KNOWLEDGE
Glossary of English Language and Literature terminology
A
Adjective – This class of word is used to give extra information about a noun. Examples include red, beautiful, small, hot, bright, evil. Adjectives generally go before the noun (the beautiful, red car) or after a verb like ‘is’ (the car is red and beautiful).
Adverb – This class of word is mostly used to give extra information about a verb. Examples include quickly, horribly, beautifully, slowly, instinctively. Often they are adjectives with -ly at the end (brightly, happily, etc), but not always. Some adverbs, sometimes called intensifiers or adverbs of degree, are used to give extra information about adjectives (very, really).
Active voice – See entry for Voice (active and passive)
Allegory - An allegory is a narrative in which a character, place, or event is used to deliver a broader message about real-world issues and occurrences. Authors have used allegory throughout history to illustrate or convey complex ideas and concepts in ways that are comprehensible or striking. One famous example of an allegory is George Orwell’s Animal Farm, in which he uses a story about farm animals overthrowing their human rulers and taking over a farm to deliver a message about Communism. Another example is The Crucible in which Arthur Miller uses the Salem Witch Hunts as an allegory for the McCarthy ‘witch hunts’ for Communists in America.
Alliteration – This is when writers use several words close together (sometimes right next to one another) which begin with the same letter-sound (not just the same actual letter). For example: The kind kid crept down the queen’s corridor.
Anadiplosis – This is another patterning technique whereby the last word of a clause is repeated at the start of the next clause. For example: Aboard my ship, excellent performance is standard. Standard performance is sub-standard. Sub-standard performance is not allowed. The best example of anadiplosis, for me, is from Star Wars Episode 1, and it comes, of course, from Yoda: Fear leads to anger; anger leads to hatred; hatred leads to conflict; conflict leads to suffering. (It’s best if you read it in Yoda’s voice.) This is not a technique you should be analysing in your essays, but it is a useful technique to employ in your own writing. See also: Anaphora and Epistrophe.
Anaphora – This term (pronounced uh-NAH-fer-uh) refers to a specific form of repetition. It is when a writer repeats the same word or phrase at the start of successive sentences (or clauses). For example: It was the best of times; it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom; it was the age of foolishness. Another famous example of this comes from Winston Churchill: We shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans. We shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air. We shall defend our island, whatever the cost shall be. Anaphora is a useful device for your own writing and can be analysed in terms of how it emphasises certain things. See also: Epistrophe.
Antagonist – The principal foe or villain in a story. See also: Protagonist.
Antithesis – This term can be used in a few different but related ways. First of all, as a word antithesis simply means a person or thing that is the direct opposite of someone or something else. So we might say that someone was looking the very antithesis of relaxed as they waited for their job interview, or in an essay we might say that Mr Birling [a character]is the antithesis of everything J.B. Priestley [the writer] believes in. In essence, anthithesis used in this way is a strong synonym of ‘opposite’. It can also be used as the adjective antithetical (e.g. people whose religious beliefs are antithetical to mine). In additional to this, antithesis is also the name of a rhetorical device by which contrary ideas are expressed together in a balanced sentence or series of sentences to highlight the contrast. The easiest way to understand this is through examples. Here are three - you should be able to see the opposites in each: (1) evil men fear authority; good men cherish it. (2) We think too much and feel too little. (3) One small step for [a] man. One giant leap for mankind. In all of these cases we would say that the writer has used antithesis because they are trying to highlight the opposite nature of the ideas on either side of the sentence(s). This is different to a juxtaposition because with antithesis the ideas are being deliberately compared and contrasted; with juxtaposition the comparison is implied by the positioning of the contrasting things, but it is not explicitly stated. See also: Juxtaposition.
Antonym - a word opposite in meaning to another e.g. bad is the antonym of good. See also: Synonym
Article - This class of word is used to refer to a noun as either specific or unspecific. In English there are three articles: two indefinite articles (a and an) which both refer to an unspecific instance of a noun (a cake, a banjo, an apple) and one definite article (the) which refers to a specific instance of a noun (the cake, the banjo, the apple). Articles are a subset of determiners. See also: Determiner.
Aside - A stage direction which signals that a line or speech in a play is not heard by the other characters on stage. It is a way for playwrights to get characters to express their thoughts to the audience without the other characters hearing them. Shakespeare uses asides regularly in his plays. See also: Soliloquy.
Assonance – This is when writers repeat the same vowel sound several times in words that are close together. For example: The queen bee needs to pee but she is too embarrassed to leave the hive.
Asyndeton – This is when writers use no conjunctions between items in a list. This can create a sense of speed or simplicity, as in this famous example from Julius Caesar: I came, I saw, I conquered. This makes the conquest of Britain simpler and faster than I came, and then I saw, and then I conquered. Asyndeton is also often used to create the sense that the list could go on - it stops but there could be more to add; it’s not really over. Consider this example from Earl Spencer’s eulogy to his sister, Princess Diana: Diana was the very essence of compassion, of duty, of style, of beauty. Here the asyndeton creates the impression that Diana wasn’t just these things, she was more too. We don’t get the same finality that we would have got if it had been a regular list, like this: Diana was the very essence of compassion, of duty, of style and of beauty. The ‘and’ suggests that this is the end of the list: there is nothing more to add. But the asyndeton in the first example avoids that sense. Hopefully, you can feel the slight difference between these versions. This technique can also be called asyndetic listing. See also: Polysyndeton.
B
Bathos – One simple but effective way to create humour in your writing is to use a technique called bathos, often as part of the rule of three, though not always. To achieve this effect, rather than building up to a climax, as you normally would, you include the least important thing last as a deliberate anti-climax where the reader expects something grand or dramatic. For example: I am making a stand in this workplace for human decency, professional integrity, and free doughnuts at lunch-break. This sudden shift from the serious to the unserious is called bathos. You can also use it in non-list-based forms, as in this nice one-sentence example: He spent his final hour of life doing what he loved most: arguing with his wife. Hopefully, you can see how the bathos works here too — you’re expecting something serious, but you get something somewhat silly instead. Here’s one more quick example, this time from The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy by Douglas Adams, which uses bathos a lot to create humour: For a moment, nothing happened. Then, after a second or so, nothing continued to happen. Again, you’re expecting something serious but you get something unserious, in this moer nothing. This is bathos. See also: Climax (rule of three).
Bildungsroman – This is the technical term for what is often called a coming-of-age story. It is a literary genre that focuses on the psychological and moral growth of a character as they go from youth to adulthood (or just a different, later stage of youth). In these stories, character change is very important, as is, more often than not, a loss of innocence. Famous examples include Great Expectations, Jane Eyre, Little Women, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Perks of Being a Wallflower and Purple Hibiscus.
Biography – An account of someone's life written by someone else. An autobiography is an account of the writer’s own life.
Blank verse – Poetry with a regular metre (or rhythm) but without any rhyme. This is a useful term for describing poetry (e.g. The poet uses blank verse / Poem X is written in blank verse), but it’s also important for writing about Shakespeare as most of his plays are written in blank verse, using iambic pentameter for the metre. See also: Metre, Free verse and Iambic pentameter.
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Caesura - A pause occurring in a line of poetry (as opposed to at the end of a line of poetry), indicated by some form of punctuation (usually a comma or a full-stop).
Catalectic – This is a poetry term which describes a line of verse which has one syllable missing from the last foot in the line. (If you don’t understand what a foot is, read the entry on metre.) So, to give an example, the first line of Macbeth is in what is technically called catalectic trochaic tetrameter: When shall we three meet again. Here the feet are trochees (stressed-unstressed: DUM-di) and there seems to be four of them (tetrameter) but the last one has no second syllable – it is just gain (DUM). So, the metre should be DUM-di, DUM-di, DUM-di, DUM-di (trochaic tetrameter), but instead we get DUM-di, DUM-di, DUM-di, DUM. The final ‘di’ syllable is missing, making it catalectic. Another famous example of this comes from William Blake’s ‘The Tyger’: Tyger, Tyger Burning Bright / In the forests of the night. You should be able to hear the same rhythm here as in that line from Macbeth. The rhythm is trochaic tetrameter, but the final syllable is missing from each line, making it catalectic trochaic tetrameter. See also: Metre.
Characterisation – This is the term we use to describe the creation of a fictional character in a text (e.g. a novel, a play, a film, etc). For example, we might talk about the characterisation of Dumbledore in the Harry Potter books. It means all the different things the writer does to show the reader what that character is like. Characterisation can be done through basic things like physical description (he has a long beard) and personality description (e.g. he is a kind man), but also through more interesting, subtle things like the character’s thoughts, actions and speech, all of which help to show us what the character is like as a person.
Clause – This term describes the different parts that make up a sentence. The first thing to understand about clauses is that they need to have a main verb in them. That is a verb that carries tense - not just a participle like “being” or “eating”. For example: This sentence has two clauses because it has two main verbs (‘has’ in both clauses). However, despite being of a similar length (longer, in fact), this sentence has just one clause. This is because there is just one main verb in the sentence(‘has’ again) - it just has some adverbial phrases in it too. Once you’ve got that idea in your head, you can then consider the types of clauses. There are two principal types of clause: main clauses, which are fairly straightforward, and subordinate clauses, which are more complicated and which themselves come in three different flavours: adverbial, relative and conditional. We’ll summarise all of these here, but for more information about clauses and sentence types, see our separate guide to sentences. A main clause is a clause that can stand by itself. It needs a main verb, and generally has a subject and sometimes an object too. For example: I drive a bus. You need at least one main clause in every major sentence (that’s a full sentence). An adverbial subordinate clause (generally just called a subordinate clause) is a clause which adds additional information to a main clause, especially about how, when or why the action in the main clause happens. An adverbial subordinate clause starts with a subordinating conjunction, such as after, although, when, because, etc. For example: I will crash my bus into that lamp post unless I slam on the breaks. A relative subordinate clause (generally just called a relative clause) is used when we want to say a little more about a person or a thing without having to start a new sentence. Relative subordinate clauses start with a relative pronoun, such as that, who, which, or whose. For example: I bought a new bus that goes much faster than my old bus. Finally, a conditional subordinate clause (generally just called a conditional clause), provides a condition in which the main clause will happen, usually using if as the conjunction. For example: If my bus breaks down, I will be very cross. See also: Compound sentence, Complex sentence and Simple sentence.
Climax (rule of three) – When you use the rule of three, more often than not, you will build to a climax, where the last thing in your list is the most important or significant. Here’s an example: I stand before you today the representative of a family in grief, in a country in mourning, before a world in shock. See also: Bathos.
Complex sentence - A sentence with a main clause and one or more subordinate clauses. In a complex sentence the main clause is the key idea and any subordinate clauses are dependent on it - they tell us something more about the main clause. For example: I will crash my bus into that lamp post unless I slam on the breaks. Or: After my wife extravagantly sneezed in the tiny space capsule, she felt very embarrassed. For more information about sentence types, see our guide to sentences. See also: Clause, Compound sentence and Simple sentence.
Compound sentence - A sentence with multiple main clauses. In a compound sentence each main clause has equal grammatical importance. For example: I am a bus driver, and my wife is an astronaut. Or: I love buses; my wife loves space. For more information about sentence types, see our guide to sentences. See also: Clause, Complex sentence and Simple sentence.
Conflict – This is the term we use for the problem or problems that lie at the heart of a plot – the things that need to be resolved in order for the plot to end. It doesn’t just mean conflict in the conventional sense or people not getting on or arguing. It’s all the issues that the character or characters face. We can broadly think of conflict as coming in three types: conflict with others (when the protagonist of a story has some kind of disagreement or difficulty with another character; this could even include the conflict with a villain who needs to be defeated); conflict with the self (when there is some inner conflict that the protagonist has to overcome, like fear or insecurity); conflict with the environment (when the protagonist has to overcome a problem with the world; it could be climbing a difficult mountain, crossing a desert or even overcoming a problem in their society like racial injustice). These are all examples of conflict. The key thing to remember is that all plots must have conflict – otherwise they are just a series of things happening, rather than a plot. Plots end when conflicts are resolved.
Conjunction – This class of word is used to join things together in a sentence. Conjunctions can join either words or clauses, and they come in two flavours: co-ordinating conjunctions (to join things that are of equal importance) and subordinating conjunctions (to join things when one is more important than the other). For example: and, but, or, yet, so (co-ordinating conjunctions); after, although, as, because, before, once, until, since, though, unless, or when (sub-ordinating conjunctions).
Connotations – The connotations of a word are the ideas or feelings which come to mind when we hear the word, in addition to its literal or primary meaning. One straightforward way to understand this is with colours. Red has connotations of danger; blue has connotations of sadness. Other words have connotations too; for example, majestic has connotations of royalty. We can also talk about words having more positive or negative connotations, meaning they invoke more positive or negative feelings when we hear them. For example, thin and skinny mean about the same thing, but skinny has more negative connotations (it sounds like a criticism), whilst thin is fairly neutral. Another example would be walked and trudged, which mean the same sort of thing, but trudged has more negative connotations (it doesn’t sound like a walk done with joy).
Consonance - This is when writers repeat the same consonant sound several times in words that are close together. For example: The accordion clattered down the corridor, keeping awake the accountants, who were in quarantine.
Couplet - A block of poetic verse two lines long. Usually this would be a two-line stanza, though couplet can be used to describe any set of two lines – it doesn’t have to be its own stanza. See also: Tercet, Quatrain and Sestet.
D
Declarative sentence - A sentence mood for making statements. See entry for Sentence for a full description.
Denouement - This is part of the narrative structure of a story. It refers to the final part of a narrative, after the conflict has been resolved, in which the final strands of the plot are drawn together and everything comes to a nice close. It comes after the resolution at the end of the falling action. See also: Exposition, Falling action, Inciting incident, Resolution, Rising action and Structure.
Determiner – This class of word modifies a noun and tells us about how well that noun is known. There are different types of determiner, but they all have one thing in common – they go before a noun. Examples include a, an, the (called articles), this, that, those (called demonstratives), my, your (called possessives), some, every (called quantifiers). Possessive determiners (my, her, his, your, its) are often confused with pronouns, but the key difference is that determiners go before a noun (she drove her car to the airport) but pronouns replace a noun (she drove it to the airport – ‘car’ has been replaced in this example). See also: Article.
Diction - This term refers to the choice and use of words and phrases in speech or writing. So, if someone used lots of sophisticated words and phrases in a piece of writing, then we would say the diction was sophisticated. Or if they used lots of metaphors and similes, we might say diction was poetic. Or some advice from a teacher might be that you need to simplify the diction in your essays to make your meaning clearer. It’s just a handy way to refer to the kind of language someone uses.
Direct address - This is the term we use for when a writer speaks (or writes) directly to the reader/audience. It is most commonly done through the 2nd person pronoun ‘you’. For example: How did you feel when you first started school? You should be able to see that, in that example, the reader is directly addressed. The reader (you) was also directly addressed in the previous sentence. Direct address can also be done even more directly by using a person’s name. For example: This is an excellent essay, Ruby, very well done! Here ‘Ruby’ has been addressed directly through her name.
Direct Speech – This is the term we use when writers show readers exactly what a character is saying, using speech marks (“Hello,” the man said. “How are you?”). It is contrasted with indirect speech, when a character’s words are reported but not stated exactly and no speech marks are used (The main said hello and asked how I was.) Direct speech is good for characterisation because it really conveys the character’s voice. It is also good for slowing a story down to make a section more dramatic.
Discourse marker - Discourse markers are words or phrases like well, so, anyway, right, okay, as I say, to begin with. We use them to connect, organise and manage what we say or write or to express attitude. For example: So, I’ve decided I’m going to go to the bank and ask for a car loan. Or: Right, let’s get started. We need to get the suitcases into the car. Or: Anyway, is that it? Has anyone got any questions? Or: What do I mean by feet? Well, this takes a bit of explaining. Some discourse markers are very common in spoken language (So, well, oh, I mean, like, anyway, look, now, etc) and others are more common in written language (in conclusion, firstly, moreover, on the other hand, ultimately, essentially, etc). You need to use appropriate discourse markers to make your writing flow naturally, feel organised and feel authentic.
Dramatic irony – This is the term we use to describe situations when the reader or audience are aware of something that a character or set of characters are not aware of. There is dramatic irony, for example, in An Inspector Calls when Mr Birling calls the Titanic “unsinkable.” The play is set before the Titanic launched but it was performed afterwards, meaning the audience would know that it did, in fact, sink, making Birling look arrogant and foolish when he says this. This is classic example of dramatic irony. Another oft-used example is when two characters in a play (or a TV show or whatever) are talking about another character, who happens to be standing behind them, somewhere out of sight. We, the audience, know this third character can hear everything the others are saying about him, but the characters themselves don’t know this. This creates dramatic irony. Dramatic irony can be used in prose fiction (e.g. novels) too. It might be that the reader has learnt something in a previous chapter which the characters in the current chapter don’t know about. This, too, would be dramatic irony.
Dramatic monologue – This term describes poems which are written from a perspective that is very different to the poet. In a dramatic monologue the speaker is very clearly a character created by the poet who is delivering the content of the poem. Examples of dramatic monologues from the GCSE anthology include ‘Porphyria’s Lover’ by Robert Browning and ‘The Farmer’s Bride’ by Charlotte Mew.
E
End-stop – This term describes the punctuation at the end of a line of verse which creates a pause. For example, we might say that the fifth and sixth lines of a particular poem are end-stopped if they have a comma, a full-stop or some equivalent punctuation at the end of them. This punctuation would be called an end-stop. End-stopped lines are contrasted with enjambed lines, which have no punctuation at the end. Consider the first three lines of ‘Wild Geese’ by Mary Oliver: You do not have to be good. / You do not have to walk on your knees / for a hundred miles through the desert repenting. The first and third lines have an end-stop but the second does not. See also: Enjambment.
Enjambment – This term describes the running over of a sentence into the next line of a poem, without a pause at the end of the line. It is also sometimes called a run-on line. This is what you get when a line of a poem is not end-stopped. Lines of a poem that are not end-stopped are enjambed. Consider the first three lines of ‘Wild Geese’ by Mary Oliver: You do not have to be good. / You do not have to walk on your knees / for a hundred miles through the desert repenting. The second line is enjambed because the sentence runs over into the third line without a pause. See also: End-stop.
Epistolary fiction – This is any fiction written as a series of documents. The most common form is letters, but diary entries, newspaper clippings and other documents are sometimes used. Recently, electronic documents such as blogs, and e-mails and social media communication have also come into use. The epistolary form can add greater realism to a story because it mimics the workings of real life, without needing to use any kind of omniscient (all-knowing) narrator.
Epistrophe – A rhetorical device that uses patterning where writers repeat the final word at the end of successive clauses or sentences. This is essentially the opposite of anaphora, and is often used in conjunction with parallelism. He's learning fast. Are you earning fast? It might even be used over several clauses as in this passage from a speech by Martin Luther King: With this faith we will be able to work together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day. This is not a technique you should be analysing in your essays, but it’s a useful technique to employ in your own writing. See also: Anaphora, Anadiplosis and Parallelism.
Ethos – This is the first of the three pillars of Ancient Greek rhetoric (persuasive language). The Greeks felt that, if a person was going to persuade their audience, the first thing they would need to do was to establish that they are somebody worth listening to. This is ethos. This could be achieved by mentioning qualifications, by sounding knowledgeable about the topic, by relating personal experience, by using long words, etc. See also: Logos and Pathos.
Euphemism - A mild or indirect word or expression substituted for one considered to be too harsh or blunt when referring to something unpleasant or embarrassing. Well-known examples include ‘passed away’ as a euphemism for ‘died’ or ‘downsizing’ to mean ‘firing people from their jobs’. Shakespeare uses lots of euphemisms for murder in Macbeth: I have done the deed, for example.
Exclamatory sentence - A sentence mood for making statements forcefully. See entry for Sentence for a full description.
Exposition – This is part of the narrative structure of a story. The exposition is the part of a story in which the necessary background information is introduced to the reader/audience. It is the set-up for the story, essentially – the background information which tells us about the setting, the characters' backstories, prior plot events, historical context, etc. In the typical description of narrative structure, the exposition is the first part of the narrative (Once upon a time there was a… etc), and it comes before the inciting incident, which gets the story going. See also: Denouement, Falling action, Inciting incident, Resolution, Rising action and Structure.
Extended metaphor – See entry for Metaphor
F
Falling action - This is part of the narrative structure of a story. The falling action is the part the comes after the climax, leading to the resolution at the end of the story. How do the characters respond to the climax? How are the conflicts finally brought to a resolution? The falling action is the part of the story that deals with this. For example, in Cinderella, the falling action involves the prince’s search for the owner of the glass slipper, which ends with the resolution, when he finally discovers that it belongs to Cinderella. The falling action is generally much shorter than the rising action, which is the part which forms the bulk of the story. See also: Denouement, Exposition, Inciting incident, Resolution, Rising action and Structure.
Fiction - Literature that describes imaginary events and people (e.g. novels). Non-fiction is anything that is describing true events and real people (e.g. biography).
Figurative language – This is the general term we use to describe all the different techniques where writers use comparison between two things to convey additional, more complex aspects of meaning. The three main types of figurative language are metaphors, similes and personification, which all have separate entries in this glossary. See also: Metaphor, Personification and Simile.
Flashback - This is a special kind of timeshift in which the narrative jumps backwards in time and then tells an episode of the story from an earlier time. Flashbacks are different to regular backwards timeshifts because they last much longer – several paragraphs at least, if not several pages - and they include direct speech and regular storytelling devices. You should use flashbacks sparingly, or perhaps not at all, in your assessment writing as you will rarely have time to tell a complete story which includes a sizeable flashback. See also: Timeshift.
Foil - A character could be described as a foil character (or as a foil for another character) if they have been created by the writer to deliberate contrast another character in order to shine a light on that character’s characteristics, especially their flaws. Here are some examples from texts we study at SHSG. We could say that Amaka is a foil for Kambili in Purple Hibiscus. And, likewise, Auntie Ifeoma is a foil for Papa. In Macbeth, Banquo is a foil for Macbeth, and in An Inspector Calls, Sheila and Eva are foils for one another. We might say that Fred is a foil for Scrooge in A Christmas Carol too.
Foreshadowing – We say a writer is using foreshadowing when they hint at something which will happen later on in a story. Foreshadowing helps the reader to develop expectations about what is to come. For example, a writer might have a small bad thing happen (an animal dying) to foreshadow a bigger bad thing later (a character dying in the same way). Here we would say that the death of the animal foreshadowed the death of the human character. Or two schoolboys might discuss how strict their English teacher is at the start of a story to foreshadow the harsh punishment that the teacher will give one of them later in the story. Foreshadowing prevents a reader from feeling too shocked or cheated by events in a story. It should be subtle, though, not obvious – you don’t want to make the story predictable. Foreshadowing done well means that afterwards we experience a sense of satisfaction because we think, “Of course that was going to happen,” even though we hadn’t realised it beforehand.
Form – This is the term we use to describe a type of literary text. There are three forms that matter to you: the novel, the poem and the play. Each of these forms have different distinct features (and terminology). For example, plays have lines and stanzas and rhyme schemes. We don’t find these in novels, though novels have chapters, which we don’t find in poems or plays. There are too many examples of different form features to list here, but when you are asked to analyse the form of a text it means you are analysing one of the features that is distinct to that particular form of text (poem, play or novel).
Free verse – A type of poetry that does not use a consistent rhythm or rhyme. Different lines of the poem have different metres. See also: Metre and Verse.
H
Hyperbole (pronounced ‘high-per-buh-lee’) – This is the term we use when somebody exaggerates something in such a way that it is clear that they are exaggerating. They exaggerate for effect, in other words. For example, a person might say, “My English homework took me an hour last night!” when really they spent about forty minutes on it. This would be exaggeration, but not hyperbole as it’s not clear that they didn’t spend an hour on it. However, it would be hyperbole if they said, “I’ve been working on that English essay for a hundred years.” Here we are not meant to believe they’ve been doing it for that long — they just mean it’s taken them a long time. It’s like when people say, “I’ve told you a hundred times,” when they clearly haven’t, or when people say, “This is the worst thing that’s ever happened to me,” when it clearly isn’t. Exaggeration for effect in this way is called hyperbole.
I
Iambic pentameter – A term for a particular poetic metre, which describes lines of a poem that are ten syllables long using five stressed-unstressed syllable feet, called iambs. Iambic pentameter goes di-DUM di-DUM di-DUM di-DUM di-DUM. You will encounter iambic pentameter when you look at Shakespeare (it’s the metre he uses for the verse in his plays) and also the sonnet form of poem (including Shakespeare’s sonnets). See also: Metre.
Idiom - An idiom is a short phrase whose meaning is generally known to people through usage but whose meaning is not generally easy to determine unless you already know the meaning. This is easier to understand with examples than with a definition. Here are some English idioms: over the moon, see the light, through thick and thin, break the ice, call it a day, bite the bullet, throw caution to the wind, burn your bridges, hang in there, a perfect storm, it takes two to tango, a blessing in disguise, actions speak louder than words, add insult to injury, barking up the wrong tree, better late than never, by the skin of my teeth, don’t put all your eggs in one basket, etc. There are literally hundreds of idioms, many of which you probably know without thinking about it. Idioms are one of the hardest parts of a language for a non-native speaker to learn.
Imagery – This is the general term for anything sensory that we are asked to imagine in a story or a poem or a play. If there is a description of a garden, for example, with the flowers and the lawn and the lawnmower and the smell of freshly mown grass and the bees buzzing around, all of that is imagery. We have imagery of flowers, imagery of freshly mown grass, imagery of buzzing, etc. We can also group imagery together, so flowers, grass and bees would all be imagery of nature (or natural imagery), and a gravestone, a coffin and a corpse would all be imagery of death (or death imagery), and so on. Imagery can relate to any of the 5 senses: it is anything in a text that we are asked to imagine the sensory experience of (a sight, a sound, a smell, a taste or a touch). It might seem as if this is everything in a story, but that’s not true. For example, if you look at the last sentence in this paragraph (It might seem as if …etc), you will see there is no imagery in that sentence: you are not being asked to imagine anything. But when you are, we call that imagery. When you write about imagery in an essay, more often than not you will be writing about patterns of imagery (e.g. natural imagery, death imagery, etc).
Imperative sentence - A sentence mood for commands. See entry for Sentence for a full description.
Inciting incident – This is part of the narrative structure of a story. The inciting incident is the event in a narrative that gets the story going. It is the event that brings about the rest of the plot, and it comes after the exposition. In Cinderella, for example, the inciting incident is the visitation of the Fairy Godmother – this is the bit when the main plot kicks off. In Macbeth, the inciting incident comes when the witches deliver the first set of prophecies. In A Christmas Carol, the inciting incident is the visit of Marley’s ghost. In A Monster Calls, it is the visit of the Monster. In An Inspector Calls, it is the visit of the Inspector. And so on. The Inciting incident begins the rising action of a story. See also: Denouement, Exposition, Falling action, Resolution, Rising action and Structure.
In medias res - This term is Latin and literally means “in the midst of things”. It is used to describe the structure of a story. A story begins in medias res when it starts in the middle of the action, rather than at the beginning of the plot. These stories then use timeshifts and flashbacks to fill the reader in on what happened earlier. You should almost always start your assessment stories in medias res. It is very hard to tell a story in the amount of time you have in an assessment and so, by starting in the middle of the action, you cut straight to the most interesting thing while getting extra marks for using a non-linear structure. See entries for: Flashback, Structure and Timeshift.
Indirect Speech – This is also sometimes called reported speech. It is when we are told what somebody said without being given the exact words they used (The main said hello and asked how I was). Indirect speech is useful for speeding up a piece of dialogue. Consider this example: the teacher explained to us what we needed to do in the lesson and said that we’d be in detention if we didn’t get it done on time. In this example, lots of words were presumably used by the teacher, but we don’t have to read them all because the exact words aren’t important; we just get the gist of it through the indirect speech, which makes it less boring to read.
Intensifier - See entry for adverb.
Interrogative sentence - A sentence mood for asking questions. See entry for Sentence for a full description.
Irony – This term is notoriously difficult to understand, and it used in several different ways to mean things which seem almost unconnected to one another, despite the same word being used to describe them. The simplest form of irony is when words are used to mean something other than what they suggest, often the opposite of what they suggest. This kind of irony (sometimes called verbal irony) is like sarcasm, but without the teeth. For example: Her voice heavy with irony, Simone said, "We're so pleased you were able to stay so long." (e.g. she wasn’t pleased at all.) There is also something that is sometimes called situational irony, where the outcome is humorously opposite to what might be expected. So, for example, it a weatherman is getting married, and the weather is terrible, we might say that this is ironic. Or if a country builds loads of weapons which they sell to another country, and then that country uses the weapons to attack the country that built them, we might say that it was ironic. This meaning or irony seems to have little to do with the other meaning of verbal irony, but the same word is used. There is also dramatic irony, which has a different meaning again. This version of irony has its own entry in this glossary, however, and it’s s the one you’re most likely to write about in your essays, so you should read about it in that entry. See also: Dramatic irony.
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Juxtaposition – When two contrasting things are placed side-by-side (or very near to one another – e.g. in the same paragraph or in two consecutive paragraphs), we call that a juxtaposition. So, if something really good happens in a story immediately before something really bad happens, then we would say those two things are juxtaposed. Or, take this sentence: The bright summer sun shone on the field of roses and on the man’s mutilated corpse. Here there is a clear juxtaposition between the sunshine/flowers and the mutilated corpse. It is only juxtaposition if the contrasting things are placed side-by-side – this is important. We wouldn’t say there was a juxtaposition between something at the start of a story and something at the end; that is just a contrast. To be juxtaposition they have to be placed side-by-side. Also, with juxtaposition the writer is not explicitly comparing or contrasting the two juxtaposed things: with juxtaposition the comparison is implied only by the positioning. The contrasting items are placed side-by-side and the reader is expected to notice the contrast without being told about it. See also: Antithesis.
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Length (of a line of poetry) – The length of a line of poetry refers to the number of syllables in that line. So we might say that a poem with ten syllable lines has longer lines than a poem with eight syllable lines. It doesn’t matter how long the actual lines are (to look at on a page) – it’s just the number of syllables.
Listing – This one is pretty self-explanatory. It’s when writers include lists of things in their writing, often to emphasise that there is a lot of something, so many, in fact, that the writer needs to use a list to report them all. It’s basic, but it’s not to be overlooked when you’re looking for methods to analyse.
Logos – This is second of the three pillars of Ancient Greek rhetoric (persuasive language). The Greeks felt that, if a person was going to persuade their audience, they would need to make good, logical arguments. This is logos. It is your reasoning. It’s about making sense. You need to have premises which follow on and build from one another in a clear and logical way. See also: Ethos and Pathos.
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Main clause - see entry for Clause.
Major sentence - A major sentence is any sentence which has a main verb in it. It is, in essence, a full sentence, a proper sentence. For example: Johnny ate the apple. Major sentences are contrasted with minor sentences, which are incomplete sentences (sometimes called fragments). For example: Johnny ate the rotten apple. The rotten apple! In this example we have a major sentence (“Johnny ate the apple”) followed by a minor sentence (“The rotten apple!”). See also: Minor sentence
Metaphor – This is when a writer compares something to something else by saying that it is that thing, rather than saying that it is simply like that thing (as in a simile). A metaphor is a slightly stronger comparison. For example: Your face is a poem; your eyes are a symphony. When analysing a metaphor, the trick is to work out what the two things being compared have in common: what do a face and a poem have in common? What do eyes and a symphony have in common? A poem can be beautiful and complex and moving and hard to figure out; a face can be these things too. That, we might say, is the extra meaning added by the metaphor: it implies the face is beautiful and excites the emotions, but it’s not straight-forward or obvious; it is the kind of face that requires careful study, but that yields a worthwhile reward as a result, just like a poem. That’s one way we could analyse that metaphor. (For more examples of this kind of analysis see the entry for ‘simile’.) An extended metaphor is a metaphor that is used multiple times, often in different ways, over the course of a single story or poem, but the same principal applies when it comes to analysing it.
Metre – This is the term for describing the rhythm of a piece of poetry, determined by the number and type of feet used in a line. What are feet? Well, this takes a bit of explaining. The foot is the basic repeating rhythmic unit that forms part of a line of verse. Each foot consists of several syllables, usually two or three, and the syllables can either be stressed or unstressed. The easiest way to get your head around this is with examples. The most common metrical feet in English poetry are the iamb, the trochee and the dactyl. The iamb is two syllables long, with an unstressed-stressed pattern (di-DUM). Here’s a line of verse with five iambs, from Macbeth (the stressed syllables form the beat and are in bold): That struts and frets his hour upon the stage. Hopefully, you can just about see that the rhythm of this line is di-DUM (that struts) di-DUM (and frets) di-DUM (his hour) di-DUM (up-on) di-DUM (the stage). Like the iamb, the trochee is also two syllables long, but with the opposite pattern, stressed-unstressed (DUM-di rather than di-DUM). Here's a line of (terrible) verse with four trochees: Eager Tiger Drinking Cider (DUM-di, DUM-di, DUM-di, DUM-di). Finally, the dactyl has three syllables, with the pattern stressed-unstressed-unstressed (DUM-di-di). Here’s a line of (bad) verse with five dactyls: Endlessly out of the mockingbird’s musical melody (DUM-di-di, DUM-di-di, DUM-di-di, DUM-di-di, DUM-di-di). With all of these examples, you should be able to say the line out loud and hear the rhythm, especially if you exaggerate it a bit when you say it, putting more stress than is natural on the bold part. Ok, assuming you’re still with us, let’s now bring this back to metre. The metre of a line of verse (and generally a whole poem) is determined by the metrical foot that is used (iamb, trochee, dactyl, etc) and the number of these feet that are used in each line. Again, there are lots of terms here for the number, but we’ll just cover the two most important ones. If there are five feet in a line, we call it pentameter; if there are four feet in a line, we call it tetrameter. So, a metre with four iambs would be iambic tetrameter (di-DUM di-DUM di-DUM di-DUM). A metre with four trochees would be trochaic tetrameter (DUM-di, DUM-di, DUM-di, DUM-di). A line with five iambs would be iambic pentameter (di-DUM di-DUM di-DUM di-DUM di-DUM). A line with five dactyls would be dactylic pentameter (DUM-di-di, DUM-di-di, DUM-di-di, DUM-di-di, DUM-di-di). And so on. See also: Iambic pentameter and Verse.
Minor sentence - A minor sentence is a sentence which is not grammatically complete, usually because it doesn’t have a main verb in it. These are sometimes called fragment sentences. Consider the following short passage, in which the underlined sentences are all minor sentences: Sally put her hand up. Right up in the air. She waved it around in the hope her teacher would see. Silence. More waving. More silence. Sally gave up and put her hand down. You should be able to see that these are not full sentences - they’re just words or phrases with a full stop at the end. Like this. Or this. Or even this. These are called minor sentences, and they are contrasted to Major sentences, which are full sentences. See also: Major sentences
Modal verb – These words are used to change the meaning of other verbs. They can express meanings such as certainty, ability, or obligation. The main modal verbs are will, would, can, could, may, might, shall, should, must and ought.
Morphology - This is the term for one of the key processes by which languages create meaning. The meanings of regular words (called root words) can be amended by adding morphemes at the start or end of the word (prefixes and suffixes, respectively). This process of making new meanings is called morphology. It’s easiest to understand in an example. Take the word print. This verb can be turned into an adjective with the addition of the morpheme -able at the end, making printable (meaning something that can be printed). In turn, this adjective can be amended further with the morpheme re- at the start, making reprintable (meaning something that be printed multiple times). We can then tweak the morpheme at the end, going from -able to -ability, turning the adjective into a noun: reprintability (meaning the capacity for something to be printed multiple times). There are many, many different morphemes in English, which can change the word class of a word or alter its meaning in some way. We could make unreprintability, for instance, by adding the morpheme un- to the start. Or we could use the morpheme -er to make reprinter (someone who prints things multiple times). You could apply this same system to almost any verb in English. Try it yourself with these verbs: drive and plant.
Motif – This term (pronounced moh-teef) is a bit more complex than most of the terms in this glossary. There are debates about what exactly constitutes a motif, but I’ll try to explain it as simply as possible here. (If you want a much more detailed explanation, that goes through all the different ways this term can be used, there is an excellent one on LitCharts here.) The easiest way to think about a motif is as a symbol that recurs throughout a work of literature and which is used in different ways to convey ideas about a major theme. For example, blood is not just a symbol but a motif in Macbeth. It is a symbol, yes, but it is one that recurs sufficiently often, and in sufficiently complex ways, that we would also call it a motif (it represents guilt, but also violence and the relationship between these two things). We might say the same about fire or the beast in Lord of the Flies. They are both symbols, but they are complex and recurring images whose meanings change slightly in different situations in the novel. The same could be said of the wallpaper in The Yellow Wallpaper. This is arguably not just a symbol but a motif. Motifs could be particular words, like blood or a particular colour, or images or even characters. It’s a good idea to read around this term to help make sure you’re using it correctly. See also: Symbolism.
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Narrative Voice – When writers tell stories, they can use different types of narrator, and we call these the narrative voice of the story (essentially, the voice of the narrator). These come in 1st person (I), 3rd person (he/she) and, sometimes, 2nd person (you). When writing in a 3rd person narrative voice, writers also have to decide how much their narrator knows. Do they know the thoughts of all the characters and everything that happens to everyone, or are there things the narrator doesn’t know? If they know everything, we call them an omniscient narrator (meaning all-knowing, like a god). On the other end of the spectrum, writers can have their third person narrator only know the thoughts of one character, a bit like a 1st person narrator but from the 3rd person. This is called a 3rd person limited narrator (meaning limited to one character at a time).
Noun – This class of word is used to refer to things. They can be real, concrete things like a car or a butterfly, or they can be abstract things like religion or politics or happiness. There are various ways to test to see if something is a noun. Generally, nouns will fit into this sentence: I like _____. So we can’t say I like beautiful, or I like very, but we can say I like cars or I like politics or I like butterflies (though, note, we do need to pluralise the noun – we can’t say I like butterfly or I like lamp – we need to say butterflies or lamps).
Novel – A novel is relatively long work of narrative fiction, written in prose (normal language) rather than poetry, which represents characters and action with some degree of realism. To be considered a novel, a story generally has to be more than about 40,000 words long, but it also has to include sufficient depth and detail to its characters. Shorter works of fiction are either called short stories (less than 17,000 words) or novellas (between about 17,000 and 40,000 words).
O
Object (of a sentence) – see entry for Subject.
Onomatopoeia – This is when writers use a word that sounds like the thing it describes. Sometimes examples are very straightforwardly a word for a sound, such as moo, bang, crackle, etc. However, sometimes words just happen to sound a bit like the thing they’re describing, (ooze, flinty, wobble), and we call that onomatopoeia too. The effect of this technique is mostly that it makes the sounds a bit more vivid in the reader’s mind.
Oxymoron – This is when two opposing words are used together to describe something such that it doesn’t really make sense, but we can still understand it on some level. For example, deafening silence. This is impossible, nobody can be deafened by silence, but it makes sense to us. Other examples include, beautifully ugly or this famous list of oxymorons from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet: Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health! Still-waking sleep…
P
Paradox - A paradox is a seemingly absurd or contradictory statement which when investigated may prove to be well founded or true. One of the most famous examples of paradox is in George Orwell’s Animal Farm, where the final rule of the animals on the farm eventually becomes: All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others. Shakespeare uses several of them in the first scene of Macbeth too: when the battle’s lost and won (how can a battle be lost and won?) and, most famously, fair is foul and foul is fair. Arguable the master of paradox was Oscar Wilde. Here are some of his most famous ones: I can resist anything but temptation; I have the simplest tastes - I am always satisfied with the best. And perhaps best of all (though I’m not convinced Wilde actually said this): a good friend will always stab you in the front.
Paragraph – A paragraph is one of the different units that words can be organised into in a piece of prose writing (along with sentences and chapters). Paragraphs consist of one or more sentences, which are related to one another in some way, and they help break up a long text so it’s easier to read. If you are analysing paragraphs, you need to think about why the writer has decided to group that sentence or those sentences into one paragraph, rather than multiple paragraphs. Why exactly those sentences? One general rule is that the more important something is the larger the unit is that gets dedicated to it. Imagine these words: Tina cried. If it wasn’t that important, I might use those words as part of a sentence (…, and then Tina cried while Alfie continued to put the dishes away.) If I wanted it to seem more important, I’d make it its own sentence, with no other words: Tina cried. And if it was even more important, I’d put that sentence in its own paragraph, so it was alone on a line in the story; just Tina cried and no other words. And if it was even more important than that, I’d make that paragraph the only paragraph in a whole chapter! The reader would really recognise its importance then
Parallelism – This is a patterning technique by which a writer uses similar patterns of grammatical structure and length. It’s easiest to understand through example. Compare these two examples. This one uses simple parallelism with its adjectives: Alfred tried to make the law clear, precise, and equitable. This one does not: King Alfred tried to make clear laws that had precision and were equitable. As a result, it doesn’t flow very well. Parallelism can be used to powerful effect when more parallel structures are used. For example: The bigger they are, the harder they fall. Or: Her purpose was to impress the ignorant, to perplex the dubious, and to startle the complacent. Or this lengthy example from Shakespeare’s Richard II: I'll give my jewels for a set of beads, / My gorgeous palace for a hermitage, / My gay apparel for an almsman's gown, / My figured goblets for a dish of wood. It is very effective for making your writing flow nicely.
Participles (past and present) – There are two special forms of a verb that are called the past participle and the present participle. The present participle is very straightforward – that is the -ing version of the verb, and it can be used to form the progressive version of a tense (she was walking) or it can be used as a noun (walking is fun). The past participle is most straightforwardly recognised as the -en form of a verb in sentences like she has written the answer (perfect tense), or the cake was eaten quickly (passive voice). The past participle is harder to spot, though, because sometimes it is the -u- version of verbs like sing and swim (she had sung the song before; she has swum the English Channel several times), and sometimes it is simply identical to the normal past tense version of the verb (made, cried, killed, etc).
Passive voice – see entry for Voice (active and passive)
Pathetic fallacy – This technique is used when the writer makes the environment (usually the weather) represent something going on in the story. So, if a character is sad, for example, the writer decides to have it rain in the story; or if a character feels threatened the writer might include a storm; if a character is feeling trapped the writer might describe the room they’re in to make it sound really small and cramped. It is often combined with personification when the environment is given emotions too (the angry wind).
Pathos - This is third of the three pillars of Ancient Greek rhetoric (persuasive language). The Greeks felt that, if a person was going to persuade their audience, they would need to reach them emotionally as well as rationally. They would need to appeal to their heart as well as their head. This is called pathos. It involves using language and ideas to get an emotional response from the audience – using language to make them feel something. You need to appeal to your audience’s emotions to make your words memorable and to really affect and change their mind. Common emotions that writers often appeal to include pity, pride, admiration, anger, outrage and fear. See also: Ethos and Pathos.
Personification – This is when writers give inanimate objects (things that don’t have feelings or personalities) human qualities. Sometimes this is easy to spot if those qualities are feelings (the angry wind), but it can also be when inanimate things are given human actions (The wind whispered through dry grass, the lightning danced across the sky). We would call these examples personification too.
Positioning – This is the term we use for the way representation is used in different types of non-fiction text. When something is positioned in a particular way, it means that thing has been represented in that way in the text. There are three basic types of positioning: writer, reader and other. Writer positioning is the way writers (and speakers) represent themselves in a text, revealing their own attitudes and values through the writing. What are they like? Are they unified with their audience or in opposition with them? Audience positioning is the way the text positions its audience, considering the assumptions it makes about them and the way they are represented. What are they like? Are they like the writer/speaker or different? The positioning of others and ideas is the way the text represents individuals, events, and institutions other than the writer/speaker and audience. Positioning is connected to representation, and it’s an important aspect of non-fiction writing. It is often done through the use of pronouns: I = writer positioning; you = audience positioning; they = positioning of others. When you are writing non-fiction pieces you need to think about how you position yourself, your audience and anyone else you write about. See also: Representation.
Preposition – A preposition links a following noun or pronoun to some other word in the sentence. Prepositions often describe locations or directions, but can describe other things too, such as relations of time. Examples include to, of, from, since, before, etc. Some prepositions, like before and since, can also be used as subordinating conjunctions.
Poem – A poem is a piece of writing in which the expression of feelings and ideas is given additional intensity by the way language is used. Sometimes poems use rhythm (the way the stresses in the words are combined) and rhyme, but not always. Blank verse is unrhymed, for example, and free verse is unrhymed and does not have a fixed rhythm either. However, it is still poetry because it is written in such way that a lot of meaning is conveyed in relatively few words, often through powerful imagery or interesting figurative language (metaphors, similes, personification).
Polysyndeton – This is when writers use many conjunctions to achieve an overwhelming effect. For example: For A Level, I am taking Biology and English and History and Maths and Music. All those ands help to make the student sound like she is doing a LOT. Here is another example: We went upstairs, through period bedrooms swathed in rose and lavender silk and vivid with new flowers, through dressing-rooms and poolrooms, and bathrooms with sunken baths. This helps create a sense of how excessive the luxurious the house is. This technique can also be called polysyndetic listing. See also: Asyndeton.
Pronoun – These words stand in for nouns and they allow us to refer to things without having to keep repeating the noun over and over again. For example: Amanda waved at Michael. She knew she would miss him; he was her best friend. In these two sentences, the pronouns are she, him and he (her is a determiner, not a pronoun). Without pronouns, we would end up repeating nouns all the time, which sounds weird. For example: Amanda waved at Michael. Amanda knew Amanda would miss Michael; Michael was Amanda’s best friend. See? Weird.
Prose – This is the term we use to describe writing that does not have any kind of specific rhythm. Prose is, essentially, ordinary written language. Novels are written in prose, for example. So is this glossary. So are short stories, essays, newspapers, text messages, etc. Prose is almost all written language except poetry and certain plays, like those written by Shakespeare, which are predominantly in verse. See also: Verse.
Protagonist – The main character in a story. It is possible for a story to have multiple protagonists. See also: Antagonist.
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Quatrain - A block of poetic verse four lines long. Usually this would be a four-line stanza, though quatrain can be used to describe any set of four lines – it doesn’t have to be its own stanza. See also: Couplet, Tercet and Sestet.
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Relative clause - see entry for Clause.
Repetition – This is when writers deliberately repeat a word or phrase in such a way that the reader is meant to notice it. We wouldn’t talk about the repetition of ‘is’ in the previous sentence, for example; or the repetition of ‘the’ in this sentence. It’s just that those words happen to be used more than once. But when something is clearly being repeated for a reason, we call that repetition. If you’re analysing repetition, you need to remember that the writer is expecting you to recall the first example when you read the second one (the repeated one). From this you need to decide why. Sometimes it might be emphasising something by saying it more than once (This was the first time he had ever fallen in love … It was the first time he had ever fallen in love.). Or, if the second repetition is in a different situation from the first time it was used, it might be drawing your attention to the fact something has changed. But what? Figuring this out will help you to analyse it.
Representation – This is the process by which the media presents the ‘real world’ to an audience. Media texts construct meanings about the world – a picture, a film, a television programme or a newspaper article re-presents the world for its audience, and therefore shapes our understanding of what the real world is life. This process is called representation. See also: Positioning.
Resolution - This is part of the narrative structure of a story. The resolution comes at the end of the falling action, when all the conflicts in the stories are resolved. This doesn’t necessarily mean that all the conflicts end, as such, some resolutions can be more ambiguous, and in the hands of an expert storyteller some conflicts can even be left unresolved, but there must be enough resolution for the story to feel like it can come to an end in a way that is satisfying for the audience. See also: Denouement, Exposition, Falling action, Inciting incident, Rising action and Structure.
Rhyme scheme - This is the term we use for the system of rhyme that a writer uses in a block of rhymed verse. It describes the distribution of the rhymes in the verse - which lines rhyme with which, in other words. Rhyme schemes are written using letters of the alphabet, with each matching letter corresponding to a rhyme. So, for example, we might say there is an ABAB rhyme scheme in a block of 4 lines of verse. This would mean that the 1st line rhymes with the 3rd line, and the 2nd line rhymes with the 4th line. Or, for example, an ABCACD rhyme scheme would mean that the 1st and 4th lines rhyme (A), and that the 3rd and 5th lines rhyme (C), but that the 2nd and 6th lines are not rhymed, and have a different sound at the end from the A and C lines, and from each other. There are also some common rhyme schemes that are sometimes given shorthand names. For example, an ‘alternating’ rhyme scheme is one where every other line rhymes (e.g. ABAB CDCD), and an ‘envelope’ rhyme scheme describes a quatrain (a 4-line verse) where the 1st and 4th lines rhyme and form a kind of envelope around the rhyming couplet in the middle (ABBA CDDC). There are lots of reasons a poet might use a particular rhyme scheme, but generally speaking, regular rhyme in a poem creates a sense of harmony, a sense that things are in accord with one another, and irregular rhyme conveys the opposite. That said, the envelope rhyme scheme (ABBA) is often used to create a circular structure (a return to the start at the end), which can sometimes convey the idea that the speaker of the poem is struggling to move forward from wherever they are. But you’ll need to think about the meaning of each specific poem to see if any of these added meanings apply. See also: Couplet, Quatrain, Sonnet and Verse.
Rising action – This is part of the narrative structure of a story. The rising action of a story contains the events which explore and develop its conflict up until the climax. It is generally the majority of the story, in which very often, things “get worse”: someone makes a wrong decision, the antagonist hurts the protagonist, new characters further complicate the plot, etc. For example, in Cinderella, the rising action of the story takes us from the appearance of the Fairy Godmother (the inciting incident) right up to the climax, when Cinderella has to flee the ball, leaving her glass slipper behind. In A Christmas Carol, the rising action takes us from the appearance of Marley’s ghost (the inciting incident) to the climactic moment when Scrooge sees his own grave and vows to become a better man. See also: Denouement, Exposition, Falling action, Inciting incident, Resolution and Structure.
Rule of three – This is the principal that things work well when grouped into threes. Sometimes these sets of three are called triads or triplets. It all means the same thing. The thinking is that when we get to the second item in the list, we notice the pattern, subconsciously at least, and so the third item feels rewarding since we kind of saw it coming. For example: The government of the people, for the people and by the people. Triads usually end in either a climax or an anti-climax (bathos), depending on the effect you want to create. See also: Climax and Bathos.
S
Semantic field - A semantic field is a set of words grouped by meaning. Words from the same semantic field have a particular meaning in common. For example, words from the semantic field of nature include tree, plant, flower, grass, lion, etc. All of these words have the meaning of nature in common with one another. Words from the semantic field of food include steak, vegetable and fruit, as well as less obvious words like spoon and saucepan. The meanings of all these words are connected to the idea of food. Semantic fields are very similar to patterns of imagery (e.g. natural imagery), except they are broader, as a semantic field can include abstract concepts too like jealousy or fashion, neither of which are really sensory enough to be called imagery.
Sentence – A sentence is a group of words which are grammatically connected to each other but not to any words outside the sentence. It is one of the different units that words can be organised into in a piece of writing. Sentences come in two basic flavours: major sentences and minor sentences. Major sentences are full sentences, which have a main verb which communicates the action in the sentence. Most ordinary sentences are major sentences. The previous sentence was a major sentence, for example, as is this one. Minor sentences are partial sentences which do not have a main verb but which are written as sentences. Like this. Here, ‘Like this’ is used as a sentence (it has a full-stop at the end) but it doesn’t actually have a verb in it. This is a major sentence. (The verb is 'is’). This is too. (There’s another ‘is’.) But not this. (It has no verb.) Sentences also come in different types: simple, compound, complex and compound-complex. The sentence type depends on the make-up of the clauses in the sentence, and you can find out more about this in our guide to sentence types. If this weren’t complicated enough, sentences can also have what are called moods. The mood of a sentence shows the attitude of the speakers to the action or event referred to in the verb phrase: we can tell someone something, or ask them or demand them to do something. There are four sentences moods: declarative, interrogative, imperative and exclamatory. The declarative mood is used for making statements - it is the most common mood. Here’s an example of a declarative sentence: The old man was content in the park. You can recognise the declarative mood by checking whether the subject (the old man) comes first and is followed by the verb (was). The interrogative mood is used for asking questions. Here’s an example of an interrogative sentence: Was the old man content in the park? To create this mood, the verb (was) is moved before the subject (the old man) and a question mark is put at the end. The third mood is the imperative mood. This is used for making commands or instructions, and it is created by getting rid of the subject of the sentence and starting with just a verb instead. Here’s an example of an imperative sentence: Eat your vegetables. (Notice that there is not subject.) Finally, we have the exclamatory mood, which is very straightforward. It is simply a more forceful version of a declarative sentence, marked at the end with an exclamation mark. Here’s an example of an exclamatory sentence: That river is really beautiful! You will need to learn the different sentence forms (major and minor) the different sentence types (simple, compound and complex) and the different sentence moods (declarative, interrogative, imperative and exclamatory). For more information about sentence types, see our guide to sentence types. See also: Clause, Subject and object (of a sentence) and Paragraph.
Sestet - A block of poetic verse six lines long. Usually this would be a six-line stanza, though sestet can be used to describe any set of six lines – it doesn’t have to be its own stanza. See also: Couplet, Tercet and Quatrain.
Sibilance - This is when writers use lots of ‘sss’ and ‘sh’ sounds (called the sibiliant sounds) in words that are close together. For example: Grendel the shadow-stalker, stealthy and swift; spurned and joyless.
Simile - This is when a writer compares two things by saying that one is like the other, rather than saying that it is the other (as in a metaphor). For example, the skin on the old lady’s hands was like crumpled newspaper. To analyse a simile, you need to consider what the two things being compared (in this case skin and crumpled newspaper) have in common. Here we might say that the simile implies that her skin is greying or appears faded; it could also suggest her hands are mottled, as if they have things printed on them. This simile also gives a sense of the feeling of her skin, which is probably dry and fragile. (For more examples of this kind of analysis see the entry for ‘metaphor’.)
Simple sentence - A sentence with just one main clause. For example: I drive a bus. For more information about sentence types, see our Creative Writing guide to sentences. See also: Complex sentence and Compound sentence.
Speaker (of a poem) – the fictional person, created by the poet, who is actually speaking the lines of the poem (sometimes called the voice or persona). Most poems have one speaker, but some poems have multiple speakers.
Soliloquy - This term describes speeches in plays (generally reasonably long ones) which are delivered by a character on stage but which are not heard by any other characters. Essentially, the character is speaking their thoughts aloud during a soliloquy. As such, they are similar to asides, but are generally longer and, unlike asides, they are almost always delivered when there are no other characters on stage. Essentially, they are big speeches that an actor delivers directly to the audience while alone on the stage. They give the audience an window into the inner life of the key characters in a play. In Shakespeare’s plays, we generally number the key soliloquies by the key characters (e.g. Macbeth’s first soliloquy, Macbeth’s second soliloquy, etc). See also: Aside.
Sonnet – A type of poem with very strict rules about its construction. Sonnets always contain 14 lines and they use iambic pentameter (see separate glossary entry) for their rhythm. Sonnets typically come with two possible rhyme schemes: ABAB CDCD EFEF GG (called Shakespearean sonnets) or ABBA ABBA CDECDE (called Petrarchan sonnets). Sonnets traditionally have a kind of twist or turn in them, where the focus shifts, often indicated by words such as ‘But’, ‘Yet’, or ‘And yet’. This turn is called the volta. It usually occurs at the start of the final couplet (GG) or before the final sestet (CDECDE), depending on whether the sonnet is Shakespearean or Petrarchan. Sonnets are usually about love. See also: Couplet, Iambic pentameter, Rhyme scheme and Sestet.
Staging and stage directions – This is the term we use to describe all the things that playwrights and directors can do with the way a play is performed on the stage. Sometimes this is called stagecraft. In a script, the staging of the play is communicated through stage directions. These are the parts of a play script that tell the actors and the directors what to do beyond the lines the characters have to say. Staging can include everything from lighting, costume, sound and actions the actors have to take (sipping a cup of tea, screaming, murdering the butler, etc). Stage directions can also be used just before a line in the script to tell the actor how to say that line (angrily, quietly, firmly, etc).
Stanza - A group of lines forming the basic recurring unit in a poem; sometimes also referred to as a verse, though stanza is the term you should use. Stanza are separated by a line break when you look at a poem on the page.
Structure – The structure of a story is the order in which we, the reader, are told things. Often when we read a story we don’t think about the structure; we just take it for granted that things happen in the order they happen, as if there is no other possible order. But this is never the case. If a writer reveals something at the start of a story (that a character is poor, for example), there will be a reason for it: perhaps it will be important later on in the story (because they find a pot of gold). Or if a writer chooses not to reveal something until late on in the story (that the King is actually the poor boy’s father, for example), they will have done this for a reason, perhaps to create suspense or a twist. Stories can be told in a non-linear way too: things don’t have to be told in the order that they happen in realtime – they can jump forward and backwards to make the story more interesting to read. Another aspect of structure is when one thing happens immediately before or after something else. Again, this is often a deliberate choice by the writer because they want to draw the reader’s attention to the connection between these things. Understanding structure is important for writing your own stories, as well as for analysing other people’s writing. See also: Flashback, In medias res and Timeshift.
Subject and Object (of a sentence) – One way for us to think about a sentence is in terms of its subject and, if present, its object(s). Nearly all sentences have a subject – this is the thing that is doing or being the verb in the sentence. For example, in the sentence David ate the cake, the subject is David (he is the one doing the verb – e.g. eating). Most verbs also have objects as well as subjects. In the previous example, the object is the cake (the thing being eaten). Some verbs even require multiple objects. One example is give. With giving we need a giver, a receiver and also a thing being given. The teacher gave Alice a book. The subject here is the teacher and the two objects are Alice and the book. Some verbs don’t need any objects at all, though. David cried. Here we just have a subject (David), but cried doesn’t need an object.
Subordinate clause - see entry for Clause.
Subtext – This is the term we use to describe the meaning that is not explicitly stated but which is implicit and so becomes understood by the reader/audience. It’s easy to understand if you think about the word itself: sub- (meaning under) + text. So, it’s the meaning that is underneath the text. For example, in Act 5 of Macbeth, Macbeth speaks to a doctor and ask if it’s possible for him to cure Lady Macbeth of her growing madness: Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased, pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow, raze out the written troubles of the brain. Here, Macbeth seems to be talking about his wife, but the subtext of his words reveals something different: he is really asking the doctor to cure Macbeth himself. This is the meaning underneath the words – the subtext of this speech.
Suspense – This is when a writer hints at something but doesn’t reveal everything, causing the reader to experience a feeling of intrigued uncertainty about what might happen later on.
Syllable - A unit of pronunciation having one vowel sound, with or without surrounding consonants, forming the whole or a part of a word. For example, there are two syllables in water and three in inferno. Cheese has just one syllable. Apple has two (A-pul). And so on. You should be able to hear how many syllables there are in a word (there are three in syllable), but the core to working it out is the number of vowel sounds (not necessarily vowel letters). So book has two vowels in it but is only one syllable as it just has one vowel sound. Colour has three vowels but only two vowel sounds (CUH-luh or perhaps CUHL-uh). And so on. Once you know how many syllables there are in a word, you need to figure out which syllables are stressed and which are unstressed. This is just about how much emphasis you put on each of the sounds in the normal pronunciation of the word or words. So Peter has two syllables (PE-tuh), with the first syllable stressed and the second unstressed. We say PE-tuh, not pe-TUH. Same for tiger (TI-guh) and writer (RI-tuh). This is often true for two-syllable words in English, though not always. Replete, for example, has its stress on the second syllable (ruh-PLEET). In words with more than two syllables we often put the stress on other syllables too, as we do when combining multiple single-syllable words. Consider the word consider (cun-SID-uh). Here the stress is on the second syllable (SID). Or consider this phrase from Shakespeare’s Macbeth: That struts and frets his hour upon the stage. This is a 10 syllable phrase, with alternate unstressed and stressed syllables: that STRUTS and FRETS his HOUR u-PON the STAGE. There is a special name for this combination of stresses, which you can read more about in the entry on Metre. See also: Metre and Length (of a line of poetry).
Symbolism – A symbol is a thing that represents or stands for something else, and works of literature can have symbols in them too. This is when the writer uses something in the story (usually a real, physical thing) to represent something else (usually some kind of abstract idea). So, for example, blood might be used to symbolize guilt; this would mean that whenever somebody said something about blood (that it’s hard to wash off for example) then what they would really be seeing is that guilt is hard to get rid off. Or an object in a story, like a character’s bracelet might symbolize the character’s relationship with someone else, and so when they decide to throw the bracelet away it would mean that they’re throwing the relationship away. See also: Motif.
Synonym – Two words are synonyms (or synonymous) if they have the same approximate meaning. Some synonyms of walk include stroll, amble, trudge, saunter, etc. However, it is worth noting that very few words have exactly the same meaning. All of those synonyms of walk mean something slightly different. Choosing the correct word in your writing is about choosing the right synonym – the one that means exactly what you want it to mean and - not just choosing one that sounds ‘more ambitious’.
Syntax - This is the term we use to describe the way words and phrases come together to form grammatically understandable sentences. The syntax of a sentence means how the words have been put together. So, for instance, in English we put the subject of a sentence before the verb, which means the dog bites the man means something very different to the man bites the dog, even though the words are all the same. Likewise, in English we generally put adjectives before nouns (blue rabbit) and not after them (rabbit blue), which is not true of all languages. Word order is an element of syntax. Similarly, in English sentences we have different endings to verbs depending on the subject of the sentence: Peter walks into the room (3rd person subject) vs. I walk into the room (1st person subject). Notice the extra ‘s’ in this first example. We need that for the sentence to be grammatically correct (Peter walk into the room doesn’t sound right - it sounds more like an imperative: Peter, walk into the room). These verb endings are an aspect of what is called grammatical agreement, which is another aspect of syntax. If the syntax of your sentence is wrong, it means the way you have combined the words and phrases does not make grammatical sense.
T
Tense – Tense is the part of grammar that helps us understand time in a story and whether things happened before, during or after other things. Very simply, we might say there are two tenses in English, past and present (she walked vs. she walks), and there is sort of a future tense (she will walk), though that’s more complicated as we need to use a modal verb to form it (will). On top of this we can also use the progressive or perfect form of tenses. These are called aspects. The progressive aspect is created using the present participle (the -ing form e.g. she is walking). This tells us that the action is taking place at the moment; it is ongoing. We can have the present progressive (she is walking) or the past progressive (she was walking). The perfect aspect is created using the past participle form of the verb (sometimes the -en form e.g. she has eaten, sometimes the u form e.g. she has sung, and sometimes the regular -ed form e.g. she has walked). This aspect can also come in present (she has walked) and past (she had walked), and it generally calls attention to the consequences of a prior event; for example, he has gone to lunch implies that he is still away, in contrast with he went to lunch, in which case it’s not clear whether or not he’s back. This creates two core tenses (past and present) plus two aspects (progressive and perfect) and these can be combined in different ways (e.g. present perfect, past progressive, etc). And then there is the added complexity of modal verbs, which can convey futurity (e.g. she will walk home this evening) and other more complex meanings (e.g. she may walk home this evening). See also: Modal verb.
Tension – This is the feeling of mental or emotional strain that we often feel when reading stories or watching TV and film. It arises when the outcome of a situation is uncertain and we, as the reader or viewer, are desperate to know what’s going to happen. It might be the tension that comes with a 200m race: will the person we want to win actually win? Or it might be the tension that comes when a character is searching for something in a place they’re not meant to be: will they be caught? Knowing how to create and maintain tension is crucial for writing effective stories.
Tercet – A block of poetic verse three lines long. Usually this would be a three-line stanza, though tercet can be used to describe any group of three lines – it doesn’t have to be its own stanza. See also: Couplet, Quatrain and Sestet.
Timeshift - This is the term for when a story jumps about in time. So, rather than time moving forward in a normal way, the writer shifts time dramatically, either forward or backwards. Timeshifts can be used to fill the reader in on bits of essential background information, or prior events, so you can focus your narrative on the most interesting parts of the story, rather than starting with the dull but necessary stuff. You need to ensure you change tense appropriately when you do this. Timeshifts can also be used to jump forward in time (to the next day or next week). This is more straightforward and doesn’t require any tricky tense changes, but it’s also less interesting structurally. See also: Flashback
Tragedy - Tragedy is one of the oldest forms of story in the Western tradition, going back to the Ancient Greeks 2,500 years ago. Macbeth is a tragedy, as is The Crucible. According to the Penguin Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory, tragedy is “a form of drama concerned with the misfortunes, and, ultimately, the disasters, that befall human beings of title, power and position.” At the centre of any tragedy is the tragic hero. In many tragedies, the play is named after this character or characters (e.g. Othello, Macbeth, Romeo & Juliet, Oedipus, Medea, etc). The tragic hero should be admirable, but neither too virtuous (otherwise it would be cruel), nor too wicked (otherwise we’d be too pleased when they suffer). They should have a tragic flaw which brings about their downfall in some way; the most common tragic flaw is hubris (e.g. excessive pride or self-confidence). The tragic hero should experience a high degree of suffering, usually ending in death. At some point the tragic hero should experience a moment of recognition in which he understands the cause of his suffering. The hero’s suffering should cause the audience to feel pity and fear. Tragedies should also have a clear focus: a tragedy should select and shape the materials from which it is constructed into a single narrative action, with the sole, or at the very least the primary intention of inciting suffering, pity and sadness. “The tragic poet,” says Walter Kaufmann, “makes do with a minimum of information and a handful of characters. He deals with a single, brief, climactic action in which human suffering is brought to a high pitch, not by way of telling us some strange, exotic story, but to mobilize our grief, to lend it words.” Tragedies should also be hopeless and inevitable: “In tragedy [the protagonist’s] attributes are seen to be insufficient to save them either from self-destruction or destruction brought upon them,” claims J A Cuddon. “And there is no hope for them. The is hope, perhaps, after tragedy but not during it. The overwhelming part about tragedy is the element of hopelessness, of inevitability.” Tragedies also lack reason and justice: the rule that prosperity and adversity are distributed in proportion to the merits of the agents (‘poetic justice’) is absent from tragedy. It may be true that villainy never remains victorious and prosperous in the end, but there is not the proportionality that poetic justice dictates. Finally, tragedies should bring about catharsis: this is a Greek word meaning something like the purging of (excess) emotion. A tragedy should leave us feeling emotionally exhausted, but also cleansed, like after a good run. Tragedy is a kind of detox that brings balance to our emotions.
Triadic structure – This is another term to describe the Rule of three. See entry for Rule of three for more information.
U
Unreliable narrator – Writers sometimes use a narrator who cannot be trusted by the reader. When we read a story with an unreliable narrator, we know that we cannot believe everything this person tells us, and this is part of the way the story is meant to be received. Using an unreliable narrator places the reader in a position where they have to interpret what they are told; they have to read between the lines, try to figure out the truth for themselves, which is part of the fun of these kinds of stories. Examples of unreliable narrators in the texts we study include the narrator of The Yellow Wallpaper and the speaker of Porphyria’s Lover.
V
Verb – This class of word is used to tell us about what is happening. These can be actions (walking, eating, dancing, etc) or states (thinking, knowing, liking, etc). Generally, the best way to test if something can be used as a verb is to work out whether or not it can be tensed. If we use walk as an example, we can tell it’s a verb (or it can be used as a verb) because we can also say walked and walking. This is not true of nouns like jealousy (jealousyed? jealousying? - no) or adjectives like large (larged? larging? - no). The past tense and the present participle are the best tests for this. Is apple a verb? (appled? appling? – no.) Is melt a verb? (melted? melting? – yes). Be warned: this test doesn’t always work because many words can be both nouns and verbs. It’s possible to go for a walk, for example, in which case walk is a noun not a verb (and the verb in this case is go). There are many examples of nouns that can also be verbs (phone, table, google, toast, etc), but the tense test isn’t a bad place to start if you’re not sure whether or not a word is a verb.
Verse – This is the term we use to describe writing arranged with a rhythm (or metre), often having a rhyme as well, though not always. If something is written in verse, in other words, it’s written with some kind of rhythm. Unless it’s free verse (see the separate entry for that). The most important way to think about verse is as the alternative to prose, which is ordinary writing. Verse is what poets use, including Shakespeare in his plays. See also: Free verse, Blank verse, Prose and Metre.
Voice (active and passive) – In English, sentences can be in either the active voice or the passive voice. This affects how we interpret the subject and object of the sentence (it might help to read that entry of the glossary if you don’t know what subjects and objects are). In the active voice (the normal phrasing), the subject comes before the verb, and the object comes after it. David ate the cake. We know the subject is David and the object is the cake because of the order of the words. However, we can also use the passive voice, in which case the object comes first, and the subject becomes optional. The cake was eaten by David. The passive voice is formed by using a special verb phrase, which includes the past participle. It allows us to say what happened without saying who actually did it. For example, mistakes were made. Using this sentence form, we can admit that mistakes happened without saying who actually made the mistakes. Here’s another example: my cat was run over. In this case, we don’t know who ran over the cat, so we need to use the passive voice. Most of the time you will use the active voice, but it’s good to know that you can use the passive voice when required. See also: Participles (past and present), Subject and object (of a sentence) and Verb.
Volta – see entry for Sonnet.