Literary Devices

8th Grade Reading

Allegory

• A narrative that serves as an extended metaphor.

• Usually written in the form of fables, parables, poems, or stories

• Tells a story that has characters, a setting, and other types of symbols that have literal and figurative meaning

• Writers use allegory to add different layers of meanings to their works.

• Allegory makes their stories and characters multidimensional, so that they stand for something larger in meaning than what they literally stand for.

• Allegory allows writers to put forward their moral and political point of views.

Alliteration

• A pattern of sound that includes the repetition of consonant sounds.

• Used to call attention to a phrase and fix it into the reader’s mind-emphasis

1.But a better butter makes a batter better.

• Remember it is not necessarily the letters but the letter sounds that are repeated.

Allusion

• A reference in a literary work to a person, place, or thing in history or another work of literature.

• Allusions are often indirect or brief references to a well-known character or event.

• “Hey! Guess who the new Newton of our school is?”

• “Newton”, means a genius student, alludes to a famous scientist Isaac Newton.

Antagonist

• A character in a story or poem who deceives, frustrates, or works against the main character in some way.

• Doesn’t necessarily have to be a person could be (Evil, death, etc.)

• Just prevents the main character from having a “Happily Ever After”

• In the Batman series, Batman and Robbin are the “good guys” saving the world

• The antagonist could be a character like Joker

Ballad

• A narrative folk song.

• Ballads were created by common people and passed on orally due to the illiteracy of the Middle Ages.

• A traditional story that is passed down in simple language for others to understand

• The three little pigs could be an example

Character

• A person who is responsible for the thoughts and actions within a story, poem, or other literature.

• They serve as the medium that readers interact with throughout the piece of literature

• Characters are the main things people remember about a story

Connotation

• An association that comes along with a particular word

• Connotation relates to the ideas or qualities that are implied by the word

• Example: Gold

• Connotations for gold could be greed or luxury

• NOT necessarily what gold means

Couplet

• A style of poetry defined as a complete thought written in two lines with rhyming ends

• Couplet means two

• So long as men can breathe or eyes can see• So long as lives this, and this gives life to thee

Denotation

• The exact meaning of a word, without the feelings or suggestions that the word may imply.

• The opposite of “connotation”• Denotation is the Dictionary definition of the

words meaning

• Heart: an organ that circulates blood throughout the body. (Denotation)

• In context, people associate the word heart with love or heartache. (Connotation)

Dialogue

• The conversation between characters in a drama or narrative

• Often remembered as character conversations

Elegy

• A type of literature defined as a song or poem, written in couplets that expresses sorrow usually for someone who has died

• Often remembered as a “Eulogy”-spoken at a wake service for someone who has passed on

Figurative Language

• A type of language that varies from the norms of literal language, in which words mean exactly as they say.

• Most common types: Similes and Metaphors-discussed later

Flashback

• An interruption of the chronological sequence of an event of earlier occurrence

• Allows the writer to present past events

during current events in order to provide background for the current narration

• Flashbacks can occur throughout the story or sometimes given at the end to wrap the story up and make sure the reader doesn’t miss the meaning of the story

Genre

• A type of literature

• Each story relates to a particular genre based on its characteristics

• Many types of genres

• Example:• The gothic genre often features things such as

supernatural elements and attempts to horrify the reader

• Historical fiction, mystery, fantasy, folktale, poetry, non-fiction, autobiography, biography, realistic fiction, and science fiction

Hyperbole

• An extravagant exaggeration.• A figure of speech that is a major exaggerated

description of a statement • Used to emphasize descriptions

Irony

• A literary term referring to how a person, situation, statement, or circumstance is not as it would actually seem.

• Usually it is the EXACT opposite of what it appears to be

• I posted a video on YouTube about how boring and useless YouTube is.

• The name of Britain’s biggest dog was “Tiny”.• You laugh at a person who slipped stepping

on a banana peel and the next thing you know, you slipped too.

• The butter is as soft as a marble piece.• “Oh great! Now you have broken my new

camera.”

Lyric

• A lyric is a song-like poem written mainly to express feelings of emotions or thought from a particular person

• Generally these are short expressing vivid imagination as well as emotion and all flow fairly concisely

• Often times, you can think about music as music consists of lyrics written about a certain topic

Metaphor

• A type of figurative language in which a statement is made that says that one thing is something else but, literally it is not.

• A comparison NOT using like or as

1.My brother was boiling mad. (This implies he was too angry.)

2.The assignment was a breeze. (This implies that the assignment was not difficult.)

3. It is going to be clear skies from now on. (This implies that clear skies are not a threat and life is going to be without hardships)

4.The skies of his future began to darken. (Darkness is a threat; therefore, this implies that the coming times are going to be hard for him.)

5.Her voice is music to his ears. (This implies that her voice makes him feel happy)

Motif

• A recurring object, concept, or structure in a work of literature

• Can be two contrasting elements in a work, such as good and evil

• Allows one to see main points and themes that the author is trying to express, in order that one might be able to interpret the work more accurately

Myth

• Any story that attempts to explain how the world was created or why the world is the way that it is

• Myths are stories that are passed down from generation to generation and normally involve religion

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

Narrator

• One who tells a story, the speaker or “voice” of an oral or written work

• Narrator is not usually the same person as the author• One of these types of narrators:

– Participant-protagonist or participant in any action in the story

– Observer- someone who is indirectly involved in the action of the story

– Non participant- one who is not at all involved in any action in the story

Parable

• A brief and often simple narrative that illustrates a moral or religious lesson

Persona

• The persona is the narrator, or storyteller, of a literary work created by the author

• The persona is not the author, but the author’s creation-the voice through which the author speaks

Personification

• A figure of speech where animals, ideas or inorganic objects are given human characteristics

• Example: animals being able to talk/walk

Point of View• A way of the events of a story are conveyed to the reader.• First Person-narrator is a character in the book

• Third Person Objective-narrator is outside of the story and can only report what he or she sees or hears

• Third Person Limited-narrator is outside of the story but can see into the mind of the characters

• Third Person Omniscient-omniscient means “ALL knowing” so this is when the narrator is outside of the story but can see into ALL aspects of the story

Protagonist

• Considered to be the main character or lead figure in a story

• Can also be referred to as the “hero” of the story

• Would be Batman in referring back to that example

Rhyme

• Repetition of and identical or similarly accented sound or sounds in a work

• Can be words that rhyme at the end of lines or words that rhyme within the line

Setting

• The time, place, physical details, and circumstances in which a situation occurs

• Includes the background, atmosphere or environment in which the characters live in

Simile

• A simile is a type of figurative language that does not mean exactly what it says, that makes a comparison between two unlike objects or ideas by connecting them with the words “like” or “as”

• Our soldiers are as brave as lions.• Her cheeks are red like a rose.• He is as funny as a monkey.• The water well was as dry as a bone.• He is as cunning as a fox.

Short Story

• A prose narrative that is brief in nature

• Also has many of the same characteristics of a novel including characters, setting, and plot

• Sometimes the explanation of ideas is not as well-written as it should be due to the length of the story

Symbol

• A symbol is a word or object that stands for another word or object

• The object can be seen with the eye or not visible

• Example: A dove stands for peace

Symbolism

• The use of symbols to signify ideas and qualities by giving them symbolic meanings that are different from their literal sense

• Black is a symbol that represents evil or death.• A ladder may stand as a symbol for a

connection between the heaven and the earth.• A broken mirror may symbolize separation

Theme

• A common thread or repeated idea that is incorporated throughout a literary work

• A thought or idea the author presents to the reader that may be deep, difficult to understand, or even moralistic

Imagery

• Means to use figurative language to represent objects, actions, and ideas in such a way that appeals to our physical sense

• It was dark and dim in the forest. – The words “dark” and “dim” are visual images.

• The children were screaming and shouting in the fields. - “Screaming” and “shouting” appeal to our sense of hearing or auditory sense.

Non-Fiction

• All of the information is based on true facts and is not made up