Here’s a starter for 10 – what is the point of literature?
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Category: Literary devices
CHRISTMAS SPECIAL: Mince pies & juicy persons in Charles Dickens’ ‘A Christmas Carol’
Happy Christmas, all.
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What is an unreliable narrator? Reading Ishiguro & Nabokov to find out
Most of us wouldn’t want unreliable people as friends.
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What’s the difference between tone, mood & atmosphere?
Many readers think that tone, mood and atmosphere are one and the same.
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What’s the difference between symbol & motif?
Symbol, motif and theme – otherwise known as the triumvirate of literary fiction.
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What is foreshadowing? Reading Oscar Wilde’s ‘Picture of Dorian Gray’ to find out
One of the biggest debates in literary studies is this: should literature convey a moral message?
What is imagery? Reading Virginia Woolf’s ‘Mrs Dalloway’ & ‘To the Lighthouse’ to find out
One of the most confusing literary devices is also one of the most frequently seen in literature – imagery.
What’s the difference between hyperbole & caricature?
Some readers have asked why this blog is called ‘Hyperbolit’, and what the term actually means.
What’s the difference between form & structure?
Two of the most commonly mixed-up words in the study of English Literature are ‘form’ and ‘structure’.
What’s the difference between personification, anthropomorphism & pathetic fallacy?
The poetry of earth is never dead:
When all the birds are faint with the hot sun,
And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run
From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead;
That is the Grasshopper’s – he takes the lead
In summer luxury, – he has never done
With his delights; for when tired out with fun
He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed.
[…]— On the Grasshopper and Cricket (1884), by John Keats
‘The wind howled in anger’, ‘the trees danced in the wind’, ‘the keyboard said, “are you done with typing already?!”
What do these three phrases share?
The Hyperbolit School 