CSET English (Subtests I 105 & II 106) key terms

A method of analysis that examines a short passage word by word and line by line, attending to diction, syntax, imagery, and structure to build an interpretation grounded in the text itself rather than in outside biography or history.

The writer's choice of words, considered for their connotation, formality, and precision. Analysis of diction asks why this word rather than a near synonym appears, and what that choice reveals about tone and purpose.

The arrangement of words into phrases, clauses, and sentences. In literary analysis, sentence length, parallelism, inversion, and punctuation patterns are read as meaningful choices that shape pace and emphasis.

The speaker's or narrator's attitude toward the subject and audience, conveyed through word choice, imagery, and sentence structure. Tone differs from mood, which is the feeling the text creates in the reader.

The emotional atmosphere a text produces in the reader, built from setting, imagery, pacing, and sound. Unlike tone, mood describes the reader's felt response rather than the writer's attitude.

The associations and emotional shading a word carries beyond its literal meaning. A writer may choose between words with the same denotation to control tone, as with cheap versus inexpensive or slender versus skinny.

The literal, dictionary meaning of a word, stripped of emotional association. Distinguishing denotation from connotation is a standard first step in analyzing an author's word choices.

Language that appeals to the senses to create vivid mental pictures or sensations. Imagery may be visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory, or gustatory, and recurring images often carry thematic weight.

A figure of speech that describes one thing as another without using like or as, asserting an implied comparison. Extended metaphors develop the comparison across a passage or an entire work.

A comparison between two unlike things using like, as, than, or resembles. Because the comparison is explicit, analysis should explain what the vehicle illuminates about the tenor rather than merely labeling the device.

Attributing human qualities, emotions, or actions to nonhuman things, animals, or abstractions. It can create atmosphere, make abstract ideas concrete, or signal a speaker's emotional involvement with the world.

An object, person, or event that carries meaning beyond its literal self, often because of how the text emphasizes or repeats it. Symbols are usually supported by context rather than standing alone.

A gap between what is said or expected and what is meant or occurs. Verbal irony involves saying the opposite of one's meaning; situational irony involves a reversal of expectation; dramatic irony occurs when the audience knows more than a character.

A mode that uses humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to criticize folly or vice, usually with the aim of correction. Satire targets human behavior or institutions, not merely individuals.

The perspective from which a narrative is told, such as first person, third-person limited, or third-person omniscient. The choice determines what information readers can access and how they judge characters.

The voice that tells a story, which is not identical to the author. A narrator may be a character within the story or an outside observer, and may be reliable or not.

A narrator whose account the reader has reason to distrust because of limited knowledge, self-interest, naivety, or deliberate deception. Recognizing unreliability requires noticing contradictions between what is claimed and what is shown.

A technique that blends third-person narration with a character's thoughts and idiom without quotation marks or attribution tags. It lets readers inhabit a character's perspective while retaining a narrator's voice.

A recurring image, phrase, object, or situation that develops a theme through repetition. A motif is usually smaller than a symbol and gains meaning from the pattern it creates across a work.

A central idea or insight about life that a literary work explores, such as the cost of ambition or the fragility of community. Themes are implied through patterns of detail rather than stated once.

A narrative in which characters, settings, and events consistently stand for abstract ideas or moral principles, producing a second level of meaning. Allegory is sustained and systematic, unlike a single symbolic image.

An indirect reference to a well-known person, text, event, or work of art, relying on the reader's shared cultural knowledge. Allusions can compress meaning and signal a work's intellectual context.

The way a text echoes, borrows from, or responds to other texts through quotation, allusion, parody, or genre convention. Meaning is understood as arising between texts rather than within one alone.

An imitation of a style or work that exaggerates its features for comic or critical effect. Parody depends on the reader recognizing the original it transforms.

An elaborate, often extended metaphor that draws a surprising parallel between two very dissimilar things. Metaphysical poets such as John Donne built whole poems around conceits.

A direct address to someone absent, dead, or nonhuman, such as an abstract idea or an object, as though it could respond. It often signals heightened emotion or rhetorical ambition.

A formal lyric poem addressing a particular subject with elevated feeling and elaborate stanzaic structure. English odes include the Pindaric, Horatian, and irregular forms.

A short poem expressing a speaker's personal thoughts or feelings rather than telling a story. The term now covers a broad range of non-narrative poetry, including sonnets and elegies.

A fourteen-line poem usually in iambic pentameter, following either the Petrarchan pattern of octave and sestet or the Shakespearean pattern of three quatrains and a couplet. The form often turns at a volta.

A metrical line of five iambs, each an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one, producing ten syllables. It is the dominant meter of English blank verse and the sonnet.

The regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in verse, described by foot type and number per line. Meter is a rhythmical scaffold that poets may follow, vary, or break for effect.

Unrhymed poetry written in iambic pentameter. It gives poets the rhythm of formal verse without the constraint of rhyme, and it dominates English dramatic and narrative poetry from the sixteenth century onward.

The continuation of a sentence or phrase past the end of a line of verse without a pause. Enjambment can create momentum, suspense, or a tension between line breaks and grammatical units.

A pause or break within a line of verse, often marked by punctuation, that divides the line into two parts. It can slow pace or create emphasis within the metrical flow.

The time, place, and social environment in which a narrative unfolds. Setting can shape character motivation, establish mood, and carry symbolic or thematic significance.

A character whose traits contrast with those of another character, usually the protagonist, to highlight particular qualities by difference. A foil need not be an antagonist.

The methods an author uses to construct a character, including direct description and indirect revelation through action, speech, thought, and the reactions of others.