English Literature Composition: Lit Terms: List 2

Circumlocution - noun an indirect way of expressing something; a style that involves indirect ways of expressing things

Classicism - noun a movement in literature and art during the 17th and 18th centuries in Europe that favored rationality and restraint and strict forms

Cliche - noun a trite or obvious remark

Climax - noun the decisive moment in a novel or play;arrangement of clauses in ascending order of forcefulness; the highest point of anything conceived of as growing or developing or unfolding

Colloquialism - noun characteristic of spoken or written communication that seeks to imitate informal speech

Comedy - noun light and humorous drama with a happy ending; a comic incident or series of incidents

Conflict - noun an open clash between two opposing groups (or individuals); an incompatibility of dates or events; opposition between two simultaneous but incompatible feelings; opposition in a work of drama or fiction between characters or forces (especially an opposition that motivates the development of the plot); the reference of an expression

Connotation - an idea or feeling that a word invokes in addition to its literal or primary meaning

Contrast - noun the act of distinguishing by comparing differences;the range of optical density and tone on a photographic negative or print (or the extent to which adjacent areas on a television screen differ in brightness); verb put in opposition to show or emphasize differences; to show differences when compared; be different

Denotation - noun the most direct or specific meaning of a word or expression; the class of objects that an expression refers to; the act of indicating or pointing out by name

Denouement - noun the final resolution of the main complication of a literary or dramatic work; the outcome of a complex sequence of events

Dialect - noun the usage or vocabulary that is characteristic of a specific group of people

Dialectics - noun a rationale for dialectical materialism based on change through the conflict of opposing forces

Dichotomy - noun being twofold; a classification into two opposed parts or subclasses

Diction - noun the manner in which something is expressed in words; the articulation of speech regarded from the point of view of its intelligibility to the audience

Didactic - adj. instructive (especially excessively)

Dogmatic - adj. characterized by assertion of unproved or unprovable principles; relating to or involving dogma; of or pertaining to or characteristic of a doctrine or code of beliefs accepted as authoritative