Plot and Structure: Literary Terms

Exposition: The beginning of a story, usually where the author introduces characters, as well as provides readers with details to make them familiar with the story. Rising Action: The rising action comes after the exposition, and is the part of a story where characters develop along with the story. Readers begin to develop an emotional attachment to the story, and even with the characters. The rising action builds up to the climax. Climax: The turning point of a story. It comes after the rising action, and is a point of intensity in the story. Actually, it is usually the most intense part of a story. It really gets the readers adrenaline pumping. The part of a story where the reader can not put the story down. Falling Action: After the climax, this part of the story more or less wraps things up. Everything pretty well settles down, and generally goes back to normal or as close to normal as possible. The story begins to end. The falling action provides details for the ending of the story. Resolution: The ending of the story. Issues and conflicts are resolved by this point, and the story ends. Conflict: Usually introduced during the rising action, the conflict is the problem or problems of a story. There are various types of conflict such as: man vs. man, man vs. self, man vs. nature, etc. Protagonist: Commonly thought of as the “good” guy, the protagonist is basically the character who is trying to help others. However, the protagonist can and most likely will have faults. These faults may make him/her less appealing to readers, but they can still be the protagonist. Antagonist: The ‘bad’ guy of the story. Sometimes this person is troubled, and just causes problems. The antagonist makes peoples life harder. Flashback: A moment when the author takes the audience back in time to a point of interest in a characters life. In Media Res: This is when the author begins a story in the middle of the story. Consequently, the author must go back and do some explaining in a way, so that they story will make sense, but sometimes very little explanation is needed.