Practice Literary terms for Standards Test:

Alliteration                             Free verse                             Personification

Antagonist                             Hyperbole                              Petrarchan lover

Aside                                      Iambic pentameter               Simile

Assonance                            Metaphor                               Situational irony

Blank verse                           Meter                                      Soliloquy

Chorus                                   Onomatopoeia                     Tragedy

Consonance                         Oxymoron                             Verbal irony

Dramatic irony                      Paradox

Match the correct term with the correct definition:

1. ______________ A statement that seems, at first, to contradict itself, but is ultimately true. 

2. ______________ Poetic repetition of vowel sounds.

3.   _______________  Five feet containing one accented and one unaccented syllable.

     4.  ________________ In a drama, a moment when a character is alone on the stage and speaks his or her thoughts aloud.

5.   _______________  The close repetition of identical consonant sounds before and after different vowels. eg:  flip, flop; feel, fill; east, west.

6. ________________ A man whose love for a beautiful woman is not returned.  He sees love as something that should be painful and confusing.

7. ________________ When the audience or the reader knows something important that a character in the play or story does not know. It can add to comedic effect and suspense.

    8. ________________ A device in which a character in a drama makes a short speech which is heard by the audience but not by the other characters in the play.

9.  ________________  The close repetition of consonant sounds, usually at the beginning of words.

10.  ________________ The common name for iambic pentameter.

11.   _______________  A measured verbal rhythm.

12.  ________________ An apparent contradiction that is actually true. The statement challenges us to uncover the underlying truth that resolves the apparent contradiction.

13. ________________ When what actually happens is the opposite of what is expected or appropriate.

14.  ________________ A person or force which opposes the protagonist in a literary work.

15.  ________________ A play, novel, or other narrative in which there are many serious and important events, and the main character comes to an unhappy end.

16.  ________________  A comparison of two unlike objects not using like or as.

17. _________________ A figure of speech that combines contradictory or opposing ideas.

18.  ________________ A comparison of two unlike objects using like or as.

19.  ________________  The use of words whose sounds seem to express or reinforce their meansings. eg:  hiss, bang, woof.

20.  __________________ Giving human characteristics to an inanimate object.

21.  __________________ In classical Greek tragedies, a group of nameless onlookers who comment on and interpret the action of the play.

22.  _________________ poetry written without meter or specific line lengths.

23.  _________________ A figure of speech in which an overstatement or exaggeration occurs. It can help express strong emotion or create a comic effect for the reader.