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| In literature, magic realism combines the real or mundane with the fantastic. Features of magic realism include quick and unusual chronological shifts, dream-like sequences, complicated plots, and elements of surprise, shock, and the inexplicable. Frequently, fairy tales are incorporated into the work and often there is an element of contemporary social relevance. |
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| A branch of criticism based upon Marxist thinking and theories. According to Marx and Engels, economics provide the base (or infrastructure) of society, whereas art, politics, law, religion, and philosophy emerge from that base and form a superstructure. Marxist critics view literary works as the product of labor and analyze the implications of class and ideology within and surrounding the text. Although there are a range of approaches within Marxist criticism, most Marxist readings show how literary production is related to the economic and social realities of its time. |
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| Generally, rhyme refers to the similar sound in syllables or paired groups of syllables. Masculine rhymes are rhymes with single-syllable stressed words. |
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| Greek term for understatement by which something is described in terms less grand or important than it deserves or merits, typically to minimize its importance. Meiosis is a form of litote, a figure of speech in which a statement is made indirectly by denying its opposite. |
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| Originally, any drama accompanied by music used to enhance mood or emotion. By the nineteenth century, melodramas became highly stereotypical and favored sensational plots over realistic characters. Characters in melodrama are stock characters, usually either highly virtuous or villainous, and plots are generally sensational and improbable. Virtue inevitably triumphs over villainy. The term melodrama is used today almost exclusively as a pejorative. |
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| Plays that self-consciously examine the nature of drama or the theater by drawing attention to the fact that they are plays. Also known as metatheater. |
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| Novels or works of short fiction that self-consciously examine the nature of fiction by drawing attention to the fact that they are works of fiction. |
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| A figure of speech where one thing is described in terms of another. Metaphors do not use connective words such as "like" or "as." |
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| Broadly defined as poetry that addresses spiritual or philosophical matters, but more specifically, and more often, used to describe a particular group of seventeenth-century poets. |
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| The rhythms in poetry made by units of sound created by accented and unaccented syllables. Each metrical unit is called a foot (feet, plural). A foot usually consists of one or more stressed syllables with one or more unstressed syllables. To determine the meter, one first scans a poem to determine what kind of foot is used and then how many feet per line are included. The most common types of feet include iamb (iambic, adj.), an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable; trochee (trochaic, adj.), a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable; dactyl (dactylic, adj.), a stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables; and anapest (anapestic, adj.), two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed syllable. Two less common metrical feet include the spondee (spondaic, adj.), a foot of two successive syllables that are equally or almost equally stressed, and the pyrrhic (pyrrhic, adj.), a foot of two successive syllables that are equally or almost equally unstressed. The next step in identifying the meter of a poem determines how many feet occur in each line. Metrical lines are named according to the number of feet per line: monometer (1 foot), dimeter (2 feet), trimeter (3 feet), tetrameter (4 feet), pentameter (5 feet), hexameter (6 feet), heptameter (7 feet), or octameter (8 feet). Most verse in English literature uses a system of meter called accentual syllabic meter, a pattern of a regular number of stressed and unstressed syllables in a line of a fixed number of syllables per line. |
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| A figure of speech that replaces the name of one thing with the name of another closely related thing. For example, "the crown" is used to signify the monarchy. |
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| The Middle English period runs from the Norman invasion of England in 1066 to 1500; unlike Old English, Middle English closely resembles our own English language. After the Norman invasion, there were linguistic, social, and cultural changes and also changes in the literature; the Middle English period is the first major age of secular literature in English. The fifteenth century saw a growth in literature aimed at a popular audience. In the Middle English period, a range of genres emerged including chivalric romances, secular and religious songs, folk ballads, drama, morality plays, and miracle plays. |
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| Miracle play (or mystery play) |
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| A Middle English play based upon a biblical story or a saint's life. A miracle play is a type of morality play, an allegorical drama in the Middle English period with a didactic purpose. Generally, morality plays used allegorical characters such as Everyman or Avarice to convey a moral lesson or to tell a story about morality. |
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| A period in British and American literature spanning the years between World War I and World War II. Works in this period reflect the changing social, political, and cultural climate and are diverse, experimental, and nontraditional. |
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| Modernism or the modern period should not be confused with the term contemporary. Instead, modern refers to a period in both British and North American literature and visual art beginning with the onset of World War I in 1914 and ending with the conclusion of World War II. Modern literature and art are characterized by their attempts to break away from traditional modes of expression and subject matters. Modernist works feature innovations in style, form, genre, subject matter, and thought. Frequently, modernist works are experimental, such as stream of consciousness, or connected with the avant-garde. |
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| A metrical line of poetry consisting of one metrical unit, or a foot. |
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| The feeling or emotion created specifically through elements of the setting. Mood (also called atmosphere) is more specific than tone, which is established by a variety of elements, including symbolism, imagery, diction, meter, rhyme, alliteration, and assonance. |
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| An allegorical drama in the Middle English period with a didactic purpose. Morality plays used allegorical characters such as Everyman or Avarice to convey a moral lesson or to tell a story about morality. Frequently, morality plays were about a conflict between good and evil or right and wrong. |
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| A significant element that recurs either in a specific literary work, in a group of literary texts, or in literature as a whole. Motifs can be plots, imagery, symbols, themes, ideas, narrative details, or characters. In a specific literary work, motifs usually relate and contribute to the work's larger themes. |
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| The reasons or explanations for why a character acts in the ways he or she does in response to events of the plot. Motivation is part of characterization, or how an author uses description, action, dialogue, and emotion to convey the complexities of a character. |
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| A narrative from a culture's oral tradition, often incorporating cultural values or a belief system. Myths usually involve cosmic and natural forces and stories of creation. Frequently they involve heroic figures, superhuman beings, or supernatural forces. Myths are considered distinct from legends because myths are not rooted in historically based facts or stories. |
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| The telling of true or fictitious events by a narrator. Narratives can be either verse or prose and focus on the depiction of events or happenings. The study of theories and practices of narratives is called narratology. |
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| The voice or character who tells a story and offers information, interpretation, or insight to readers about events, context, or character. Narrative perspectives or points of view include first-person, third-person, omniscient, limited-omniscient, intrusive, unintrusive, fallible or unreliable, and self-reflective narrators. First-person narrators are personas who use "I" or "me" to tell a story. Usually a first person is involved in the plot but not always. Second-person narrators use "you" to tell a story; these are rarely used. A third-person narrator uses "he" or "she." There are several kinds of third-person narrators. An omniscient narrator is all-knowing and has complete knowledge of all characters' thoughts and histories, as well as the story's events, settings, and contexts. An omniscient narrator can move freely between any number of characters. A limited-omniscient narrator has access to one or more (but not all) character's thoughts and some of the story's events and contexts. An intrusive narrator is one who offers comment, critique, interpretation, or additional information to readers about characters or events as he or she recounts events. An unintrusive narrator relates events with a minimum of commentary, observation, or interpretation. Unreliable or fallible narrators are those whose readers are given reasons to question or doubt the validity of their perspective. Readers can doubt a narrator's reliability or accuracy based on his or her age, intelligence, sanity, or relationship to the events. A self-conscious narrator is one who draws attention to the fact that he or she is narrating a work of fiction, as is often the case with metafiction. |
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| An offshoot of realism in American literature, Naturalism claimed to give an even more realistic and unflinching depiction of contemporary life. Naturalism was characterized by a pessimistic view of humanity and human existence; characters in Naturalist narratives have strong, instinctual, or animalistic drives; have little or no control over the events and forces that govern their lives; and their lives are frequently intertwined with social and economic forces beyond their control. |
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| A period of British literature spanning 1660-1785. The Neoclassical period is often divided into three subareas: the Restoration era, the Augustan age, and the Age of Sensibility. |
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