Literary Techniques Review

NOTE: In order to play this game, it must be viewed in slide show (F5)

Interactive Quiz created by Nancy Roberts Garrity at St. John Fisher School

Directions: Read the example on each slide. Then click on the button that identifies the type of literary technique.

“Three times Della counted it.”

imagery

inversion

inference

Mr. James Dillingham Young

The letters of “Dillingham” looked blurred, as though they were thinking seriously of contracting to a modest and unassuming D.

imagery

personification

inference

She stood by the window and looked out dully at a gray cat walking a gray fence in a gray backyard.

repetition

personification

inversion

In “The Gift of the Magi,” the narrator refers to Della’s hair as a “brown cascade.”

personification

synecdoche

metonymy

The next two hours tripped by on rosy wings.

personification

hyperbole

paradox

“Jim stopped inside the door, as immovable as a setter at the scent of quail.”

metaphor

simile

personification

Jim had an expression on his face that Della could not read:

“It was not anger, nor surprise, nor disapproval, nor horror, nor any of the sentiments that she had been prepared for.”

inversion

irony

repetition

Out of his trance Jim seemed quickly to wake.

inversion

inferenceimagery

personification

synecdoche

metonymy

White fingers and nimble tore the string and paper.

“Della leaped up like a little singed cat.”

metaphor

simile

paradox

In the conclusion, the narrator describes Della and Jim as “two foolish children” yet he appears to contradict himself by saying that they “were the wisest of all who give gifts.”

paradox

oxymoron

understatement

At the end of the story, the reader is surprised because the events are contrary to what one might expect. What is this called?

verbal irony

irony of the situation

dramatic irony