Below, a list of literary terms and definitions, oriented largely toward poetry but essential for prose writers as well. I’m not a poet but I’ve used these terms in my writing, and I think it’s a good idea if all writers be familiar with them. The definitions given here are taken from several different sources, modified in many cases to fit my needs and uses. All who peruse this list should be aware that these are the definitions I use. You may not agree with them. I took great pains to distinguish, for example, style, tone, and voice, a set of definitions that I’ve always found to be confusing and never adequate. These definitions may not be universal; they are, however, workable for me.
Allegory – A narrative or description which has a second meaning beneath the surface; a long and complicated story with an underlying meaning different from the surface meaning of the story itself.
Alliteration – The repetition of initial consonant sounds; the repetition of the same first letter in a group of words or in a line of poetry.
Allusion – A reference to something in history or a previous literature; a richly connotative word or a symbol, a means of suggesting far more than it says; a reference by something quoted or mentioned in passing, especially to something presumed to be well known.
Apostrophe – Addressing someone deceased or absent as if that person were alive and present and could reply; words addressed to a lifeless thing as if it could hear or reply.
Assonance – The repetition of vowel sounds; resemblance in sound of words or syllables; a substitute for rhyme in which the vowels are alike but the consonants are different.
Caricature – Parody or satire by exaggeration of certain characteristics or features, often to ludicrous proportions; distortion of one or more parts to hold them up to ridicule.
Connotation – Meanings beyond what a word expresses; overtones of meaning; a suggestion in addition to the literal meaning.
Consonance – The repetition of final consonant sounds; a harmony of sounds.
Denotation – The literal meaning of a word; the dictionary definition.
Didactic Poetry – Poetry whose primary purpose is to teach or preach; poetry intended to instruct, or inclined to instruct others.
Figure of Speech – Any way of saying something other than the ordinary way; an expression in which words are used out of their literal meaning or in striking combinations to add beauty or force.
Foot – One accented syllable plus one or two unaccented syllables. Occasionally there may be no unaccented syllables, and very rarely there may be three.
Name of Foot Name of Meter
Iamb Iambic
Trochee Trochaic
Anapest Anapestic
Dactyl Dactylic
Imagery – The representation through language of sense experience; descriptions and figures of speech that help the mind form forceful or beautiful pictures; pictures in the mind; things imagined.
Irony – Saying the opposite of what is meant; a method of expression in which the ordinary meaning of the words is the opposite of the thought in the speaker’s mind. In Verbal Irony the discrepancy is between what is said and what is meant. In Dramatic Irony the discrepancy is between what the speaker says and what the author means. In Irony of Situation the discrepancy is between the actual circumstances and those that would seem appropriate, or between what one anticipates and what actually comes to pass.
Meaning – The experience which a poem expresses, nothing less. The Total Meaning is that which it communicates and can be communicated in no other way, and the Prose Meaning is the ingredient which can be separated out in the form of a prose paraphrase.
Melodrama – Overdramatic or overemotional writing; predominance of plot and physical action over characterization; sensational drama with exaggerated appeal to the senses and usually a happy ending; any sensational writing with a heightened appeal to emotions.
Metaphor – An implied comparison between two different things; a figure of speech in which a word or phrase that ordinarily means one thing is used of another thing in order to suggest a likeness between the two.
Meter – Any kind of rhythm we can tap our foot to; the arrangement of beats and accents in the line of poetry; a specific kind of rhythm, depending on the kind and number of feet [see above] of which the verse consists.
Metonymy – A figure of speech which consists in using the name of one thing for that of another that it naturally suggests; the use of a closely related idea for the idea itself.
Onomatopoeia – The use of words which, at least supposedly, sound like what they mean; the formation of a name or word by imitating the sound associated with the thing designated.
Overstatement or Hyperbole – Simple exaggeration, but exaggeration in the service of truth; exaggeration for effect.
Paradox – An apparent contradiction which is nevertheless somehow true; a statement that may be true but seems to say two opposite things.
Parody – Writing for comic effect or ridicule; a humorous imitation of serious writing; a poor imitation.
Personification – Giving the attributes of a human being to an animal, an object, or an idea; a representing as a person; a person or creature imagined as representing a thing or idea; a figure of speech in which a lifeless thing or quality is spoken of as if alive.
Phonetic Intensives – Words whose sound, by a process as yet obscure, suggests their meaning, to some degree at least.
Refrain – The repetition of whole words, phrases, lines or groups of lines; a phrase or verse repeated regularly in a song or poem.
Rhetorical Poetry – Uses language more glittering and high-flown than its substance warrants. It uses language without a corresponding reality of emotion or thought underneath. It is oratorical, over-elegant, and artificially eloquent.
Rhyme – The repetition of the accented vowel sound and all succeeding sounds; an agreement in the final sounds of words or lines. Called Masculine Rhyme when the similar sounds involve only one syllable, and Feminine Rhyme when the sounds involve two or more syllables. Referred to as Internal Rhyme when one or both rhyming words are within the line, and End Rhyme when both rhyming words are at the ends of the line. Approximate Rhyme may include words with any kind of sound similarity, from close to fairly remote.
Rhythm – Any wavelike recurrence of motion or sound; repetition of an accent; the arrangement of beats in a line of poetry.
Sarcasm – Bitter or cutting speech, intended to wound the feelings; the act of making fun of a person to hurt his/her feelings; bitter irony.
Satire – Ridicule, either bitter or gentle, of human folly or vice, with the purpose of bringing about reform, or at least keeping other people from falling into similar folly or vice; the use of sarcasm or irony to attack or ridicule a habit, idea, custom, etc., that is, or is considered to be, foolish, wrong, etc.
Sentimentality – Indulgence in emotion for its own sake, or expression of more emotion than an occasion warrants; a tendency to be influenced by sentiment rather than by reason.
Simile – An expressed comparison between two different things or ideas, especially as a figure of speech for rhetorical effects.
Sonnet – A poem of fourteen lines, of iambic pentameter, but in which structure and rhyme scheme allow considerable leeway. Elizabethan and Italian sonnets differ in the arrangement of the rhymes.
Stanza – Lines of poetry or verse arranged in repeated units having the same number of lines, the same metrical pattern, and often an identical rhyme scheme; a group of lines arranged according to a fixed plan.
Style – 1. The particular choice of words, broadly taken over a number of works, that presents for an author his/her characteristic manner of expression; the particular way something is done or accomplished; the distinctive quality of a writer that distinguishes him/her from others; the uniqueness of a writer. [This is the way I use the term.] 2. Excellence in writing. [This is how Strunk and White use the term.]
Symbol – Something that means more than what it is; something that stands for or represents an idea, quality, condition, or other abstraction.
Synecdoche – A figure of speech by which a part is put for the whole, or the whole for a part, the special for the general, or the general for the special.
Tone – The attitude of a writer toward his subject and toward his audience; the emotional coloring, or the emotional meaning, of a writing, and is a part of the full meaning.
Understatement – Saying less than one means; a statement that expresses a fact too weakly; a statement that says less than could be said truly.
Verse – Poetry; metrical language; lines of words with a regularly repeated accent.
Voice – The means or agency by which something is expressed, represented, or revealed; the overall quality of the writing; the particular tone, word choice, point-of-view, rhythm, and expressions that comprise the characteristics of a particular work; the manner(s) by which the author and the characters express themselves.
Sources:
Clarence L. Barnhart, Ed. in Chief. The World Book Dictionary. Doubleday & Co., Inc. 1971.
Barbara Ann Kipfer, Head Lexicographer. Roget’s 21st Century Thesaurus, 3rd Ed. Bantam Dell. 2005.
Frederick C. Mish, Ed. in Chief. The Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Merriam-Webster, Inc. 2004.
Frederick C. Mish, Ed. in Chief. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, 11th Ed. Merriam-Webster, Inc. 2012.
Laurence Perrine. Sound and Sense – An Introduction to Poetry. Harcourt, Brace and Company, Inc. 1956.
Strunk, Jr, and E.B. White. The Elements of Style, 4th Ed. Allyn and Bacon. 2000.