AQA GCSE English Literature: Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde Glossary

alter ego
An alter ego is a person’s secondary personality.

ambiguous
Ambiguous is where there is a lack of clarity over what is being said or explained. Things are unclear.

animalistic
Animalistic is where something is described or behaves as though it has the characteristics of an animal.

antithesis
Antithesis is created when two directly contrasting ideas are placed closely together for comparison.

character arc
The character arc refers to the ‘journey’ of a character – how they begin, develop, and end in the story.

characterisation
Characterisation refers to how an author creates and portrays a fictional character, by what they do and say and by direct description.

chronological
A story told in ‘chronological order’ is one simply told in the order in which events take place, rather than using time shifts.

climax
The climax of a narrative is the point of greatest excitement.

confidant
A confidant is a person someone can tell their secrets to without fear that they will be passed on.

de-evolution
De-evolution is the reverse process of evolution, to become less evolved.

descriptive language
Descriptive language is when words are used to create a strong image in the reader’s mind of what is being described and to cause an emotional impact. It can be linked to imagery.

detective fiction
Detective fiction is a type of fiction that became popular in the late nineteenth century, and which is concerned with police investigation, mysteries, and criminal activity.

double life
A double life is when a person has two lives: one public and one secret.

doubling
Doubling is where two characters mirror each other in teams of actions, appearances, or behaviors.

duality
Duality means to have two sides which are opposite.

façade
A façade is a front that someone uses to present something in one way when the hidden reality is different.

foil
A foil is a character used to highlight or emphasise something about another character.

foreshadowing
Foreshadowing is the fiction technique of making the reader anticipate events that will happen later, as in: ‘If I had known then, I might not have done what I did next’.

gothic
Gothic refers to a style of art and architecture prevalent in Europe in the medieval period, characterised by ornate buildings, especially churches and religious buildings with features such as gargoyles and stained-glass windows. Gothic style was revived and had a significant impact on nineteenth-century culture.

gothic fiction
Gothic fiction is concerned with ideas of mystery, horror, and the supernatural, often set around buildings built in the Gothic architectural style. Gothic stories often focus on the psychological torments experienced by characters as a result of being exposed to unnatural events.

hyperbolic
Hyperbolic is an adjective used to describe exaggerated description.

imagery
Imagery is the collective term referring to metaphors and similes.

juxtaposition
Juxtaposition is placing two ideas or phrases next to each other in a text for comparison or contrast.

metaphor
A metaphor brings something to life imaginatively by describing it as though it is something else that it resembles in some way, without using ‘like’ or ‘as’.

narrative
A narrative (noun) is a story. The word can also be used as an adjective to describe a text that tells a story.

narrative structure
Narrative structure describes the way a story is put together.

oxymoronic
Oxymoronic is where two opposing ideas are placed together to create a sense of confusion or uncertainty for a reader.

pathetic fallacy
Pathetic fallacy is the literary technique of giving human feelings to inanimate things, such as the weather.

persona
A persona is a person’s public image they outwardly present to society, made up of certain carefully selected aspects of their personality.

personification
Personification is a technique in which a writer describes non-human things as though they are human, as in ‘Time marches on’.

physiognomy
Physiognomy was a Victorian pseudo-science of the nineteenth century, which suggested that you could tell whether a person was good or bad based on their physical appearance.

pious
A pious person is someone who either has strong moral or religious values.

play on words
A ‘play on words’ is when words are manipulated so they have a double meaning.

protagonist
The protagonist is the main character in a story, often the one whose journey or conflict drives the plot.

rationality
Rationality describes using logic and reason when thinking about confusing events.

reason
When you reason, you can think and use logic in order to come to sensible and rational conclusions.

repressive
Preventing a person from expressing their own thoughts or indulging their own desires is repressive.

reputation
A person’s reputation refers to what people generally think about them.

scepticism
Scepticism describes feeling doubtful or not believing something you are told.

sensory language
Sensory language is language used in a text that is linked to the five senses of taste, touch, smell, sight, and sound.

setting
The setting is the location where a story takes place.

simile
Similes are figures of speech that describe things more vividly by comparing them to other things using ‘like’ or ‘as’.

symbolism
Symbolism is the use of symbols: things in a text that represent an abstract idea or feeling, such as a rainbow to represent hope.

theory of evolution
The theory of evolution is a scientific theory proposed by Charles Darwin in the nineteenth century, which explains how organisms change over time.

third-person voice
A third-person voice (or perspective) is the narrative viewpoint in which an author assumes knowledge of all characters and writes about them using the pronouns ‘he’, ‘she’, or ‘they’.

viewpoint
The viewpoint is the attitude presented by a poet or the speaker in a poem, shown through their thoughts and ideas.

visceral
Visceral describes a person’s feelings as based on an emotional reaction rather reason.