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CLEP Common Literary Forms And Genres

Subjects : clep, literature
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
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  • Match each statement with the correct term.
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This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. A humorous and often satirical imitation of the style or particular work of another author.






2. A speech - often in verse - by a lone character. The most famous example being the 'To be or not to be' speech in Shakespeare's Hamlet.






3. A nonrealistic story - in verse or prose - that features idealized characters - improbable adventures - and exotic settings.






4. A poem that contains words that a fictional or historical character speaks to a particular audience. Alfred - Lord Tennyson's 'Ulysses' is a famous example.






5. A short pastoral poem in the form of a dialogue between two shepherds. Virgil's Eclogues is the most famous example of this genre.






6. Fiction that concerns the nature of fiction itself - either by reinterpreting a previous fictional work or by drawing attention to its own fictional status.






7. A humorous imitation of a serious work of literature. The humor often arises from the incongruity between the imitation and the work being imitated. For example - Alexander Pope's The Rape of the Lock uses the high diction of epic poetry to talk abou






8. A fiction genre - popularized in the 1940s - with a cynical - disillusioned - loner protagonist.






9. Literature intended to instruct or educate. For example - Virgil's Georgics contains farming advice in verse form.






10. A novel that tells a nonfictional - autobiographical story but uses novelistic techniques - such as fictionalized dialogue or anecdotes - to add color - immediacy - or thematic unity.






11. A short poetic expression of grief. It differs from an elegy in that it often is embedded within a larger work - is less highly structured - and is meant to be sung.






12. A short play based on a biblical story.






13. A short poetic composition that describes the thoughts of a single speaker.






14. A play from the Middle Ages featuring saints or miraculous appearances by the Virgin Mary.






15. A ritualized form of Japanese drama that evolved in the 1300s involving masks and slow - stylized movement.






16. A form of nonfictional discussion or argument that Michel de Montaigne pioneered in the 1500s.






17. A romance that describes the adventures of medieval knights and celebrates their strict code of honor - loyalty - and respectful devotion to women.






18. A short prose or verse narrative - such as those by Aesop - that illustrates a moral - which often is stated explicitly at the end.






19. A composition that is meant to be performed. The term often is used interchangeably with play.






20. A work that imitates the style of a previous author - work - or literary genre. Alternatively - the term may refer to a work that contains a hodgepodge of elements or fragments from different sources or influences. It differs from parody in that its






21. A particularly compressed and truncated short story. They are rarely longer than 1 -000 words.






22. Traditionally - a folk song telling a story or legend in simple language - often with a refrain.






23. Disturbing or absurd material presented in a humorous manner - usually with the intention to confront uncomfortable truths. Joseph Heller's Catch-22 is a notable example.






24. A fictional prose narrative of significant length.






25. A play such as Shakespeare's A Winter's Tale that mixes elements of tragedy and comedy.






26. A story meant to be performed in a theater before an audience. Most are written in dialogue form and are divided into several acts. Many include stage directions and instructions for sets and costumes.






27. The brief narration of a single event or incident.






28. Originally - a realistic novel detailing a scoundrel's exploits. The term grew to refer more generally to any novel with a loosely structured - episodic plot that revolves around the adventures of a central character.






29. Any composition not written in verse.






30. A novel in which the author's aim is to tell a story that illuminates and draws attention to contemporary social problems with the goal of inciting change for the better. Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin - which exposed the horrors of Africa






31. A genre of fiction that presents an imagined future society that purports to be perfect and utopian but that the author presents to the reader as horrifyingly inhuman.






32. A celebration of the simple - rustic life of shepherds and shepherdesses - usually written by a sophisticated - urban writer.






33. A play that confronts a contemporary social problem with the intent of changing public opinion on the matter.






34. An autobiographical poetic genre in which the poet discusses intensely personal subject matter with unusual frankness.






35. A work of fiction of middle length - often divided into a few short chapters - such as Henry James's Daisy Miller.






36. A novel written in the form of letters exchanged by characters in the story - such as Samuel Richardson's Clarissa or Alice Walker's The Color Purple. This form was especially popular in the 1700s.






37. A narrative work that reports true events.






38. A play written in the fifteenth or sixteenth centuries that presents an allegory of the Christian struggle for salvation.






39. A concise expression of insight or wisdom: 'The vanity of others offends our taste only when it offends our vanity' (Friedrich Nietzsche - Beyond Good and Evil).






40. A short narrative that illustrates a moral by means of allegory.






41. A German term - meaning 'formation novel -' for a novel about a child or adolescent's development into maturity - with special focus on the protagonist's quest for identity. James Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man is a notable example.






42. The nonfictional story of a person's life - told by that person.






43. A play consisting of a single act - without intermission and running usually less than an hour.






44. A serious lyric poem - often of significant length - that usually conforms to an elaborate metrical structure.






45. A lighthearted play characterized by humor and a happy ending.






46. A story about a heroic figure derived from oral tradition and based partly on fact and partly on fiction.






47. A story about the origins of a culture's beliefs and practices - or of supernatural phenomena - usually derived from oral tradition and set in an imagined supernatural past.






48. A poetic work that features the strong rhythms of free versebut is presented on the page in the form of prose - without line breaks.






49. An invented narrative - as opposed to one that reports true events.






50. A novel - such as Jean-Paul Sartre's Nausea - that the author uses as a platform for discussing ideas. Character and plot are of secondary importance.