech. “Is this a dagger which I see before me, The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee! I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.” -Shakespeare, Macbeth “Oh! Stars and clouds and winds, ye are all about to mock me; if ye really pity me, crush sensation and memory; let me become as nought; but if not, depart, depart, and leave me in darkness.” -Mary Shelley, Frankenstein Explain how each of these is an example of apostrophe. Examples: Idiom The term refers to a set expression or a phrase comprising two or more words. The expression is not interpreted literally. The phrase is understood as to mean something quite different from what individual words of the phrase would imply. “Every cloud has its silver lining but it is sometimes a little difficult to get it to the mint.” “I worked the graveyard shift with old people, which was really demoralizing, because the old people didn’t have a chance in hell of ever getting out.” Dramatic Monologue The occurrence of a single speaker saying something to a silent audience. This monologue often comes during a climactic moment in a work and often reveals hidden truths about a character, their history and their relationships. Famous Dramatic Monologues in Poetry: Robert Browning’s “My Last Duchess” Robert Frost and T.S. Elliot also wrote them. Sometimes these characters created by the poets seem to take over the story line of the poem itself. Metonymy Examples from everyday life: The pen is mightier than the sword. The Oval Office was busy in work. Let me give you a hand. a figure of speech that replaces the name of a thing with the name of something else with which it is closely associated. What do the underlined words symbolize? Generally, metonymy is used in developing literary symbolism. It gives more profound meanings to otherwise common ideas and objects. By using metonymy, texts exhibit deeper or hidden meanings and thus drawing readers’ attention. In addition, the use of metonymy helps achieve conciseness. For instance, “Rifles were guarding the gate” is more concise than “The guards with rifles in their hands were guarding the gate.” “The little buried mole continues blind, Why flesh that mirror Him must someday die,” -Countee Cullen, “Yet Do I Marvel” Examples from literature: “As he swung toward them holding up the hand Half in appeal, but half as if to keep The life from spilling” -Robert Frost “Out, Out” Where is the metonymy and what is being symbolized? Examples from real life: Synecdoche a literary device in which a part of something represents the whole or it may use a whole to represent a part. It may also use larger groups to refer to smaller groups or vice versa. It may also call a thing by the name of the material it is made of or it may refer to a thing in a container or packing by the name of that container or packing. The phrase “gray beard” refers to an old man. The word “sails” refers to a whole ship. The word “suits” refers to businessmen. The word “boots” usually refers to soldiers. Examples from literature: “Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them.” Ozymandias, by Percy Bysshe Shelley Where is the synecdoche in those lines? Examples of Lyric Poetry from the Romantic Movement: Lyrical Poetry a type of emotional songlike poetry, distinguished from dramatic and narrative poetry. The word ‘Lyric’ comes from the Greek word ‘Lyre’, a stringed musical instrument. “Day after day, day after day, We stuck, nor breath nor motion; As idle as a painted ship Upon a painted ocean Water, water, every where, And all the boards did shrink; Water, water, every where, Nor any drop to drink.” From “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge Pastoral Poetry the pastoral tradition refers to a lineage of creative works that idealize rural life and landscapes, while the term “pastoral” refers to individual poems or other works in the tradition. Examples: “A belt of straw and ivy buds, With coral clasps and amber studs: And if these pleasures may thee move, Come live with me, and be my love.” From “The Passionate Shepherd to his Love” by Christopher Marlowe “The time has come for my groaning ox to drag My heavy plow across the fields, so that The plow blade shines as the furrow rubs against it. Not till the earth has been twice plowed, so twice Exposed to sun and twice to coolness will It yield what the farmer prays for...” -Virgil (38 BC) Elegy a form of literature which can be defined as a poem or song in the form of elegiac couplets, written in honor of someone deceased. It typically laments or mourns the death of the individual. Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done, The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won, The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting, While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring; But O heart! heart! heart! O the bleeding drops of red, Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead. Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells; Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills, For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths—for you the shores a-crowding, For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning; Here Captain! dear father! This arm beneath your head! It is some dream that on the deck You’ve fallen cold and dead. My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still, My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will, The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done, From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won; Exult O shores, and ring O bells! But I with mournful tread, Walk the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead. “Captain, Oh My Captain” by Walt Whitman about Abraham Lincoln Examples: Foil a character that shows qualities that are in contrast with the qualities of another character with the objective to highlight the traits of the other character. Milton’s “Paradise Lost Book I” is based on the comparison of two contrasting characters: God and Satan. Satan, in the entire work, appears as a foil to God. The negative traits of Satan and the positive traits of God are frequently compared which consequently brings to the surface not only the contrast between the two characters but also “justify the ways of God…” We reach a conclusion that it is only just for Satan to be expelled from the paradise because of his refusal to give in to the will of God. What character is a foil to Victor Frankenstein? Anti-heroes in TV and movies: Anti-hero A prominent character in a play or book that has characteristics opposite to that of a conventional hero. A protagonist is generally admired for his bravery, strength, charm, ingenuity etc., while an anti-hero is typically clumsy, unsolicited, and unskilled and has both good and bad qualities. Instead of having two different people to represent two extremes, an anti-hero combines both into one person and thus shows the real human nature. Dexter, Gollum, and…. Anti-heroes in literature: Gulliver in Gulliver’s Travels Jean Valjean in Les Miserables And…. Allegory a figure of speech in which abstract ideas and principles are described in terms of characters, figures and events. The objective of its use is to preach some kind of a moral lesson. Animal Farm, written by George Orwell, is an allegory that uses animals on a farm to describe the overthrow of the last of the Russian Tsars, Nicholas II, and the Communist Revolution of Russia before WW II. The actions of the animals on the farm are used to expose the greed and corruption of the revolution. Moral: Orwell makes his position clear about the Russian Revolution and exposes its evils. John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress is an example of spiritual allegory. The ordinary sinner “Christian” leaves the City of Destruction and travels towards Celestial City, where God resides, for salvation. Moral: the road to Heaven is not easy and it is full of obstacles. Example: Apposition A syntactical structure where a noun is followed by an noun phrase, where the noun phrase explains the noun further. Ms. Gallien, my English teacher… Green bell peppers, the nastiest vegetable of all… Please write three more appositive phrases: Ambiguity a word, phrase, or statement which contains more than one meaning. This serves the purpose of lending a deeper meaning to a literary work. By introducing ambiguity in their works, writers give liberty to the readers to use their imagination to explore meanings. Examples: A good life depends on a liver. Each of us saw her duck. Poetry Example: “O Rose thou art sick. The invisible worm, That flies in the night In the howling storm: Has found out thy bed Of crimson joy; And his dark secret love Does thy life destroy” -William Blake Example: Juxtaposition a literary technique in which two or more ideas, places, characters and their actions are placed side by side in a narrative or poem for the purpose of developing comparisons and contrasts. The comparison drawn adds vividness to a given image, controls pacing of poem or a narrative and provides a logical connection between two various vague concepts. “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way…” A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens What ideas are being juxtaposed here? Example: Enjambment The running-over of a sentence or phrase from one poetic line to the next, without terminal punctuation; the opposite of end-stopped. the back wings of the hospital where nothing will grow lie cinders in which shine the broken pieces of a green bottle “Between Walls” William Carlos Williams What is the effect of the enjambment on the tone of the poem? Examples: End-Stopped A metrical line ending at a grammatical boundary or break—such as a dash or closing parenthesis—or with punctuation such as a colon, a semicolon, or a period. A line is considered end-stopped, too, if it contains a complete phrase. Then say not man’s imperfect, Heav’n in fault; Say rather, man’s as perfect as he ought: His knowledge measur’d to his state and place, His time a moment, and a point his space. If to be perfect in a certain sphere, What matter, soon or late, or here or there? The blest today is as completely so, As who began a thousand years ago. “An Essay on Man: Epistle 1” Alexander Pope In contrast to the poem on the previous slide, how is the tone in these rhyming couplets affected by the endstopped lines? A few famous epigraphs: Epigraph A short quotation or saying at the beginning of a book or chapter, intended to suggest its theme. “Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.” GK Chesterson From Coraline by Neil Gaiman “If they give you ruled paper, write the other way.” Juan Ramon Jiménez From Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury “Lawyers, I suppose, were children once.” -Charles Lamb From To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee What would you infer the themes are of the above novels? Some fun ones: Epigram A brief, clever, memorable statement “Little strokes/Fell great oaks” Benjamin Franklin “Here is my wife: here let her lie! Now she is at rest, and so am I” John Dryden “Candy/Is dandy/But liquor/Is quicker” Ogden Nash “To be safe of the fourth/Don’t buy a fifth on the third” James H. Muehlbauer Copy your favorite!