1. The Most Dangerous Game
Literary Terms

2. Tone
• How the author/narrator feels

3. Mood
• How the audience feels

4. Connotation
• Emotional associations, suggestions, or
implications of a word

5. Denotation
• Literal, dictionary definition of a word

6. Plot
• series of related events (exposition,
complication, climax, resolution/denouement)

7. Conflict
• struggle

8. External Conflict
• man vs. man, man vs. society, man vs. nature

9. Internal Conflict
• struggle in a character’s mind or heart

10. Chronological Order
• Told in the order that events unfolded

11. Flashback
• When writers interrupt the flow of events to
present an episode from the past

12. Foreshadowing
• Hints or clues that suggest what is to come in
a story

13. Simile
• comparison using like or as

14. Direct Characterization
• What the narrator or another character tell us
about a character

15. Indirect Characterization
• What we learn about a character through
their actions

16. Fiction
• An invented or imagined story

17. First person point of view
• Uses I, me, or we. The narrator is a character

18. Third person point of view
• Uses he, she, they. Either follows one or two
characters (limited) or is all-knowing
(omniscient).

19. Allusion
• A reference to a person, place, or event
outside of the story

20. Theme
• The main idea or the basic meaning of a work

21. Satire
• A kind of writing that holds up to ridicule or
contempt the weakness and wrongdoings of
individuals, groups, institutions, or humanity
in general.

22. Protagonist
• Main character

23. Antagonist
• Opposes the protagonist

24. Quickwrite
• Quickwrite: Some of the most exciting
narratives pit villain against hero in a life-or-
death struggle. The tension in such stories
often depends as much on the character of
the bad guy or gal as on that of the hero.
Write a few sentences describing a villain
from a novel, story, or movie. Why does the
character fascinate you?