Allegory: A figurative work in which a surface narrative carries a secondary, symbolic or metaphorical meaning. More usually it is used of a story or fable that has a clear secondary meaning beneath its literal sense. Some recent criticism has interpreted Hawthorne’s “Rappaccini’s Daughter” as an allegory of male/female relations.
Antagonist: a character in a story or poem who deceives, frustrates, or works again the main character, or protagonist, in some way. The antagonist doesn’t necessarily have to be a person. It could be death, the devil, an illness, or any challenge that prevents the main character from living “happily ever after.” In fact, the antagonist could be a character of virtue in a literary work where the protagonist represents evil. (Victoria Henderson, Student, University of North Carolina at Pembroke)
Atmosphere/Mood: the emotional tone pervading either a part or the whole of a work, especially as observed in (though not limited to) literary texts. Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” is a masterpiece of establishing atmosphere, so much so that the atmosphere of the tale is far more important than its actual setting.
Character: a person who is responsible for the thoughts and actions within a story, poem, or other literature. Characters are extremely important because they are the medium through which a reader interacts with a piece of literature. Every character has his or her own personality, which a creative author uses to assist in forming the plot of a story or creating a mood. The different attitudes, mannerisms, and even appearances of characters can greatly influence the other major elements in a literary work, such as theme, setting, and tone. With this understanding of the character, a reader can become more aware of other aspects of literature, such as symbolism, giving the reader a more complete understanding of the work. The character is one of the most important tools available to the author. We have, at various points in the term, mentioned sympathetic character, anti-hero, protagonist, antagonist, stock character, round character, flat character, dynamic character, static character and motivation as subdivided aspects all under the general umbrella of character in relation to short fiction. (with files from Victoria Henderson, Student, University of North Carolina at Pembroke)
Characterization: the various means by which the attributes and qualities of a character are revealed, usually in a combination of their own speeches and actions in the text and the things said about them, either by the narrative voice or by other characters.
Denouement (closed): the resolution or finish of the plot in a story. A closed denouement will give the reader a sense of closure, or finality, an impression that all the important questions or concerns raised by the narrative have now been satisfactorily answered or settled.
Denouement (open): equally the resolution or finish of the plot in a story, an open denouement leaves the reader without a sense of closure or finality; the impression is given that the questions or concerns raised by the narrative remain partly or completely unanswered and that the ‘story’ of the character’s life has not finished – only this small fragment of recording that story has finished.
Diction: or lexis, or vocabulary of a passage refers to nothing more or less then its words. The words of a given passage might be drawn from one register, they might be drawn from one linguistic origin (e.g. Latin, or its Romance descendants Italian and French; Old English); they might be either very formal or very colloquial words.
Epiphany: In fiction, when a character suddenly experiences a deep realization about himself or herself, or a truth is grasped in an ordinary rather than a melodramatic moment, the character is said to have had an epiphany. The cartoon lightbulb going on next to the head of a character who has just thought of something brilliant is a crude, but relatively accurate visual representation of the idea. James Joyce is often credited with having invented or pioneered the technique. In our study, "The Dead" provides perhaps the most direct example in whole of Joyce's work, given that Gabriel's realization that Gretta has a rich emotional history in which he plays no part at all, coupled with his decision to actually listen to her and stop thinking solely in terms of what he wants in the situation, occurs near dawn after a party given on the Feast of the Epiphany (6 January, sometimes called Old Christmas Day).
Fabliau (plural fabliaux): A short, pithy story, usually of a bawdy kind.
Foreshadowing: in its simplest form, hints, allusions, clues, leading diction, etc., suggesting in advance developments in a narrative which eventually occur. Poe’s theory of the construction of the short story, first written in respect to Poe’s analysis of Hawthorne’s short fiction in the 1840s, seems to imply that in a well-written story everything is foreshadowing, that every detail, every aspect of the narrative should be combining to shape and guide the reader’s perception of one single dominant impression which the writer wishes the story to portray.
Frame: A narrative structure that provides a setting and exposition for the main narrative in a novel. Often, a narrator will describe where he found the manuscript of the novel or where he heard someone tell the story he is about to relate. The frame helps control the reader's perception of the work, and has been used in the past to help give credibility to the main section of the novel. The frame structure is also a commonplace of medieval texts, such as Boccaccio’s Decameron and Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, the individual narratives within those frames being important textual steps in the evolution of what we now call the short story.
Gothic: a literary style popular during the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th. This style usually portrayed fantastic tales dealing with horror, despair, the grotesque and other "dark" subjects. Gothic literature was named for the apparent influence of the dark gothic architecture of the period on the genre. Also, many of these Gothic tales took places in such "gothic" surroundings, such as Poe’s famous House of Usher, or Hawthorne’s garden of poisons in the centre of Padua. Other times, this story of darkness may occur in a more everyday setting, especially in later 20th-century narratives: an excellent instance is William Gaddis’s short novel Carpenter’s Gothic, which takes place largely in an upstate New York house of that architectural type, while also being gothic in the more grotesque atmospheric sense. In essence, these stories were romances, largely due to their love of the imaginary over the logical, and were told from many different points of view. This literature gave birth to many other forms, such as suspense, ghost stories, horror, mystery, and also Poe's detective stories. Gothic literature wasn't so different from other genres in form as it was in content and its focus on the "weird" aspects of life. This movement began to slowly open may people's eyes to the possible uses of the supernatural in literature. Gothic is sometimes thought of as the opposite end of a continuum formed with Romantic as the opposite end and Realistic occupying the vaguely-defined space in between the two. (with files from Jerry Taylor, Student, University of North Carolina at Pembroke)
Intertextuality/Allusion: the former is the more recent, more complex theoretical name for the latter, earlier, simpler literary technique. Allusion has long been defined as a brief, unlabelled (unidentified) reference within one literary work to a few words, lines, or images found in another. For years, the Christian Bible and the works of Shakespeare formed the source books for many a literary allusion on the grounds that common familiarity with those two foundational texts could safely be assumed to exist in virtually any English reader. Intertextuality grows out of the late 1960s interest in semiotics (or the theory of sign systems) and is defined in a much more complex manner than simple allusion. Theories of intertext suggest (in part) that all texts are influenced by other texts (unconsciously as often as not) and that every time a text is read it is (in part) recreated because each new reader reads with different education, background, reading experience, purpose, etc. A hybrid of the two forms appears in situations in which a later author deliberately employs an earlier text to organize and create a new one (an example is Angela Carter’s story “The Company of Wolves” which uses well-known plot components of the Little Red Riding Hood children’s tale to create a new story.
Irony: A literary device that uses contradictory statements or situations to reveal a reality different from what appears to be true. It is ironic for a firehouse to burn down, or for a police station to be burglarized. Verbal irony is a figure of speech that occurs when a person says one thing but means the opposite. Sarcasm is a strong form of verbal irony that is calculated to hurt someone through, for example, false praise. Dramatic irony creates a discrepancy between what a character believes or says and what the reader or audience member knows to be true. Tragic irony is a form of dramatic irony found in tragedies such as Oedipus the King, in which Oedipus searches for the person responsible for the plague that ravishes his city and ironically ends up hunting himself. Situational irony exists when there is an incongruity between what is expected to happen and what actually happens due to forces beyond human comprehension or control. The suicide of the seemingly successful main character in Edwin Arlington Robinson's poem "Richard Cory" is an example of situational irony. Cosmic irony occurs when a writer uses God, destiny, or fate to dash the hopes and expectations of a character or of humankind in general. In cosmic irony, a discrepancy exists between what a character aspires to and what universal forces provide. One might also think in terms of accidental irony: during his 1975-6 U.S. tour, Paul McCartney sang Paul Simon's musical setting of Robinson's poem "Richard Cory," substituting the name of John Denver for Richard Cory in one chorus; some years later, Denver died in a plane crash, making McCartney's casual joke (as recorded on Wings Over America) ironic in a way in which McCartney had not initially intended.
Metafiction: a type of fiction that self-consciously addresses the devices of fiction. It is the literary term describing fictional writing that self-consciously and systematically draws attention to its status as fiction, raising questions about the relationship between fiction and reality, irony and self-reflection. It can be compared to presentational theatre, that does not let the audience forget they are viewing a play; metafiction does not let the reader forget he or she is reading a fictional work.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction gives a great list of sub-categories with examples.
Minimalism: a term applicable to many arts and even in fields such as architecture, it means something a little different in each specific example defined, but, in generally, frequently, means making as much as possible out of the smallest amount of materials. In literature, John Barth has discussed minimalism as being terse, oblique, realistic or even hyper-realistic, slightly plotted, extrospective, and cool-surfaced (some of which terms themselves could be further defined and debated!). "Minimalism" has become a bit of a cultural buzzword, used uncritically and sometimes inaccurately about anything that's short. It is (to use another buzzword) protean in nature (i.e. changes its appearance easily) and may be linked with postmodernism's supposed obligation toward silence.
Narrative: a collection of events that tells a story, which may be true or not, placed in a particular order and recounted through either telling or writing. By understanding the term “narrative,” one begins to understand that most literary works have a simple outline: the story, the plot, and the storyteller. By studying more closely, most novels and short stories are placed into the categories of first-person and third-person narratives, which are based on who is telling the story and from what perspective. Other important terms that relate to the term “narrative,” are “narrative poetry,” poetry that tells a story, and “narrative technique” which means how one tells a story. (Melissa Houghton, Student, University of North Carolina at Pembroke)
Narrator: one who tells a story, the speaker or the “voice” of an oral or written work. Although it can be, the narrator is not usually the same person as the author. The narrator is one of three types of characters in a given work, (1) participant (protagonist or participant in any action that may take place in the story), (2) observer (someone who is indirectly involved in the action of a story), or (3) non participant (one who is not at all involved in any action of the story). The narrator is the direct window into a piece of work. Depending on the part of the character of the narrator plays in the story, the narrator may demonstrate bias when presenting a piece of work. (Heather Cameron, Student, University of North Carolina at Pembroke)
Plot: An author's selection and arrangement of incidents in a story to shape the action and give the story a particular focus. Discussions of plot include not just what happens, but also how and why things happen the way they do. Stories that are written in a pyramidal pattern divide the plot into three essential parts. The first part is the rising action, in which complication creates some sort of conflict for the protagonist. The second part is the climax, the moment of greatest emotional tension in a narrative, usually marking a turning point in the plot at which the rising action reverses to become the falling action. The third part, the falling action (or resolution) is characterized by diminishing tensions and the resolution of the plot's conflicts and complications. In medias res is a term used to describe the common strategy of beginning a story in the middle of the action. In this type of plot, we enter the story on the verge of some important moment. Other associated terms include archetypal plots, character, complication, conflict, crisis, denouement, exposition, resolution, subplot.
Point of view: a way the events of a story are conveyed to the reader; it is the “vantage point” from which the narrative is passed from author to the reader. There are several common point of view strategies. For example, in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s story “Rappaccini’s Daughter,” the omniscient third person point of view is presented; a “nonparticipant” serves as the narrator and has insight into each of the characters' minds. The narrator presents the events using the pronouns ‘he,’ ‘she,’ ‘it,’ and ‘they.’ In Edgar Allan Poe’s short story “The Fall of the House of Usher” the first person point of view is exhibited. In this instance the main character conveys the incidents he encounters, as well as giving the reader insight (sometimes apparently unconsciously or unintentionally) into himself as he reveals his thoughts, feelings, and intentions. The first person narrator speaks of himself/herself as ‘I’ and may be directly involved in the action of the narrative or may appear to be observing others from within the world of the story. Many other points of view exist, such as objective third person in which the narrator observes the external action but gives no information about the thought processes of the characters, and limited third person, in which the characteristics of first person narration are present, but the field of view is limited to one character only, who is conveyed using standard third person structures (such as the pronouns mentioned above). Technically, a second person point of view also exists but is rarely used because (grammatically) it positions and addresses the reader as the central character of the story. In the few cases in which a second person point of view has been used in fiction, it almost invariably appears as a fragment of a longer work, a moment (often within a novel) in which the narrator appears to be talking directly to the character and, as it were, allowing the reader to eavesdrop on that communication. Understanding the point of view used in a work is critical to understanding literature; it serves as the instrument to relay the events of a story, and in some instances the feelings and motives of the character(s). A crucial caution concerning point of view is to be sure not to assume that a given point of view is directly equal to reading the mind of the author. Writers of fiction can invent and research. Equally, although an author can reveal all aspects of a narrative through omniscient third person point of view, use of that point of view doesn’t guarantee that the author has revealed everything a reader might wish to know. Incautious readers sometimes assume a first person narration to be in the voice of the author and to accept uncritically the reliability of a first person narrator, to assume that authors are always writing out of direct personal experience with their chosen subjects, and that an omniscient third person narration is providing full disclosure of all facts relevant to interpreting the story. (with files from Stephanie White, Student, University of North Carolina at Pembroke)
Protagonist: A protagonist is considered to be the main character or lead figure in a novel, play, story, or poem. It may also be referred to as the "hero" of a work. Over a period of time the meaning of the term protagonist has changed. The word protagonist originated in ancient Greek drama and referred to the leader of a chorus. Soon the definition was changed to represent the first actor onstage. In some literature today it may be difficult to decide who is playing the role of the protagonist. For instance, in “Rappaccini’s Daughter” we could say that Beatrice is the protagonist because she is the title character and the theme of the story seems to be drawn from consideration of her suffering; it might equally be argued that Giovanni is the protagonist as the plot of the story seems to focus primarily on his perception of Beatrice, not on her perception of him. This ambiguity can lead to multiple interpretations of the same work and different ways of appreciating a single piece of literature. (with files from Khalil Shakeel, Student, University of North Carolina at Pembroke)
Setting: The total environment for the action of a fictional work. Setting includes time period (such as the 1890s), the place (such as downtown Warsaw), the historical milieu (such as during the Crimean War), as well as the social, political, and perhaps even spiritual realities. The setting is usually established primarily through description, though narration is used also. Setting may be seen to provoke or cause conflict in a story. Equally, it may appear simply as a backdrop or stage against/on which the action happens. Factual details conveyed in the establishing of setting can be an effective means of achieving verisimilitude in fiction, as in the example of Herman Melville’s “Bartleby, the Scrivener” which gives details and even street locations of real New York City buildings. The extreme opposite is seen in Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” in which all we know about the physical setting is the gothic details given about the house itself: where the house is (country or even continent), what century the events transpire in, the historical context, and any information about political reality is all unknown. In Poe’s story, the atmosphere of the setting is more important than any of its facts.
Short Story: a prose narrative that is brief in nature. The short story also has many of the same characteristics of a novel including characters, setting and plot. However, due to length constraints, these characteristics and devices generally may not be as fully developed or as complex as those developed for a full-length novel. There are many authors well known for the short story including Edgar Allan Poe, Sherwood Anderson, Alice Munro, Harlan Ellison, Mavis Gallant and Ernest Hemingway. Poe first theorized on the structure and purpose of the short story, but the written “protocol” regarding what comprises a short versus a long story is vague. Stephen King, who has written with great commercial success at all lengths in the spectrum, has suggested that a short story may be up to about 25,000 words, that a novel is usually at least 45,000 words in length, and that the 20,000 words in between those two limits are the territory loosely defined as the novella. Poe thought of the short story as one that could be read in one sitting and that may be as accurate a definition as we can find, although at the start of the 21st century, the length of time an author might expect a reader to remain “sitting” has shrunk considerably with the evolution of new narrative forms in radio, television, and cinema, and the explosion of information technology associated with the internet. (with files from Susan Severson, Student, University of North Carolina at Pembroke)
Symbol: A person, object, image, word, or event that evokes a range of additional meaning beyond and usually more abstract than its literal significance. Symbols are educational devices for evoking complex ideas without having to resort to painstaking explanations that would make a story more like an essay than an experience. Conventional (or public) symbols have meanings that are widely recognized by a society or culture (sometimes by many societies and cultures). Some conventional symbols include the Christian cross, the Jewish Star of David, the Nazi swastika (which, in earlier, different contexts once had other, much kinder symbolic associations), various national flags, rings, etc. Writers use conventional symbols to reinforce meanings. A literary or contextual symbol (or private symbol) can be a setting, character, action, object, name, or anything else in a work that maintains its literal significance while suggesting other meanings. Such symbols go beyond conventional symbols; they gain their symbolic meaning within the context of a specific story. For example, the poisoned garden in Hawthorne's story "Rappaccini's Daughter" may mean several different things in the work itself, but these meanings do not automatically apply to other stories involving gardens. The meanings suggested by Hawthorne are specific to his text; therefore, his garden is a contextual symbol. Note that he overtly associates it with other famous gardens, especially Eden. A text may give such overt guidance to interpretation of its contextual symbols, or it may present them without comment, leaving/expecting the reader to do the literary detective work of decoding possible meaning. See also allegory.
Theme: a common thread or repeated idea that is incorporated throughout a literary work. A
theme is a thought or idea the author presents to the reader that may be deep, difficult to
understand, or even moralistic. Generally, a theme has to be extracted as the reader explores the
passages of a work. The author utilizes the characters, plot, and other literary devices to assist
the reader in this endeavor. In Hawthorne’s “Rappaccini’s Daughter,” theme seems to be
explicitly stated in both the voice of the narrator, and in the challenge spoken to Giovanni by
Beatrice in her dying moments. In Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher,” theme is much less
overt; it is implicitly conveyed, as with much else in this story a servant to atmosphere, and,
consequently, is much more open to debate. In truly great works of literature, the author
intertwines the theme throughout the work and the full impact is slowly realized as the reader
processes the text. The ability to recognize a theme is important because it allows the reader to
understand part of the author’s purpose in writing the story. One of the challenges with respect
to developing theme in short fiction is the (comparatively) short length; it can be difficult to
evoke a theme implicitly in a short space. (with files from Susan Severson, Student, University
of North Carolina at Pembroke)
Tone: The apparent attitude of the speaker in a literary text, either toward the subject, toward the assumed audience, or some combination of both. It is a frequent observation of much feminist criticism, for example, that much of the literature written by men seems to assume that it is addressing a fairly sympathetic audience of other men. As noted in classes, Poe enjoys having his narrators address the reader in friendly terms, suggesting that the reader shares knowledge of what the narrator knows (and, equally, is guilty of what the narrator may be guilty of, by the same process of association)--perhaps most simply expressed as "you know what I'm talking about because you're just like me."
Trope: a general term for any figure of speech which alters the literal sense of a word or phrase: so metaphor, simile and allegory are all tropes, since they affect the meaning of words. In the rhetorical tradition tropes are contrasted with figures, which are rhetorical devices which affect the order or placing of words (so the repetition of a particular word at the start of each line is a figure).
Unreliable narrator: one who gives his or her own understanding of a story, instead of the
explanation and interpretation the author wishes the audience to obtain. This type of action tends
to alter the audience’s opinion of the conclusion. An author quite famous for using unreliable
narrators is Edgar Allan Poe, many of whose narrators are under the influence of, or suggest
detailed knowledge of, various mind-altering chemical substances. Another writer who has
achieved a tour de force by exploiting the common reading assumption that a first person
narrator is reliable (see point of view, above) is Agatha Christie who twice made a first person
narrator also the murderer in her detective fiction through the simple device of having the first
person narrator lie to the reader. Even outside the expectations of what might be called genre
fiction, any narrator may be biased for any number of reasons. Being aware of unreliable
narrators is essential, especially when you have to describe the characters and their actions to
others, since the narrator, if unreliable, may lead a reader into making erroneous assumptions.
(with files from Starlet Chavis, Student, University of North Carolina at Pembroke)
Verisimilitude: How fully the characters and actions in a work of fiction conform to our sense of reality. To say that a work has a high degree of verisimilitude means that the work is very realistic and believable--it is "true to life."
Voice: (sometimes called implied author). Voice is also related to tone. We are aware in reading that, no matter how many invented voices there may be in a text, behind them all is an author who created the text. As M.H. Abrams puts it, "a determinate intelligence and moral sensibility, who has invented, ordered, and rendered all these literary characters and materials in just this way" (219). Despite all the widely prevalent more recent and popular theories and practices which argue that a story is objective and presents itself, there remains the sense (rooted in inescapable reality) that someone chose to write the text as it exists. Theories of the implied author suggest that there is an ideal author just as there is an ideal reader in any textual interpretation. An author likes to think of readers approaching the work in the 'right' way; equally, the reader has an image of what/who the author is. These theories, no matter how they might disagree, all suggest that there is some sense of a guiding purpose behind all texts, a controlling intelligence with which the reader consents to engage in pursuit of meaning, otherwise it would all be meaningless word/sign play for its own sake (a theory itself popularized and promoted after 1966 for some years-i.e. that nothing has any meaning and that all communication is a "free play" of signs). The Hemingway story "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place" might be understood in terms of all characters representing aspects of the implied author's voice; in more old-fashioned terms, all the characters showing some aspect of Hemingway's own concerns with life and aging.
Stem definitions are cited from some of the following on-line glossaries.
http://www.english.cam.ac.uk/vclass/terms.htm
http://www.uncp.edu/home/canada/work/allam/general/glossary.htm
http://www.virtualsalt.com/litterms.htm
http://www.bedfordstmartins.com/literature/bedlit/glossary_a.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metafiction
In addition, I have used M.H. Abrams, A Glossary of Literary Terms. 7th ed. New York: Norton, 1999.
Most specific examples (unless otherwise noted) are self-generated.