Villanelle - ANSWER An intricate French poetic form with 19 lines divided into 5 3-lined
stanzas (called tercets), and one final quatrain. It has only 2 rhyming sounds, so it is difficult
to write one in English.
Petrarchan sonnet - ANSWER Italian sonnet with the rhyme scheme of abba abba. It di-
vides into 2 parts, the first part being an octet and the second being a sestet.
Elizabethan or Shakespearean Sonnet - ANSWER Written in iambic pentameter and con-
sisting of three quatrains and a final couplet with the rhyme scheme abab cdcd efef gg.
Limerick - ANSWER a humorous, frequently bawdy, verse of three long and two short
lines rhyming aabba, popularized by Edward Lear.
rhyme - ANSWER correspondence of sound between words or the endings of words, es-
pecially when these are used at the ends of lines of poetry.
Iambic pentameter - ANSWER a line of verse with five metrical feet, each consisting of
one short (or unstressed) syllable followed by one long (or stressed) syllable, for example
Two households, both alike in dignity.
Couplet - ANSWER 2 lines of verse, usually in the same meter and joined by rhyme, that
form a unit.
Volta - ANSWER the turn in thought in a sonnet that is often indicated by such initial
words as But, Yet, or And yet.
1
, The volta occurs between the octet and sestet in a Petrarchan sonnet and sometimes be-
tween the 8th and 9th or between the 12th and 13th lines of a Shakespearean sonnet.
Bildungsroman - ANSWER is a literary genre that focuses on the psychological and moral
growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood (coming of age)
Modernism - ANSWER 1900-1960 literature
- self-conscious breaks from traditional styles of poetry and verse
- industrialization. (T.S. Eliot, Virginia Woolf, John Steinbeck, James Joyce)
Postmodernism - ANSWER 1960-Present literature
- fragmentation - Paradox - Unreliable Narrator (Paul Auster, Italo Calvino, Allen Ginsberg)
Romanticism - ANSWER 1800-1850 literature
-overflowing of emotions
-individualism
- glorification
-Reaction to Industrial Revolution
Hellenistic - ANSWER 323 BC-31BC literature
- Ancient Greek
- The Epic/Epic Poems
- Gods, Humans, Heroes
(Homer)
Ab Ovo - ANSWER Latin "from the egg" - narrative that starts at beginning of the plot &
moves forward chronologically.
2
stanzas (called tercets), and one final quatrain. It has only 2 rhyming sounds, so it is difficult
to write one in English.
Petrarchan sonnet - ANSWER Italian sonnet with the rhyme scheme of abba abba. It di-
vides into 2 parts, the first part being an octet and the second being a sestet.
Elizabethan or Shakespearean Sonnet - ANSWER Written in iambic pentameter and con-
sisting of three quatrains and a final couplet with the rhyme scheme abab cdcd efef gg.
Limerick - ANSWER a humorous, frequently bawdy, verse of three long and two short
lines rhyming aabba, popularized by Edward Lear.
rhyme - ANSWER correspondence of sound between words or the endings of words, es-
pecially when these are used at the ends of lines of poetry.
Iambic pentameter - ANSWER a line of verse with five metrical feet, each consisting of
one short (or unstressed) syllable followed by one long (or stressed) syllable, for example
Two households, both alike in dignity.
Couplet - ANSWER 2 lines of verse, usually in the same meter and joined by rhyme, that
form a unit.
Volta - ANSWER the turn in thought in a sonnet that is often indicated by such initial
words as But, Yet, or And yet.
1
, The volta occurs between the octet and sestet in a Petrarchan sonnet and sometimes be-
tween the 8th and 9th or between the 12th and 13th lines of a Shakespearean sonnet.
Bildungsroman - ANSWER is a literary genre that focuses on the psychological and moral
growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood (coming of age)
Modernism - ANSWER 1900-1960 literature
- self-conscious breaks from traditional styles of poetry and verse
- industrialization. (T.S. Eliot, Virginia Woolf, John Steinbeck, James Joyce)
Postmodernism - ANSWER 1960-Present literature
- fragmentation - Paradox - Unreliable Narrator (Paul Auster, Italo Calvino, Allen Ginsberg)
Romanticism - ANSWER 1800-1850 literature
-overflowing of emotions
-individualism
- glorification
-Reaction to Industrial Revolution
Hellenistic - ANSWER 323 BC-31BC literature
- Ancient Greek
- The Epic/Epic Poems
- Gods, Humans, Heroes
(Homer)
Ab Ovo - ANSWER Latin "from the egg" - narrative that starts at beginning of the plot &
moves forward chronologically.
2
