short story terms

Short Story Terms

Kelly Road English Department – English 9

Plot

• What happens in a story


Setting

• The place and time in which a story occurs


Exposition

• Tells background information about what has gone on in that setting

• Sets up later plot events


Crisis

• The main problem or troubling event that sets the action going


Rising Action

• The series of events leading to the climax


Climax

• The point at which the action and/or tension is at its height


Falling Action

• The beginning of the end of the story• Crisis resolved; character conflicts dealt with


Denouement

• Day-new-maw• Loose ends of the plot tied up, either after the

climax, or (more commonly) in the very final scenes of the story


Protagonist

• The main character(s) in a story


Antagonist

• The character(s) or force(s) arrayed against the main character


Foreshadowing

• Hints given in the plot about what is going to happen later


Irony

• When the writer expresses a meaning that is different than the words used


Parody

• To make fun of a type of literature by writing something like it that pokes fun at it


Mood

• Also called atmosphere• The “feeling” presented in the story through

the way the author describes scenes or plot events

• Eg.: It was a dark and stormy night…


Tone

• The author’s attitudes and/or biases that come through in the story, whether in character descriptions, or in their dialogue


Dilemma

• A choice that a character must make between 2 unpleasant outcomes, in response to a plot challenge

• Dilemmas are often hard choices that involve moral or ethical issues


Symbolism

• When an important person, place or thing in a story represents both itself, and something else

• The secondary representation is generally figurative


Suspense

• A feeling of tension that builds throughout the plot

• Usually linked to what will happen at the climax


Flashback

• A scene inserted into the plot that shows events that occurred at an earlier time


Conflict

• General term for negative interactions between characters


Internal Conflict

1. Internal – struggle inside a character’s mind or self – Person vs. Self


External Conflict

1. Person vs. Person – conflict between 2 or more characters

2. Person vs. Environment – conflicts between a person and their situation – Nature, society, group, etc.


Characterization

• Round – character has many traits

• Flat – character has few traits


Characterization

• Dynamic – character’s traits change over time

• Static – character’s traits do not change over time


Characterization

• Stereotype/Stock – character with clichéd traits– Eg. James Bond, Robin Hood, Wicked

Stepmother, etc.• Realistic – A character who is NOT based on a

stereotypical cliché, but on “real life”


Characterization

• Motivation – the combination of circumstance and personality that makes a character do what they do


Point of View

• The viewpoint through which a story is told• Types:– First Person – “I” – solely the POV of the narrator;

reader only knows as much as narrator


Point of View

• The viewpoint through which a story is told• Types Cont’d:– Third Person Omniscient – “God Mode” –

narrator knows characters’ thoughts and feelings– Third Person Limited Omniscient – narrator

knows thoughts and feelings of one character, but not necessarily others


Theme

• The central idea or thesis of a story• Can be stated directly by the author, or

indirectly through the outcome of the plot


The EndKelly Road English Department – English 9

short story terms

Documents

characters person

character conflicts

self person

character descriptions

plot challengedilemmas

plot eventseg

protagonistthe main

characters mind