English 4
Mrs. La Morte
August 15, 2011
The process by which the writer reveals the personalityof a character.
1. By telling us directly what the character is like:humble, ambitious, impetuous, easily manipulated, andso on.
2. By describing how the character looks and dresses
3. By letting us hear the character speak
4. By revealing the character’s private thoughts andfeelings
-5. By revealing the character’s effect on otherpeople==showing how other characters feel or behavetoward the character
-6. By showing the character’s actions.
Direct characterization—When a reader does not haveto figure out what a character’s personality is like- theauthor tells us directly.
Indirect characterization– the reader has to use theirown judgment and put clues together to figure outwhat a character is like—just as we do in real life whenwe are getting to know someone.
Static character- one who does not change much inthe course of a story.
Dynamic character changes in some important way asa result of the story’s action.
Flat/Round-- flat characters have only one or twopersonality traits. Round characters have moredimensions to their personalities-they are complex,solid and multifaceted, like real people.
The vantage point from which a writer tells a story.There are three main points of view first-person,limited third-person, and omniscient third-person.
First-person pov- the narrator is a character in thestory. Using the pronoun I, this narrator tells us his orher own experiences but cannot reveal any othercharacter’s private thoughts. May or may not beobjective…so we may have to interpret what thenarrator says.
Limited third-person point of view– the narrator isoutside the story, like an omniscient narrator—but tellsthe story from the vantage point of only one character.The narrator can enter the mind of this chosencharacter, but cannot tell what any other characters arethinking except by observation. This narrator can alsoonly go where the chosen character goes.
In the omniscient point of view, the person telling thestory knows everything that’s going on in the story.This omniscient narrator is outside the story, a godlikeobserver who can tell us what all the characters arethinking and feeling, as well as what is happeninganywhere in the story.
A struggle or clash between opposing characters,forces, or emotions.
In an external conflict, a character struggles againstsome outside force: another character, society as awhole, or some natural force.
An internal conflict, on the other hand, is a strugglebetween opposing needs, desires, or emotions within asingle character.
Conversation between two or more people.
Writers use dialogue to advance the action of a plot,to present an interplay of ideas and personalities, andto reveal the background, occupation, or social level ofthe characters through tone and dialect.
Language that appeals to the senses.
Most images are visual—that is, the appeal to the senseof sight. But imagery can also appeal to the senses ofhearing, touch, taste, or smell.
A person, place, thing or event that stands both foritself and for something beyond itself.
The attitude a writer takes towards the reader, asubject or a character. Tone is conveyed through thewriter’s choice of words and details.
The central idea or insight of a work of literature. Atheme is not the same as the subject of a work, whichcan usually be expressed in a word or two: old age,ambition, love. The theme is the idea the writerwishes to convey ABOUT that subject the writer’s viewof the world or revelation about human nature.
Themes are usually implied. It is up to the reader topiece together all the clues the writer has providedabout the work’s total meaning.
(Bill-dungs-row-mon)
A novel about the moral and psychological growth ofthe main character
The goal is maturity, and protagonist achieves itgradually and with difficulty.
Often features a main conflict between the maincharacter and society.
Social satire is a piece of literature, or some other formof expression such as a cartoon or song, that reflectson a (while criticizing or poking fun at a) specific timeperiod or group of people and certain lifestyles,morals, and beliefs of that group.
A literary genre that deals with aspects of behavior,language, customs and values characteristic of aparticular class of people in a specific historicalcontext.
Often shows a conflict between individual aspirationsor desires and the accepted social codes of behavior.
There is a vital relationship between manners, socialbehavior and character. Downplays physicalappearances.
Characters in the novels are not always morally andsocially obliging to each other. There is adifferentiation between the upstanding hero orheroine and the socially less acceptable characters.
The different degrees of how the characters uphold thestandard level of social etiquette is what usuallydominates the plot of the novel.
