A narrative that begins in medias res (which means “into the middle of things”) starts in the middle of the story, not at the beginning. This approach skips explaining details right away, instead revealing them slowly through conversations, memories, or descriptions of past events. For example, the play Hamlet begins after the death of Hamlet’s father, which is later shown to be a murder.
Inferences are steps in logical reasoning that lead from starting points to conclusions. Inference is usually divided into two types: deduction and induction. This idea has been around since at least the time of Aristotle in the 300s BC.
Indeterminacy, in philosophy, refers to uncertainty found in science and math, as well as uncertainty that comes from how words or ideas are defined. This concept is connected to deconstructionism and to Friedrich Nietzsche’s critique of Immanuel Kant’s idea of the noumenon, which is the belief that things exist beyond what humans can directly understand.
The incipit (pronounced IN-sip-it) of a text is the first few words used to identify it. In music, an incipit is the first few notes of a composition, serving the same purpose. The word “incipit” comes from Latin and means “it begins.” The part at the end of a text is called the explicit, which in Latin means “it has been unfolded.” This term refers to a papyrus scroll.
Imagism was a poetry movement that began in the early 1900s. It focused on using clear, strong images and simple, direct language. It is seen as the first organized modernist literary movement in English.
Imagery is a literary technique that uses descriptive language to appeal to the senses. Also known as enargia, it uses figurative language to create pictures or feelings in the mind of the reader or listener. In stories, imagery helps show the tone, mood, and other parts of the narrative.
An idyll (pronounced /ˈaɪdɪl/ in the US and /ˈɪdɪl/ in the UK; from the Greek word eidullion, meaning “short poem”) is a short poem that describes simple country life. It is written in the style of Theocritus’s short poems about the countryside, called the Idylls (Εἰδύλλια). Unlike Homer, who wrote about heroes and battles, Theocritus focused on everyday scenes in a small, close-knit world.
An idiom is a phrase or expression that has a meaning that is not literal. Instead of using words in their usual way, idioms use them to express ideas in a special or different way. These expressions are considered formulaic language, which means their overall meaning is not the same as the meanings of the individual words used.
Iambic pentameter is a rhythmic pattern used in traditional English poetry and plays. It describes the beat or meter created by the words in each line. Meter is measured in small groups of syllables called feet.
Hypotaxis refers to the way parts of a sentence are arranged when some parts are more important than others. This term comes from Greek, where “hypo-” means “beneath” and “taxis” means “arrangement.” One example of hypotaxis is when one part of a sentence depends on another part in a complex sentence. For instance, a clause might describe or explain another part of the sentence.