The Writer's Technique Glossary

This lesson is the reference backbone of the course. It is a working glossary of the techniques you will meet in Edexcel Paper 1 (fiction) and Paper 2 (non-fiction), organised by category, with definitions, one-line examples and effects. It is designed to be used as a quick lookup during revision — and as the raw material from which your analytical vocabulary (Lesson 1) does its work.

Knowing the name of a technique is only the first step. Naming without analysis is feature-spotting, and feature-spotting is a fast route to a mid-band response. But you can't analyse a technique you can't name. This lesson gives you the names. Lessons 1 and 8 teach you how to use them to earn marks.

This lesson develops AO2 across both papers: analyse language and structure with accurate subject terminology.

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How to use this glossary

Read it once, straight through. Then bookmark it and return to it while working through practice extracts. When you spot a feature you can't name, look it up here. When you see a name you don't recognise, look it up here.

Across Paper 1 and Paper 2, you are likely to need around 25–30 techniques confidently. The glossary below covers roughly 40 — the full GCSE canon plus a handful of near-top-band terms.

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Category 1: figurative language

Figurative language makes comparisons or departures from the literal.

Technique	Definition	One-line example	Effect
Simile	Comparison using like or as	Her voice was like cracked glass.	Makes abstract qualities (fragility, brokenness) concrete
Metaphor	Direct comparison (X is Y)	Her voice was cracked glass.	Intensifies the comparison — X is Y, not merely similar
Extended metaphor	A metaphor developed across multiple sentences	The lesson became a battlefield; every word a grenade...	Builds a sustained conceptual world
Personification	Giving human qualities to non-human things	The wind complained at the window.	Makes the environment feel alive, often mirroring mood
Pathetic fallacy	A specific type of personification: weather/landscape reflects character mood	It rained on the day of the funeral.	Externalises emotion onto the setting
Hyperbole	Deliberate exaggeration for effect	I've told you a million times.	Intensity, humour, or satire
Understatement	Deliberate minimising	It was a bit of a tragedy.	Irony, British dry humour, emotional restraint
Oxymoron	Two contradictory terms side by side	bitter sweetness, deafening silence	Captures paradoxical experience in two words
Paradox	A statement that seems contradictory but reveals a truth	The more you know, the less you understand.	Provokes thought; signals complexity
Symbolism	One thing standing for a larger idea	A wilting rose = lost love	Condenses theme into a concrete image
Allegory	An extended symbolic narrative	Animal Farm as an allegory of revolution	Layers a story with a second, abstract meaning
Allusion	A reference to another text, event or figure	A garden-of-Eden moment	Activates cultural resonance
Imagery	Language that appeals to the senses	The wet pavement gleamed.	Creates vivid mental pictures

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Category 2: sensory language

Imagery can be grouped by which sense it appeals to.

Sense	Name	Example
Sight	Visual imagery	The sky flared orange at the horizon.
Sound	Auditory imagery	Footsteps echoed in the empty corridor.
Touch	Tactile imagery	The cold brass handle bit into her palm.
Smell	Olfactory imagery	The hallway smelled of boiled potatoes and damp wool.
Taste	Gustatory imagery	The coffee tasted of yesterday.

Synaesthesia is when one sense is described in terms of another (a loud colour, a sharp smell). It is a near-top-band term — name it if you see it.

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Category 3: sound devices

Writers use sound patterning even in prose (not just poetry).

Technique	Definition	Example	Effect
Alliteration	Repetition of initial consonant sounds	silently, slowly, she stepped	Draws attention, creates rhythm
Sibilance	Alliteration specifically of s/sh/z sounds	she sighed, slipping softly	Hushed, sensual, or sinister tone
Assonance	Repetition of vowel sounds	the old stone road	Creates internal music
Consonance	Repetition of consonant sounds (anywhere in words)	pitter-patter of late letters	Textural resonance
Onomatopoeia	Words that sound like what they describe	crash, hiss, whisper	Direct sensory immediacy
Plosive alliteration	Alliteration on plosive consonants (b, p, d, t, g, k)	the bitter bright bang	Abrupt, aggressive, percussive
Fricative alliteration	Alliteration on fricatives (f, v, th)	the faint feeble frost	Breathy, quiet, unresolved

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Category 4: repetition and patterning

Technique	Definition	Example	Effect
Repetition	Any repeated word or phrase	no, no, no	Emphasis, insistence
Anaphora	Repetition at the start of consecutive clauses	We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds...	Builds rhythm, rhetorical power
Epistrophe	Repetition at the end of consecutive clauses	...of the people, by the people, for the people	Drives a point home, creates closure
Tricolon	A list of three parallel items	blood, sweat and tears	Persuasive rhythm; feels complete
Listing	Multiple items in sequence (can be of any length)	the shoes, the bag, the coat, the keys	Accumulation, comprehensiveness
Parallelism	Repetition of grammatical structure	She came; she saw; she conquered.	Balance, elegance, memorability
Antithesis	Opposed ideas in parallel structure	It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.	Sharp contrast, paradox
Chiasmus	Reversed parallelism (A–B–B–A)	Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country.	Memorable, rhetorical
Asyndeton	Omission of conjunctions in a list	I came, I saw, I conquered.	Speed, urgency, punch
Polysyndeton	Multiple conjunctions in a list	and the wind and the rain and the cold...	Accumulation, exhaustion

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Category 5: poetic/prose structural devices

These are often associated with poetry but appear in prose too. Paper 1 is prose fiction — you won't see poetry — but knowing the names helps if sentences behave like verse.

Technique	Definition	Example	Effect in prose
Enjambment	A line that runs on without pause	she opened / the door	Rare in prose — used when paragraph breaks fall mid-thought
Caesura	A pause mid-line, often at a punctuation mark	She opened the door. Nothing.	In prose: a mid-sentence full stop or dash
Juxtaposition	Placing two things side by side for contrast	the child's hand in the soldier's hand	Implied comparison; the reader draws the contrast
Motif	A recurring image, phrase or idea	recurring references to clocks	Unifies a text thematically
Frame narrative	A story within a story	a character telling a tale to another character	Layers perspective
Cyclical structure	Opening and ending mirror each other	the story begins and ends at the same door	Signals inevitability, entrapment
In medias res	Starting in the middle of the action	The bullet missed by three inches.	Immediate engagement, deferred explanation
Flashback / analepsis	A narrative jump to an earlier time	She remembered, years earlier, when...	Provides context or contrast
Foreshadowing	Early hints at later events	He locked the door twice that night.	Creates unease, dramatic irony

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Category 6: rhetorical devices (especially for non-fiction)

These cluster heavily in Paper 2 non-fiction extracts — speeches, articles, letters.