Lit Terms 81-100

Oxymoron: a figure of speech in which two contradicting words or phrases are combined to produce a rhetorical effect by means of a concise paradox.

Pacing:  rate of movement; tempo.

Parable:  a story designed to convey some religious principle, moral lesson, or general truth.

Paradox:  a statement apparently self-contradictory or absurd but really containing a possible truth; an opinion contrary to generally accepted ideas.

Parallelism: the principle in sentence structure that states elements of equal function should have equal form.

Parody:  an imitation of mimicking of a composition or of the style of a well-known artist.

Pathos:  the ability in literature to call forth feelings of pity, compassion, and/or sadness.

Pedantry: a display of learning for its own sake.

Personification: a figure of speech attributing human qualities to inanimate objects or  abstract ideas.

Plot: a plan or scheme to accomplish a purpose.

Poignant:  eliciting sorrow or sentiment.

Point of View: the attitude unifying any oral or written argumentation; in description, the physical point from which the observer views what he is describing.

Postmodernism: literature characterized by experimentation, irony, nontraditional forms, multiple meanings, playfulness and a blurred boundary between real and imaginary.

Prose:  the ordinary form of spoken and written language; language that does not have a regular rhyme pattern.

Protagonist: the central character in a work of fiction; opposes antagonist.

Pun:  play on words; the humorous use of a word emphasizing different meanings or applications.

Purpose: the intended result wished by an author.

Realism:  writing about the ordinary aspects of life in a straightfoward manner to reflect life as it actually is.

Refrain:  a phrase or verse recurring at intervals in a poem or song; chorus.

Requiem:  any chant, dirge, hymn, or musical service for the dead.