Literary Techniques and Theories: A Concise Reference

Literary Techniques and Theories

Stream of Consciousness

The stream of consciousness technique is when text shifts from exterior aspects of the plot almost exclusively to the inner world of a character.

Focalization

Focalization refers to the perspective through which a narrative is presented.

Types of Narration

• First Person: In this point of view, a character (typically the protagonist, but not always) is telling the story. You’ll notice a lot of “I” and “me” or “we” in first-person narrations.
• Second Person: In this point of view, the author uses a narrator to speak to the reader. You’ll notice a lot of “you,” “your,” and “yours” in second-person narration.
• Third Person: In this point of view, an external narrator is telling the story. You’ll notice a lot of “he,” “she,” “it,” or “they” in this form of narration.

Figures of Speech

• Simile: A figure of speech in which one thing is linked to another, in such a way as to clarify and enhance an image. It is an explicit comparison recognizable by the use of the words ‘like’ or ‘as’.
• Metaphor: A figure of speech in which one thing is described in terms of another. The basic figure in poetry. A comparison is usually implicit; whereas in simile it is explicit.
• Personification: The attribution of human qualities to inanimate objects.
• Hyperbole: A figure of speech which contains an exaggeration for emphasis.
• Metonymy: A figure of speech in which the name of an attribute or a thing is substituted for the thing itself (‘The stage’ for the theatrical profession).
• Synecdoche: A figure of speech in which the part stands for the whole, and thus something else is understood within the thing mentioned.

Literary Criticism Theories

• Deconstruction: It concentrates on the interaction of the signifiers (sound images), almost abandoning the concept of a signified (mental concept).
• Marxism: A method of socioeconomic analysis that views class relations and social conflict using a materialist interpretation of historical development and takes a dialectical view of social transformation.
• New Criticism: Emphasized close reading, particularly of poetry, to discover how a work of literature functioned as a self-contained, self-referential aesthetic object.
• Gender Schema Theory: Used to explain how individuals become gendered in society and how sex-linked characteristics are maintained and transmitted to other members of a culture.
• New Historicism: It builds on post-structuralism and deconstruction but also includes historical dimensions in the discussion of literary texts.
• Poststructuralism: Stressed the fact that one component of binary pairs pointed out by structuralism is always suppressed by the other.
• Structuralism: Uses structural aspects in the interpretation of texts and neglects historical, sociological, biographical, and psychological dimensions. Searching for overarching, universal elements, rules, and structures within a central genre or period of time.
• Russian Formalism: Stressed that critics should concern themselves with the literariness of literature. Redirecting attention from authors to verbal devices claimed that the device is the only hero of the literature.
• Historical and Biographical Approaches: Sees a literary work chiefly, if not exclusively, as a reflection of its author’s life and times or the life and times of the characters in the work.
• Moral-Philosophical Approach: Usually describes or evaluates a work in terms of the ideas and values it contains. This often means examining a work’s ideas and values—both those expressed directly by the narrator or character and those implied by the overall design and content—in relation to a particular ethical, philosophical, or religious system.