Drama Terms

When a sentence is purposefully left incomplete or cut off. due to an inability or unwillingness to continue speaking. This allows the ending to be filled in by the listener's imagination. In order to show it in a sentence, one may use the em dash (-) or ellipsis (...).

• Aposiopesis
• Apostrophe
• Anagnorisis
• Anadiplosis

Tags

CCSS.RL.8.3

CCSS.RL.7.3

CCSS.RL.11-12.3

CCSS.RL.9-10.3

CCSS.RL.4.3

A character who is meant to represent characteristics, values, ideas, etc. which are directly and diametrically opposed to those of another character, usually the protagonist. (Although it is technically a literary element, the term is only useful for identification, as part of a discussion or analysis of character; it cannot generally be analyzed by itself.)

• Aside
• Soliloquy
• Foil
• Motif

The use of a comic scene to interrupt a succession of intensely tragic dramatic moments.

• Catharsis
• Comic Relief
• Tragic Flaw
• Motif

Tags

CCSS.RL.7.3

CCSS.RL.6.10

CCSS.RL.7.10

CCSS.RL.6.7

CCSS.RL.9-10.10

A speech of some duration addressed by a character to a second person.

• Dramatic monologue
• Allusion
• Dramatic irony
• Aside

Tags

CCSS.RL.6.10

CCSS.RL.6.3

CCSS.RL.5.10

CCSS.RL.7.10

CCSS.RL.7.5

Comedy based on deliberately clumsy actions and humorously embarrassing events.

• Dialogue
• Slapstick
• Soliloquy
• Climax

A recurring important idea or image.

• Symbol
• Allusion
• Anagnorisis
• Motif

Tags

CCSS.RL.7.3

CCSS.RL.11-12.3

CCSS.RL.9-10.3

CCSS.RL.K.3

CCSS.RL.5.5

The turning point of the action in the plot of a play or story. The point of greatest tension in the work.

• Catharsis
• Falling Action
• Rising Action
• Climax

The resolution of the plot of a literary work.

• Exposition
• Climax
• Rising Action
• Denouement

The selection of words in a literary work.

• Foreshadowing
• Setting
• Diction
• Allusion

An interruption of a work's chronology to describe or present an incident that occurred prior to the main time frame of a work's action.

• Subplot
• Flashback
• Climax
• Foreshadowing