1. LITERARY TERMS #12
THE END

2. BILDUNGSROMAN
A type of novel that depicts an individual’s coming-of-age through self- discovery and personal knowledge. Such stories often explore the protagonist’s psychological and moral development.
EXAMPLES: Dickens’ Great Expectations and Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.

3. EPISTOLARY
A novel comprised primarily of letters sent and received by its principle characters. This type of novel was particularly popular during the eighteenth century.

4. NOVELLA
An intermediate-length (between a novel and a short story) fictional narrative.

5. APOLOGY
Often at the beginning or conclusion of a text, the term “apology” refers to an instance in which the author or narrator justifies his/her goals in producing the text.

6. EPITHET
An adjective, noun, or phrase expressing some characteristic quality of a thing or person or a descriptive name applied to a person, i.e., “Richard the Lion- Hearted.”

7. APOSTROPHE
An address to a dead or absent person, or an abstraction or inanimate object.

8. DEUs EX MACHINA
Latin for “god from the machine.” A deity in Greek and Roman drama who was brought in by stage machinery to intervene in action.

9. FRAME NARRATIVE
A story that an author encloses around the central narrative in order to provide background information and context. A “tale within a tale.”

10. EXPOSITION
Usually located in the beginning of a text, this is a detailed discussion introducing characters, setting, background information, etc. readers might know in order to understand the text that follows.

11. METONYMY
A figure of speech that substitutes one aspect or attribute for the whole itself. Example: referring to a woman as “a skirt,” or the ocean as “the deep.”