Text Book Reflections: Literary Elements

A brief refresher of the bits and pieces that make up literature!

Literary Elements

·         Antagonist- person in the main character’s way

·         Character- a person/entity in literature

·         Conflict- the problem

·         Mood And Tone- the atmosphere or “feel” of a text and the attitude the narrator has about the text

·         Plot- what’s going on!

·         Protagonist- main character

·         Setting- when and where a story takes place

·         Themes- the universal ideas that are being expressed by literature

Literary Devices

• Allegory- where people represent ideas (Young Goodman Brown’s wife Faith)
• Allusion- reference to ANY person, song, text etc outside of the text you’re reading
• Archetype- a character, event or symbol repeated regularly enough to appear in many texts
• Deus ex machine- the gods or God interfering in the lives of mortals
• Hyperbole- exaggeration
• Imagery- language that paints a picture in your mind as you read
• Metaphor- direct comparison (Bob is a giraffe)
• Motif- idea or object that is present throughout a text
• Point of view- who is telling us the story
• Simile- comparison using like or as (Bob is as tall as a giraffe)
• Symbolism- one thing standing for/representing another

image borrowed from: http://msfalkenthal.weebly.com/ela.html