Essential Literary Terms: A Brief Norton Guide with Exercises

I am using this book for the close reading section of this class. I have found it very helpful in doing my papers and the exercises are good practice for identifying certain aspects of literary pieces. While many students would sell this book back at the end of the semester, I will not because with being an English major, I believe that this book will still be as helpful in upper level classes as it was in a 200 level class.

The author categorizes and provides exceedingly clear definitions of many literary terms. For example, she clears up the ambiguity between "synechdoche" and "metonymy" that other authors avoid. After her explanations, the provides exercises for many of the definitions. The quality of the material is far better than similar books. Although the number of definitions is not as great as other books covering literary terms, the clarity and depth of explanations make the book a necessity for today's Advance Placement or college student. My book was dated 2007.

Friendly and approachable this book may be, but it does not have all the "essentials" that students and teachers may want to use the minute they encounter such terms as "romanticism," "naturalism," "realism," "magical realism," and other aspects of literary studies that are often mentioned in anthologies and histories. A truly essential guide would be briefer in some of its explanations in order to cover some more ground and thus truly be suitable as a text to accompany introductory literary studies courses.

I am a college student and only have had a chance to look over this book briefly, but I can tell that this book will help me greatly in my studies. One of my professors told me she will make this a required text in the fall. This text will help me come to a better understanding of the terms and process used when analyzing the structure of a text for use in a class room setting.