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






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






3. A full-length fictional work that is novelistic in nature but written in verse rather than prose. Examples include Aleksandr Pushkin's Eugene Onegin and Vikram Seth's The Golden Gate.






4. 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






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






6. 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.






7. 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.






8. 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.






9. 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






10. Any composition not written in verse.






11. 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.






12. 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






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






14. 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






15. 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.






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






17. A work of didactic literature that aims to influence the reader on a specific social or political issue.






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






19. 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.






20. 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.






21. 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.






22. 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.






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






24. Fiction that is set in an alternative reality






25. 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.






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






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






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






29. 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






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






31. 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.






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






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






34. A narrative work that reports true events.






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






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






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






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






39. 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.






40. A short play based on a biblical story.






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






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






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






44. 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.






45. 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






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






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






48. 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.






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






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