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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. Fiction that is set in an alternative reality






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






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






4. 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.






5. 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.






6. 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.






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






8. 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






9. 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.






10. The nonfictional story of a person's life. James Boswell's Life of Johnson is one of the most celebrated examples.






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






12. 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.






13. 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.






14. 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






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






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






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






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






19. 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.






20. 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.






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






22. 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






23. 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.






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






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






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






27. A short play based on a biblical story.






28. 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.






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






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






31. A fictional prose narrative of significant length.






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






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






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






35. 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.






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






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






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






39. 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.






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 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






42. 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






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






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






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






46. 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.






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






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






49. 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).






50. Any composition not written in verse.