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CLEP Common Literary Forms And Genres

Subjects : clep, literature
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
  • If you are not ready to take this test, you can study here.
  • 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 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.






2. Fiction that is set in an alternative reality






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






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






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






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






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






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






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






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






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






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






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






15. 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






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






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






18. Any composition not written in verse.






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






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 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.






22. 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.






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






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






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. 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






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






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






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






30. A short play based on a biblical story.






31. 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.






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






33. 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.






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






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 fictional prose narrative of significant length.






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






38. A narrative work that reports true events.






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






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






41. 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.






42. 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.






43. 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).






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






45. 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.






46. 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.






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






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






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






50. 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.