Up to Snuff #121: Literary Device Notes
By, Afua Serwah Osei-Bonsu
Plot-
Rising action, climax, falling action
Arrangement connective sequence of narrative events
Series of events
Character-
Usually one main protagonist, usually 3, not more than three characters, short stories limit number of characters, one fleshed out or round character, many other two dimensional or flat, depends on tone, plot, theme, setting, characters rendered, how character is revealed through eg. litanies, draws on what?
Setting
“~Time, place and mood, when and where and under what circumstances “
“restricted geographical setting.” “In a single place within a short period of time”
“Within a social situation.”
Tone
“~Specific attitude or perspective one adopts with regards to a specific character or place or development”
Theme-Meaning of subject, underlying idea or statement about its subject
Prose-ordinary unrhymed language
Narrative-Has to do with actual stories or writings that include narration
Point of View-eg. First person narrative singular- (I,my)
First person plural (we, are)
Third person point of view-(she, he, they)
Omnipresent narrator-moves around in space and time
Limited omnipresent narrator-expresses emotions single character
Second person-(you)
Irony-manipulation of narrative perspective, authors decisions, gaps, overstatement verbal irony, dramatic irony
Figurative-non-literally, in order to achieve a special effect
Metaphor-one thing compared to another
Simile-one thing is like another
Personification-human qualities to ideas or things
Allusion-associations to persons, places or events
Symbols-Anything that stands for something else
Rhyme-sound patterns of stressed vowels
Alliteration-repetition of a consonant sound
Rhythm-relationship stressed and unstressed syllables, recurrent or similar rhythm is poems meter.
Most literary device notes extracted from:
Richard Abercarian, Marvin Klotz and Samuel Cohen, eds. Literature: The Human Experience: Reading and Writing. New York: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2016, Print