2011级名词解释

repetition of the same consonant sound in a line of verse, especially at the beginning of successive words. Eg: “The sun sank slowly.” (P6)

[2] Romance: It means a tale in verse, embodying the life and adventures of knights.

Characteristic of the early feudal age, romance reflects the spirit of chivalry. It was a type of literature that was very popular in the Middle Ages and was introduced from France into England in the 2nd half the 13th and the 14th centuries. \"Sir Gawain and the Green Knight\" is an example of a medieval romance. (P14) [3] Heroic couplet: They are poetry consisting lines of iambic pentameter rhymed in

pairs. The rime scheme is aa, bb, cc, and so on. This verse form was introduced into English poetry by Chaucer, and has been in constant use ever since. (P33) [4] Humanism: With the spreading of the Greek and Roman culture there appeared a

number of humanist scholars who took great interst in the welfare of human beings. According to them it was against human nature to sacrifice the happiness of this life to an after life. They argued man should be given full freedom to enrich their intellectual and emotional life. In religion they demanded the reformation of the church; in art and literature, instead of singing praise to God, they sang in praise of man and of the pursuit of happiness in this life. (P52)

[5] Spenserian stanza: Invented by Edmund Spenser, it is a nine-line stanza. While

each of the first eight lines is in iambic pentameter form, the ninth line is an iambic hexameter line. The rhythm scheme is abab bcbc c. (P55)

[6] Sonnet: First introduced to England from Italy by poets Thomas Wyatt and the

Earl of Surrey, it was a poem of fourteen lines, usually in iambic pentameter with various rhyming scheme. The rhyme scheme in the Italian form as typified in the sonnets of Petrarch is abba abba cde cde. The rhyme scheme of the English, or Shakespearean sonnet is abab cdcd efef gg. (P78)

[7] Neoclassicism: As a trend first oiriginating in France during the reign of Louis

XIV, Neoclasscism was represented by Boileau’s L’Art Poetique which propoounded that dramatists should follow the rules set down by Roman writers. In literature most writers of the time had a great respect for the classic writers, and especially for Romans such as Horace and Ovid. (P118)

[8] Modernism: Modernism is a rather vague term which is used to apply to the

works of a group of poets, novelists, painters, and musicians between 1910 and the early years after the World War II. The term includes various trends or schools, such as imagism, expressionism, dadaism, stream of consciousness, and existentialism. It means a departure from the conventional criteria or established values of the Victorian age. Alienation and loneliness are the basic themes of modernism. In the eyes of modernist writers, the modern world is a chaotic one and is incomprehensible. Human beings are helpless before such a world and no longer able to do things that their forefathers once did. [9] Dramatic Monologue：A dramatic monologue contains simply a speech by some

imaginary person on one particular occasion in his life. According to M. H. Abrams, it includes 3 features: 1) there is a speaker who is not the poet, 2) there

exists at least one or more listeners, and3) the personality of the speaker can be revealed. A representative of this is Robert Browning’s My Last Duchess.

[10] Stream of consciousness：Also called “interior monologue”, it refers to the

writing technique which seeks to depict the multitudinous thoughts and feelings which pass through the mind. A representative of this is James Joyce’s Ulysses.