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Test your basic knowledge |
CLEP Literary Techniques
Start Test
Study First
Subjects
:
clep
,
literature
Instructions:
Answer 22 questions in 15 minutes.
If you are not ready to take this test, you can
study here
.
Match each statement with the correct term.
Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.
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. Latin for 'in the middle of things.' The term refers to the technique of starting a narrative in the middle of the action. For example - John Milton's Paradise Lost - which concerns the war among the angels in Heaven - opens after the fallen angels a
Anagnorisis
Poetic license
In medias rest
Invocation
2. The use of specific types of words - phrases - or literary structures that are not common in contemporary speech or prose.
Epiphany
Poetic diction
Bathos
Invocation
3. The use of a statement that - by its context - implies its opposite. For example - in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar - Antony repeats - 'Brutus is an honorable man -' while clearly implying that Brutus is dishonorable.
Dramatic irony
Verbal irony
Melodrama
Bathos
4. Greek for 'God from a machine.' The phrase originally referred to a technique in ancient tragedy in which a mechanical god was lowered onto the stage to intervene and solve the play's problems or bring the play to a satisfactory conclusion. Now - the
Deus ex machina
Poetic license
Melodrama
Parallelism
5. A technique in which one understanding of a situation stands in sharp contrast to another - usually more prevalent - understanding of the same situation.
Allusion
Poetic diction
Pathos
Situational irony
6. A sudden - powerful - and often spiritual or life changing realization that a character reaches in an otherwise ordinary or everyday moment.
Interior monologue
Deus ex machina
Situational irony
Epiphany
7. A description or characterization that exaggerates or distorts a character's prominent features - usually to elicit mockery.
Epiphany
Caricature
Irony
Situational irony
8. A moment of recognition or discovery - primarily used in reference to Greek tragedy. For example - in Euripides' The Bacchae - Agave experiences it when she discovers that she has murdered her own son - Pentheus.
Pathos
Allusion
Deus ex machina
Anagnorisis
9. An implicit reference within a literary work to a historical or literary person - place - or event.
Caricature
Allusion
Invocation
Foreshadowing
10. An author's persistent reminding of his or her presence in the work. By drawing attention to the artifice of the work - the author ensures that the reader or audience will maintain critical detachment and not simply accept the writing at face value.
Pathos
Parallelism
Epiphany
Romantic irony
11. The use of sentimentality - gushing emotion - or sensational action or plot twists to provoke audience or reader response.
Wit
Interior monologue
Anagnorisis
Melodrama
12. An author's deliberate use of hints or suggestions to give a preview of events or themes that do not develop until later in the narrative.
Poetic diction
Cosmic irony
Parallelism
Foreshadowing
13. A wide-ranging technique of detachment that draws awareness to the discrepancy between words and their meanings - between expectation and fulfillment - or - most generally - between what is and what seems to be.
Cosmic irony
Allusion
In medias rest
Irony
14. A technique in which the author lets the audience or reader in on a character's situation while the character himself remains in the dark. One example is in Sophocles' Oedipus Rex - when Oedipus vows to discover his father's murderer - not knowing -
Wit
Poetic license
Deus ex machina
Dramatic irony
15. A record of a character's thoughts - unmediated by a narrator.
Situational irony
Interior monologue
Verbal irony
Poetic license
16. The perception of fate or the universe as malicious or indifferent to human suffering - which creates a painful contrast between our purposeful activity and its ultimate meaninglessness.
In medias rest
Cosmic irony
Caricature
Poetic license
17. Similarities between elements in a narrative (such as two characters or two plot lines). For instance - in Shakespeare's King Lear - both Lear and Gloucester suffer at the hands of their own children because they are blind to which of their children
Invocation
Bathos
Wit
Parallelism
18. From the Greek word for 'feeling -' the quality in a work of literature that evokes high emotion - most commonly sorrow - pity - or compassion.
Pathos
Caricature
Melodrama
Invocation
19. The liberty that authors sometimes take with ordinary rules of syntax and grammar - employing unusual vocabulary - metrical devices - or figures of speech or committing factual errors in order to strengthen a passage of writing.
Cosmic irony
Invocation
Epiphany
Poetic license
20. A prayer for inspiration to a god or muse usually placed at the beginning of an epic. Homer's Iliad and Odyssey both open with this.
In medias rest
Invocation
Foreshadowing
Interior monologue
21. A form of wordplay that displays cleverness or ingenuity with language.
Romantic irony
In medias rest
Poetic diction
Wit
22. A sudden and unexpected drop from the lofty to the trivial or excessively sentimental. It is sometimes used intentionally - to create humor - but just as often is derided as miscalculation or poor judgment on a writer's part. An example from Alexande
Dramatic irony
Bathos
Verbal irony
Irony