Adapted from M.H. Abrams Glossary of Literary Terms and from years of college education
Elements of the Dramatic Dynamic
Plot – the events or actions undertaken by the characters in a dramatic or narrative work that lead to achieving a particular artistic or emotional effect
Protagonist – hero or heroine of the story that is pitted against some opponent (be it another person or an abstract idea)
Antagonist – the opponent of the protagonist – this may also be called the villain if the antagonist is evil (not all are)
Foil – character in a given work that acts as a direct opposite of the protagonist in order to highlight and stress the “character” of the protagonist
Conflict – the ebb and flow of the protagonist’s and antagonist’s relationship
Character – persons represented in a literary work who are interpreted by the reader as being endowed with particular moral, intellectual, and emotional qualities by inferences from what the persons say and their distinctive ways of saying it (dialogue) and from what they do (action)
Flat – also known as a “type” or “two-dimensional” character – this character is built
around a single idea or quality
Round – complex in temperament and motivation
Symbolism – something that is used to represent something else or has a range of reference beyond itself
Persona – the first person speaker of a work of literature – Bone in Rule of the Bone
Tone – literary speaker’s (or persona) attitude towards the reader, often inferred
Voice – implied author – authorial presence in the text – Huck Finn
Motif – a conspicuous or obvious element such as a type of incident device, reference, or formula which occurs frequently in works of literature
Theme – general concept or doctrine, whether it is stated or inferred, which the work is designed by the author to evoke
Irony –
Verbal – the meaning that is implied by what is said is sharply different to the words that are said
Dramatic – when audience or reader knows of a present or future circumstance about which the characters are ignorant
1. First person – narrator (using “I”) that is either a minor or major character in the story
2. Second person – story is told by narrator to someone s/he calls “you”
3. Third person –
a. Omniscient – a narrator that sees and knows all
b. Limited – tells the story but stays inside the confines of what is perceived, thought, remembered and felt by a single character (or a small series of characters)
Self-conscious narrator – shatters illusion that s/he is telling something that actually happened by revealing to the reader that the narration is a work of fictional art, or by flaunting the discrepancies between its patent fictionality and the reality it seems to represent
Fallible or Unreliable narrator – one whose perception, interpretation, and evaluation of the matters s/he narrates do not coincide the opinions and norms implied by the author, which the author expects the alert reader to share
Freytag’s Pyramid (German critic Gustav Freytag wrote Technique in Drama (1863))
1. Exposition – the beginning of a story when everything is essentially divulged to the audience
2. Rising action – Aristotle called complication – relationship of protagonist/antagonist
3. Climax – pinnacle of problem and complication between protagonist/antagonist
4. Crisis – reversal or “turning point” of the fortunes of the protagonist
5. Falling action – beginning of outcome (also known as catastrophe)
6. Denouement or Resolution– French for “unknotting” – action ends in success or failure, conflicts are settled, mystery is solved or the misunderstanding is cleared
Dramatic Dynamic (Aristotle's analysis in Poetics in the fourth century BCE)
1. Hubris – the hero’s pride – a feeling of being “better than we are” - sins against god(s)
2. Hamartia – the tragic flaw of the hero – “error of judgment”- sins against neighbors - result of Hubris
3. Anagnorisis – the discovery of facts recently unknown to hero
4. Pathos - suffering as a result of actions - not the end
5. Catastrophe – an event that developed to the point of climax through complication
a. Peripeteia – reversal of fortune from happiness to disaster
6. Catharsis – in Greek signifies “purification” or “purgation”
7. Sophrosume - wisdom - spiritual sanity - balanced life - "condition of wisdom"
LINKS
Critical Concepts
http://www.ksu.edu/english/baker/english320/cc.htm
The Literary Encyclopedia
Introductory Guide to Critical Theory (Purdue)
http://www.sla.purdue.edu/academic/engl/theory/index.html
Introduction to Modern Literary Theory (Dr. Kristi Siegel)
http://www.kristisiegel.com/theory.htm
Literary Resources - Theory (Jack Lynch)
http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Lit/theory.html
Song of Myself on American Transcendentalism Web (annotated)
http://www.vcu.edu/engweb/transcendentalism/roots/legacy/whitman/songofmyselfweb.html
TILT (University of Texas):
http://tilt.lib.utsystem.edu/nf/intro/internet.htm
The Texas Information Literacy Tutorial (TILT) is designed to introduce
first-year students to research sources and skills. The tutorial, which takes
less than thirty minutes, introduces students to information literacy by
allowing them to select one of the following topics: censorship & freedom of
speech, global communication, internet business, laws & regulations, new trends,
and security & privacy. The site explains the difference between scholarly and
popular magazines and contains some entertaining visuals.
U. C. Berkeley:
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/Internet/FindInfo.html
The U. C. Berkeley site focuses specifically on Internet research, discussing in
great detail how to find, evaluate, and cite information on the Internet. For
the true neophyte, it even explains what the Internet is and offers a glossary
of Internet terminology.
Life in Elizabethan England - social and cultural information - http://renaissance.dm.net/compendium/home.html
Renascence Editions - various full text of works from Renaissance writers - http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~rbear/ren.htm
Britannica's Shakespeare page - http://search.eb.com/shakespeare/ind_intro.html
The Folger Shakespeare Library - http://www.folger.edu/
*Henry Ford Community College provides personal Web pages for faculty, administrators and staff as a forum for self expression. The contents of both the Web pages themselves and/or of material accessed via links to other pages may contain material that some may find offensive. The views and opinions expressed in the pages are those of the page authors only. The College accepts no responsibility for the contents of these pages.