Glossary of key terms

On this page, you can find a glossary with words that are particularly useful to know when working with Shakespeare and his texts. Click each word for a full definition.

Antithesis

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Alliteration

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Aside

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Chain of Being

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Comedy

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Couplet

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Dark lady

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Dramatic irony

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Elizabethan era

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Fair youth

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Fate

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Foreshadowing

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

History play

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Hubris

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Humanism

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Iambic pentameter

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Jacobean era

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

King James I

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

King’s Men

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Lord Chamberlain’s Men

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Metaphor

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Meter

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Personification

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Playwright

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Prologue

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Prose

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Pun

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Queen Elizabeth I

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Renaissance

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Rhyme

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Simile

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Soliloquy

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Sonnet

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Symbol

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Thou

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Tragedy

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Tragic flaw

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Tragic hero

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Trochaic tetrameter

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

Verse

To read this text you must have a membership. Signup.

...