UIL Literary Criticism Exam Study Guide 2024.

UIL Literary Criticism Exam Study Guide 2024. Absolute - ANSWER a word free from limitations or qualifications ("best," "all," "unique," "perfect") Accismus - ANSWER a form of irony in which a person feigns indifference to or pretends to refusesomething he or she desires Acronym - ANSWER a word formed from the initial letters of words and pronounced as a separate word Acrostic - ANSWER verse in which certain letters such as the first in each line form a word or message Adage - ANSWER a familiar proverb or wise saying Ad Hominem Argument - ANSWER an argument attacking an individual's character rather than his or her position on an issue Agroikos - ANSWER Rustic, straight-talking, unsophisticated, not anxious about his image, unfazed by others' joking. Allegory - ANSWER a literary work in which characters, objects, or actions represent abstractions Alliteration - ANSWER the repetition of initial sounds in successive or neighboring words Allusion - ANSWER a reference to something literary, mythological, or historical that the author assumes the reader will recognize Alterity - ANSWER the state of being other or different; otherness Ambiguity - ANSWER An event or situation that may be interpreted in more than one way. Analogy - ANSWER a comparison between different things that are similar in some way Anaphora - ANSWER A rhetorical figure of repetition in which the UIL Literary Criticism Exam Study Guide 2024 same word or phrase is repeated in (and usually at the beginning of) successive lines, clauses, or sentences. Anecdote - ANSWER a brief narrative that focuses on a particular incident or event Anglo-Norman Period - ANSWER the period in English literature between 1100 and 1350, which is also often called the Early Middle English Period and is frequently dated from the Conquest in 1066 Anthology - ANSWER A collection of various writings, such as songs, stories, or poems Antithesis - ANSWER a statement in which two opposing ideas are balanced Aphorism - ANSWER a concise statement that expresses succinctly a general truth or idea, often using rhyme or balance Apostrophe - ANSWER a figure of speech in which one directly addresses an absent or imaginary person, or some abstraction Archetype - ANSWER a detail, image, or character type that occurs frequently in literature and myth and is thought to appeal in a universal way to the unconscious and to evoke a response Argument - ANSWER a statement of the meaning or main point of a literary work Asyndeton - ANSWER a constructions in which elements are presented in a series without conjunctions Auditory - ANSWER Having to do with the sense of hearing Augustan Age - ANSWER is a style of English literature produced during the reigns of Queen Anne, King George I, and George II in the first half of the 18th century, ending in the 1740s with the deaths of Pope and Swift (1744 and 1745, respectively) Balanced Sentence - ANSWER a sentence in which words, phrases, or clauses are set off against each other to emphasize a point Ballad - ANSWER A narrative poem written in four-line stanzas, characterized by swift action and narrated in a direct style. Baroque - ANSWER An artistic style of the seventeenth century characterized by complex forms, bold ornamentation, and contrasting elements Bathos - ANSWER insincere or overly sentimental quality of writing/speech intended to evoke pity Beat Generation - ANSWER Group highlighted by writers and artist who stressed spontaneity and spirituality instead of apathy and conformity. Biblical Allusion - ANSWER reference from the Bible, ex: eyes like heaven, the crowd parted like the red sea. Bildungsroman - ANSWER A German word referring to a novel structured as a series of events that take place as the hero travels in quest of a goal Blood and Thunder - ANSWER A class of work specializing in bloodshed and violence. Many of these have to do with crime and high emotion. Sometimes abbr. to "blood," "blood books," or "penny bloods." Bowdlerize - ANSWER (v.) to remove material considered offensive (from a book, play, film, etc.) Caesura - ANSWER A natural pause or break in a line of poetry, usually near the middle of the line. Carpe Diem - ANSWER "Seize the day"; a Latin phrase implying that one must live for the present moment, for tomorrow may be too late. Chiaroscuro - ANSWER An Italian word designating the contrast of dark and light in a painting, drawing, or print.