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| An indirect reference to something (usually a literary text) with which the reader is expected to be familiar. Allusions are usually literary, historical, Biblical, or mythological. |
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| A term borrowed by psychologist Carl Jung who described archetypes as "primordial images" formed by repeated experiences in the lives of our ancestors, inherited in the "collective unconscious" of the human race and expressed in myths, religion, dreams, fantasies, and literature. These "images" of character, plot pattern, symbols recur in literature and evoke profound emotional responses in the reader because they resonate with an image already existing in our unconscious mind, e.g. death, rebirth. |
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| Repetition of a vowel sound within two or more words in close proximity. "Fake" and "lake" denote rhyme; "lake" and "fate" demonstrate assonance. |
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| A series of words separated by commas (with no conjunction), e.g. "I came, I saw, I conquered." The parts of the sentence are emphasized equally; in addition, the use of commas with no intervening conjunction speeds up the flow of the sentence. |
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| The use of images, especially in a pattern of related images, often figurative, to create a strong unified sensory impression. |
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| A frequently recurrent character, incident, or concept in literature. A dominant theme or central idea. |
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| A seemingly contradictory statement or situation which is actually true. This rhetorical device is often used for emphasis or simply to attract attention. |
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| Sentence which uses and or another conjunction, with no commas, to separate the items in a series, usually appearing in the form X and Y and Z, stressing equally each member of the series. It makes the sentence slower and the items more emphatic than in the asyndeton. |
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| Word or phrase used two or more times in close proximity. |
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| A rhetorical antithesis. Juxtaposing two contradictory terms, like "wise fool" or "deafening silence." |
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| Part of something is used to stand for the whole —e.g. "threads" for clothes; "wheels" for cars. |
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| In grammar, the arrangement of words as elements in a sentence to show their relationship. |
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