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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 lengthy narrative that describes the deeds of a heroic figure - often of national or cultural importance - in elevated language. Strictly - the term applies only to verse narratives like Beowulf or Virgil's Aeneid - but it is used to describe prose






2. 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.






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






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






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






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






7. A short play based on a biblical story.






8. A form of high-energy comedy that plays on confusions and deceptions between characters and features a convoluted and fast-paced plot.






9. 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.






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






11. A novel set in an earlier historical period that features a plot shaped by the historical circumstances of that period.






12. A formal poem that laments the death of a friend or public figure - or - occasionally - a meditation on death itself. In Greek and Latin poetry - the term applies to a specific type of meter (alternating hexameters and pentameters) regardless of cont






13. 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.






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






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






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






17. A fictional prose narrative of significant length.






18. Any composition not written in verse.






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






20. 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.






21. 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






22. A succinct - witty statement - often in verse. For example - William Wordsworth's observation 'The child is the father of the man.'






23. A humorous and often satirical imitation of the style or particular work of another author.






24. A serious play that ends unhappily for the protagonist.






25. 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.






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






27. 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).






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






29. Works that express a preference for the natural over the artificial in human culture - and a belief that the life of primitive cultures is preferable to modern lifestyles.






30. 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.






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






32. A narrative in which literal meaning corresponds clearly and directly to symbolic meaning. For example - the literal story in John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress






33. Bertolt Brecht's Marxist approach to theater - which rejects emotional and psychological engagement in favor of critical detachment.






34. Fiction that is set in an alternative reality






35. A novel that focuses on the social customs of a certain class of people - often with a sharp eye for irony. Jane Austen's novels are prime examples of this genre.






36. 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.






37. 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.






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






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






40. 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.






41. A work of prose fiction that is much shorter than a novel (rarely more than forty pages) and focused more tightly on a single event.






42. An autobiographical work. Rather than focus exclusively on the author's life - it pays significant attention to the author's involvement in historical events and the characterization of individuals other than the author.






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






44. 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






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






46. A work that exposes to ridicule the shortcomings of individuals - institutions - or society - often to make a political point. Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels is one of the most well known examples in English.






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






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






50. A narrative work that reports true events.







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