Ten Literary Terms

Biography?Definition:

An account of a person’s life, and a branch of history written by another person. (Penguin Dictionary).

History of particular men’s lives’.(Dryden).

i.e. Shakespeare, or Milton biography.

Iambic Iamb- Two syllables, unstressed-stressed, as in "today".

Pentameter- The word "pentameter" indicates that a line has five of these "feet.“

i.e. If music be the food of love, play on; Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting, The appetite may sicken, and so die. That strain again! it had a dying fall: O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet sound, That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour! Enough; no more: 'Tis not so sweet now as it was before. (Shakespeare, Twelfth Night)

• Blank Verse- Verse written in unrhymed iambic pentameter, where each line usually contains ten syllables and every other syllable is stressed.

• Mostly Shakespeare work is in Blank Verse

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Catastrophe:The tragic denouement, or unknotting of a play or story.

OR

• Catastrophe :

The scene in a tragedy which includes the death or moral destruction of the protagonist. In the catastrophe at the end of Sophocles‘ "Oedipus the King," Oedipus, discovering the tragic truth about his origin and his deeds, plucks out his eyes and is condemned to spend the rest of his days a wandering beggar. The catastrophe in Shakespearean tragedy occurs in Act 5 of each drama, and always includes the death of the protagonist.

OR

The Moor’s murder of Desdemona and his own suicide is the most suitable example of catastrophe in “Othello”

Characterization -The personality a character displays; also, the means by which an author reveals that personality.

OR

The method a writer uses to reveal the personality of a character in a literary work: Methods may include (1) by what the character says about himself or herself;(2) (2) by what others reveal about the character; and (3) (3) by the character's own actions