Short Story Test Review

The following links may be helpful resources as you prepare for your final short story test.

The Necklace by Guy De Maupassant
http://quizlet.com/17504702/the-necklace-by-guy-de-maupassant-story-element-questions-flash-cards/

The Most Dangerous Game by Richard Connell
http://moronepedia.wikispaces.com/Most+Dangerous+Game+Questions+and+Answers!

Marigolds by Eugenia Collier
http://english54321.tripod.com/id5.html

The Scarlet Ibis by James Hurst
http://www.enotes.com/topics/scarlet-ibis/quiz

The Cask of Amontillado by Edgar Allan Poe
http://www.goodreads.com/quizzes/9555-the-cask-of-amontillado

It is important to know the following literary elements:

• exposition - background material about the characters, setting, and dramatic situation in which the author introduces the essentials of the story to the reader.
• rising action - the part of the story in which the tension rises. occurs after the exposition and  leads to the story's climax.
• climax - the moment when the action comes to its highest point of dramatic conflict or the moment when the main character comes to a realization or learns a lesson.
• falling action - the part of the story following the climax and leading to the resolution in which there is a sharp decline in dramatic tension.
• resolution - the conclusion of the story
• conflict - the central source of tension and drama in the story; the problem the main character is facing. internal conflict - character vs. some feeling or emotion.  external conflict - character vs. an outside force (another character, nature, society, etc.)
• irony - a situation that seems odd or out of place.  the opposite of what one expects to happen actually happens.
• mood - the over-all feeling of a work created by the author's choice of words
• narrator - the speaker who tells the story.  May be a character in the story or may be someone outside the story.
• point of view - the perspective from which a story is told.  omniscient - author is involved in the story and presents the thoughts of all the characters involved.  limited - story is told from the viewpoint of one character who only sees part of the story.
• protagonist - the central character of the story
• antagonist - the character who works against the protagonist
• suspense - techniques used by the author to keep readers interested in the plot and wondering what will happen next
• symbol - an image, object, character, or action that stands for something else beyond its literal meaning
• theme - a story's main idea; the message that the author intends to communicate