Study guide: British Literary Vocabulary

📋 Course Outline

1. Poetry Forms and Technique
2. Literary Criticism and Evaluation
3. Critical Argument and Transitions
4. Theatre and Performance
5. Narrative and Dramatic Structure
6. Figures of Speech and Wordplay
7. Description and Representation

📖 1. Poetry Forms and Technique

📝 Essential Points

• Poetry vocabulary includes: poem, poetry, poet, poetess, poetic, poetic works, compose, poetic licence, line, verse, versify, versification, stanza, rhyme, rhyme with, caesura, stress, syllable, alexandrine, metre, quatrain, blank verse, recite

• Poetry genres and forms include:

  • lyric poetry
  • narrative poetry or verse
  • epic
  • epic poem
  • sonnet
  • ode
  • elegy
  • ballad
  • nursery rhyme
  • limerick

📖 2. Literary Criticism and Evaluation

★ Must-know

• Critical-review vocabulary includes:
  • review, review something, criticism
  • a critique, critical, critic, criticize
  • scathing, in depth, matter-of-fact, prosaic
  • far-fetched, stilted

Further detail

• Analysis vocabulary includes: analyze, analysis, assess, evaluate, assessment, comment on, commentary on, comment on something, synopsis, abstract, excerpt, summary, summarize, sum up, quote, interpret, interpretation, express, expression, be a sign of something

• Evaluative descriptors include: contextual, simple, simply, plain, unadorned, original, inventive, imaginative, racy, plausible, verisimilitude, striking, convincing, high-flown, superficial, heavy, laboured, repetitive, long-winded, rambling, hackneyed, commonplace, banal, colourless, cliché

• Further critical descriptors include:

  • pompous, affected, grandiloquent
  • sentimental, pathos
  • boring, tedious, moving
  • in a similar vein

• Critical writing also uses:

  • plagiarize, plagiarism
  • eulogy, praise, eulogize, laudatory
  • capture the reader’s interest or attention
  • in spite of, notwithstanding

💡 Memory Hook

A scathing review condemns; a eulogy praises.

📖 3. Critical Argument and Transitions

★ Must-know

• Opinion and framing expressions include:

  • in my opinion, in my view
  • from the point of view of
  • as the author points out
  • on the whole, by and large
  • in a word

• Expressions for clarification and examples include:

  • in fact
  • a typical example, a case in point
  • an example of, an instance of
  • exemplify something
  • for example, for instance

Further detail

• Expressions for organizing an argument include:

  • in the first place, in the second place
  • now we come to
  • by way of introduction
  • it should be noted that
  • what this means is that
  • it follows from this that

• Expressions for qualification and topic shifts include:

  • on the one hand … on the other hand
  • to a certain extent, to some degree
  • to the extent that, up to a point
  • concerning
  • as regards, with respect to, in relation to

💡 Memory Hook

Introduce a point, support it with an example, then draw a conclusion.

📖 4. Theatre and Performance

★ Must-know

• Theatre vocabulary includes:

  • drama or theatre as an activity
  • plays or dramatic works
  • a theatre as a building
  • a dramatic work, a play
  • comedy, farce, tragedy, repertoire

• People and production vocabulary includes:

  • act, go on the stage
  • actor, actress, acting career
  • theatre company, playwright
  • stage directions, producer, script
  • rehearse, rehearsal, cast

Further detail

• Roles and performance vocabulary includes: play in five acts, scene, hero, heroine, plot, denouement, happy ending, stage a play, cast someone as Hamlet, part, lead or leading part or role, supporting part, play or take the part of Hamlet, line, cue, give someone their cue, speech, monologue, aside, interpret, perform, performance

• Stage vocabulary includes:

  • stage, on stage
  • raise the curtain, lower the curtain
  • scenery
  • audience

📖 5. Narrative and Dramatic Structure

📝 Essential Points

• Narrative vocabulary includes: tell, relate, recount, narrative, account, narrator, action, plot, unfolding of the plot, denouement, episode, climax, incident, twist in the plot, theme, character, hero, heroine, protagonists

📖 6. Figures of Speech and Wordplay

📝 Essential Points

• Figures of speech and wordplay include: figure of speech, stylistic device, simile, metaphor, metonymy, euphemism, alliteration, hyperbole, onomatopoeia, malapropism, pun, pun on, humour, humorous, irony, ironical

📖 7. Description and Representation

★ Must-know

• Description vocabulary includes:
  • describe, descriptive, description
  • portrayal, portrait, portray someone
  • realism, realistic
  • symbol, symbolism, symbolic, symbolize
  • represent something, representation
  • image, imagery, imaginary, imagine, fantasy
  • depict something as

Further detail

• Further representation and genre vocabulary includes:
  • evoke or conjure something up
  • allude to, impersonate, characterize
  • satire on, satirical, satirize
  • caricature
  • allegory, allegorical, parable