Literary Terms – Fiction

Note: an asterisk (*) denotes a term that is applicable to both drama and fiction.

*Anticlimax – an effect that spoils a climax—adjective: Anticlimactic.

*Archetype – A pattern or model of an action, a character type, or an image that recurs consistently enough in life and literature to be considered universal

Characterization – the method by which an author creates the appearance and personality of imaginary persons The author may choose to tell the reader what a character is like through narration, show what a character is like through actions and dialogue, or have the character reveal him/herself through inner thoughts

v Flat character – a character (1) whose character (2) is summed up in one or two traits.

v Round character – a character (1) whose character (2) is complex and many-sided.

v Stock character – A stereotyped character: one whose nature is familiar to us from prototypes in previous fiction.

v Dynamic character – a character who is changed by the actions in which he or she is involved.

v Static character – a character who remains unchanged or little changed throughout the course of the story.

*Confidant/confidante – someone that the protagonist talks to, enabling the audience or reader to become aware of the protagonist’s motivation

Dystopia – an undesirable imaginary society—Orwell’s 1984 or Huxley’s Brave New World

Explication de texte – the detailed analysis, or close reading of a passage of verse or prose—such explication seeks to make meaning clear through a painstaking examination and explanation of style, language, symbolism, and the relationship of parts to the whole

*Incident – an event or episode in a work of fiction that moves the plot forward or reveals character

Motif – a recurring image, word, phrase, action, idea, object, or situation that appears in many works or in the same work

*Motivation – the psychological and moral impulses and external circumstances that cause a character to act, think, or feel a certain way

*Narrative voice – the attitude, personality or character of the narrator as it is revealed through dialogue or descriptive and narrative commentary

v Reliable narrator – a trustworthy person telling the story

v Unreliable narrator – an untrustworthy person telling the story

v Naïve narrator – a child or simple-minded adult who tells the story without realizing its meaning

v Intrusive narrator – a storyteller who interrupts the narrative to address the reader

*Point of View – the vantage point, or stance, from which a story is told; the eye and mind through which the action is perceived and filtered, sometimes called narrative perspective

v First person – the story is told by one of its characters, using the first person pronoun “I” which does not give the reader insight into other characters’ motives or thoughts

v Third person objective – the author limits him/herself to reporting what the characters say or do; he or she does not interpret their behavior or tell us their private thoughts or feelings

v Third person omniscient – the author knows all (godlike) and is free to tell us anything, including what the characters are thinking or feeling and why they act as they do

v Third person limited – the author limits him/herself to a complete knowledge of one character in the story and tells us only what that one character feels, thinks, sees or hears

Reliability – the extent to which a narrator can be trusted or believed—the closer the narrator is to the story, the more his or her judgment will be influenced by forces in the story

Stereotype – a character who represents a trait generally attributed to a social or racial group and lacks other individualizing traits, for example: a nagging wife, a hardboiled detective, a hot-headed Italian, a harsh boss

*Subplot – a secondary series of events that are subordinate to the main story; a story within a story

Suspense – quality that makes the reader or audience uncertain or tense about the outcome of events

Suspension of Disbelief – the demand made of an audience to provide some details with their imagination and to accept the limitations of reality and staging; also the acceptance of the incidents of a plot by a reader

Symbol – anything that stands for or represents something else beyond itself, usually an idea conventionally associated with it

*Theme – the core idea or message in a literary work. It is not the subject, but the controlling statement about life or human nature that emerges from a literary work’s treatment of its subject matter

Utopia – a desirable imaginary society