CHAPTER 1INTRODUCTION

Analysis of a SentenceWe have already seen that a simple sentence has only one subject and one predicate. The subject refers to the person or thing about which something is said. The predicate is that part of the sentence that says something about the subject.Study the following examples:

Fire burns. (Subject – fire, predicate – burns) The birds sing. (Subject – the birds, predicate – sing) The President visited Africa. (Subject – the president, predicate – visited Africa) Barking dogs seldom bite. (Subject – barking dogs, predicate – seldom bite)

You can see that the subject may consist of one word or several words, but it must always have a noun or pronoun in it. In the same way, the predicate may consist of one word or several words, but it must always have a verb in it.The main word in the subject is called the subject-word or simple subject.Different kinds of subjectsThe subject is always a noun or a word or phrase that does the work of a noun.

Money is the root of all evil. (Here the subject is the noun money.) They have admitted their fault. (Here the subject is the pronoun they.) The disabled are God’s special children. (Here the subject is an adjective used as a

noun.) To err is human. (Here the subject is a to-infinitive.) Slow and steady wins the race. (Here the subject is the phrase ‘slow and steady’.)

A figure of speech is a use of a word diverging from its usual meaning, or a special repetition, arrangement or ommission of words with literal meaning, or a phrase with a specialized meaning not based on the literal meaning of the words in it such as a metaphor, simile, hyperbole , or personification. Figures of speech often provide emphasis, freshness of expression, or clarity. However, clarity may also suffer from their use, as any figure of speech introduces an ambiguity between literal and figurative interpretation. A figure of speech is sometimes called a rhetoric or a locution.Not all theories of meaning have a concept of "literal language" (see literal and figurative language). Under theories that do not, figure of speech is not an entirely coherent concept.Rhetoric originated as the study of the ways in which a source text can be transformed to suit the goals of the person reusing the material. For this goal, classical rhetoric detected four fundamental operations[1] that can be used to transform a sentence or a larger portion of a text. They are: expansion, abridgement, switching, transferring.The four fundamental operationsMain article: rhetorical operationsThe four fundamental operations, or categories of change, governing the formation of all figures of speech are:[1]

addition (adiectio), also called repetition/expansion/superabundance omission (detractio), also called subtraction/abridgement/lack transposition (transmutatio), also called transferring permutation (immutatio), also called switching/interchange/substitution/transmutation

These four operations were detected by classical rhetoricians, and still serve to encompass the various figures of speech. Originally these were called, in Latin, the four

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operations of quadripartita ratio. The ancient surviving text mentioning them, although not recognizing them as the four fundamental principles, is the Rhetorica ad Herennium, of unknown authorship, where they are called ἔνδεια, πλεονασμός, μετάθεσις and ἐναλλαγή.[2] Quintillian then mentioned them in Institutio Oratoria.[3] Philo of Alexandria also listed them as addition (πρόσθεσις), subtraction (ἀφαίρεσις), transposition (μετάθεσις), and transmutation (ἀλλοίωσις).[4]

ExamplesThe saying "I got your back" almost never has the literal meaning of receipt or possession of another's spine. It is a figure of speech that means the speaker intends to protect the listener, actually or symbolically. It originates from war, in which one soldier informs another that the first will train his weapon toward an area from which an enemy might shoot the second in the back.Other examples of figures of speech:

"It's raining cats and dogs" means it's raining intensely. "I'll give you a piece of my mind" means the speaker will state a frank opinion. "Butterflies in your stomach" figuratively describes nervousness. "You want a piece of me?" means "Do you want a fight?" "You're climbing the ladder to success!" means "You are doing a decent job at trying to

achieve success."In each of these examples of figures of speech, there is a literal meaning of the words, which a listener would normally reject as absurd or inappropriate. The listener would select the figurative meaning of the utterance, assisted by the context.Absence of the proper context may defeat the figurative meaning. If someone not in a theater troupe tells someone else to break a leg, the listener must decide whether the speaker intends to adapt the figure of speech from theater to the present context; if not, the literal meaning would be provocative. If there is no cause for nervousness, complaining about butterflies in one's stomach must be applied as the listener sees fit given the context of the phrase.

CHAPTER 2DISCUSSIONS

Figures Of SpeechA figure of speech is a rhetorical device that achieves a special effect by using words in distinctive ways. Though there are hundreds of figures of speech (many of them included in our Tool Kit for Rhetorical Analysis), here we'll focus on just 20 of the most common figures.You will probably remember many of these terms from your English classes. Figurative language is often associated with literature--and with poetry in particular. But the fact is, whether we're conscious of it or not, we use figures of speech every day in our own writing and conversations.For example, common expressions such as "falling in love," "racking our brains," "hitting a sales target," and "climbing the ladder of success" are all metaphors--the most pervasive figure of all. Likewise, we rely on similes when making explicit comparisons ("light as a feather") and hyperbole to emphasize a point ("I'm starving!").Using original figures of speech in our writing is a way to convey meanings in fresh, unexpected ways. Figures can help our readers understand and stay interested in what

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we have to say. For advice on creating figures of speech, see Using Similes and Metaphors to Enrich Our Writing.

A. Simile1. Definition

In a simile we make a comparison between two objects of different kinds. These two objects will have at least one point in common.

The righteous shall flourish as the palm tree. (Here a comparison is made between the righteous and the palm tree.)Life is as tedious as a twice-told tale.O my Love’s like a red, red roseThat’s newly sprung in June;O my Love’s like a melodieThat’s sweetly played in tune.Here are some similes common in everyday speech.

"He was like a cock who thought the sun had risen to hear him crow."(George Eliot, Adam Bede)

"Human speech is like a cracked cauldron on which we bang out tunes that make bears dance, when we want to move the stars to pity."(Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary)

"Humanity, let us say, is like people packed in an automobile which is traveling downhill without lights at terrific speed and driven by a four-year-old child. The signposts along the way are all marked 'Progress.'"(Lord Dunsany)

"Life is like an onion: You peel it off one layer at a time, and sometimes you weep."(Carl Sandburg)

Shrek: Ogres are like onions.Donkey: They stink?Shrek: Yes. No!Donkey: They make you cry?Shrek: No!Donkey: You leave them out in the sun, they get all brown, start sprouting little white hairs.Shrek: No! Layers! Onions have layers!(Shrek, 2001)

"My face looks like a wedding-cake left out in the rain."(W.H. Auden)

"He looked about as inconspicuous as a tarantula on a slice of angel food."(Raymond Chandler)

"It is all, God help us, a matter of rocks. The rocks shape life like hands around swelling dough."(Annie Dillard, "Life on the Rocks: The Galápagos")

"you fit into melike a hook into an eye

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a fish hookan open eye"(Margaret Atwood)

" . . . Here comesThe white-haired thistle seed stumbling past through the branchesLike a paper lantern carried by a blind man."(W.S. Merwin, "Sire." The Second Four Books of Poems. Copper Canyon Press, 1993)

"She dealt with moral problems as a cleaver deals with meat."(James Joyce, "The Boarding House")

"She has a voice like a baritone sax issuing from an oil drum, and hams even with her silences."(John Simon, reviewing Kathleen Turner in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, April 2005)

"Good coffee is like friendship: rich and warm and strong."(slogan of Pan-American Coffee Bureau)

"Life is rather like a tin of sardines: we're all of us looking for the key."(Alan Bennett)

"If you are interested in becoming a TV journalist, it is a fine example of how not to do it. I look like an exploding tomato and shout like a jet engine and every time I see it [the video] makes me cringe."(John Sweeney, "Row Over Scientology Video." BBC News, May 14, 2007)

"My memory is proglottidean, like the tapeworm, but unlike the tapeworm it has no head, it wanders in a maze, and any point may be the beginning or the end of its journey."(Umberto Eco, "The Gorge")

"Matt Leinart slid into the draft like a bald tire on black ice."(Rob Oller, Columbus Dispatch, Feb. 25, 2007)

2. Observations on the Differences between Similes and Metaphors"Writers sometimes use similes and metaphors to help create a vivid image in the reader's mind. A simile compares two things using the word like or as. Simile: My father grumbles like a bear in the mornings.A metaphor also compares two things, but it does not use the word like or as. Metaphor: My father is a bear in the mornings.(English Language Arts Skills & Strategies: Level 8, Saddleback, 2005)"The simile sets two ideas side by side; in the metaphor they become superimposed. It would seem natural to think that simile, being simpler, is older."(F.L. Lucas, Style. Macmillan, 1955)"Simile and Metaphor differ only in degree of stylistic refinement. The Simile, in which a comparison is made directly between two objects, belongs to an earlier stage of literary expression: it is the deliberate elaboration of a correspondence, often pursued for its own sake. But a Metaphor is the swift illumination of an equivalence. Two images, or an idea and an image, stand equal and opposite; clash together and respond significantly, surprising the reader with a sudden light."(Herbert Read, English Prose Style. Beacon, 1955)

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"The relationship between simile and metaphor is close, metaphor often being defined as a condensed simile, that is, someone who runs like lightning can be called a lightning runner. Sometimes, simile and metaphor blend so well that the join is hard to find . . .."(Tom McArthur, The Oxford Companion to the English Language. Oxford Univ. Press, 1992)

"Metaphor conveys a relationship between two things by using a word or words figuratively, not literally; that is, in a special sense which is different from the sense it has in the contexts noted by the dictionary.

"By contrast, in simile, words are used literally, or 'normally.' This thing A is said to be 'like' that thing, B. The description given to A and to B is as accurate as literal words can make it, and the reader is confronted by a kind of fait accompli, where sense-impressions are often the final test of success. Thus 'my car is like a beetle' uses the words 'car' and 'beetle' literally, and the simile depends for its success on the literal--even visual--accuracy of the comparison."(Terence Hawkes, Metaphor. Methuen, 1972)"[A] simile tells us, in part, what a metaphor merely nudges us into thinking. . . .

"The view that the special meaning of a metaphor is identical with the literal meaning of a corresponding simile (however 'corresponding' is spelled out) should not be confused with the common theory that a metaphor is an elliptical simile. This theory makes no distinction in meaning between a metaphor and some related simile and does not provide any ground for speaking of figurative, metaphorical, or special meanings. . . ."The simile says there is a likeness and leaves it to us to figure out some common feature or features; the metaphor does not explicitly assert a likeness, but if we accept it as a metaphor, we are again led to seek common features (not necessarily the same features the associated simile suggests . . .)."(Donald Davidson, "What Metaphors Mean," in On Metaphor, ed. by Sheldon Sacks. Univ. of Chicago Press, 1979)"Most theorists have thought that metaphor is somehow a matter of bringing out similarities between things or states of affairs. Donald Davidson [above] argues that this 'bringing out' is purely causal, and in no way linguistic; hearing the metaphor just somehow has the effect of making us see a similarity. The Naive Simile Theory goes to the opposite extreme, having it that metaphors simply abbreviate explicit literal comparisons. Both views are easily seen to be inadequate. According to the Figurative Simile Theory, on the other hand, metaphors are short for similes themselves taken figuratively. This view avoids the three most obvious objections to the Naive Simile Theory, but not all the tough ones."

B. Metaphor

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A metaphor is an implied simile. It doesn’t state that one thing is like another or acts as another. Instead it says that the two things are one and the same. A simile, on the other hand, says that one thing is like another.Thus, when we say, ‘She is like an angel’ we use a simile, but when we say ‘She is an angel’, we use a metaphor.Examples are:

I am a rainbow "I am a rainbow" is a example of metaphor because it is comparing two nouns, a person, and a rainbow, but does not use like or as.

I am not Anger"I am not anger" is an example of metaphor because it is contrasting two nouns.

MY LIFE IS A DREAMMy life is a dream,like a tiger waking

up from her deep sleep.My life is like

a dream,it's all

upto

me,the trees

arepurple,

thestarstalk

awaythe night,

themoaning moon

lightsup the sky.

By Autumn

I AM LAS VEGASI am Las Vegas growing by the infinite

awake morning by night,or day.

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I am Las VegasMy hand is the sand.

By Rachel

I AM A SWORD

I am a sword,Sharper than a tongueNobody can defeat me,Because I am a sword,

I can not be hurt by what people sayAbout me,

I will not show my angerAgainst

Someone else.

By Alex 

MATH

Math is the career for kids.If you don'tknow math

you won't make any money.you won't get a job.

you won't get a house.

We have seen that a metaphor is an implied simile. Every simile can be compressed into a metaphor and every metaphor can be expanded into a simile.Compare:Life is like a dream. (Simile)Life is a dream. (Metaphor)

C. Apostrophe

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A figure of speech in which some absent or nonexistent person or thing is addressed as if present and capable of understanding. (For the mark of punctuation, see apostrophe [punctuation].) Examples and Observations:

"Hello darkness, my old friendI've come to talk with you again . . .."(Paul Simon, "The Sounds of Silence")

"O western wind, when wilt thou blowThat the small rain down can rain?"(anonymous, 16th c.)

"Apostrophe! we thus addressMore things than I should care to guess.Apostrophe! I did invokeYour figure even as I spoke."(John Hollander, Rhyme's Reason: A Guide to English Verse. Yale Univ. Press, 1989)

"Bright star, would I were steadfast as thou art"(John Keats)

"Welcome, O life! I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my race."(James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man)

"Blue Moon, you saw me standing aloneWithout a dream in my heartWithout a love of my own."(Lorenz Hart, "Blue Moon")

"I believe it is the lost wisdom of my grandfatherWhose ways were his own and who died before I could ask."Forerunner, I would like to say, silent pilot,Little dry death, future,Your indirections are as strange to meAs my own. I know so little that anythingYou might tell me would be a revelation."(W.S. Merwin, "Sire." The Second Four Books of Poems. Copper Canyon Press, 1993)

"Then come, sweet death, and rid me of this grief."(Queen Isabella in Edward II by Christopher Marlowe)

"O stranger of the future!O inconceivable being!whatever the shape of your house,however you scoot from place to place,no matter how strange and colorless the clothes you may wear,I bet nobody likes a wet dog either.I bet everyone in your pub,even the children, pushes her away."(Billy Collins, "To a Stranger Born in Some Distant Country Hundreds of Years from Now")

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"Dear EllaOur Special First Lady of SongYou gave your best for so long."(Kenny Burrell, "Dear Ella")

Apostrophe is a device by which a speaker begins to address an audience other than the one to which he or she is speaking. Like aporia, it is part of the irony family. In the middle section of his 1860 address at Cooper Union in New York, [Abraham] Lincoln purported to 'say a few words' to the people of the South. In so doing, he spoke to his New York audience by using fictional southern listeners as a frame. . . . Apostrophe is not necessarily restricted to oral communication. A newspaper ad from a tobacco company purportedly directed at young people, but appearing in the business or editorial section of the newspaper, uses young people as a frame through which to reach a different audience."

D. Personification1. Definition

Personification can be described as a figure of speech in which an inanimate object is personified, by attributing human traits and qualities to it. In other words, whenever emotions, desires, sensations, physical gestures and speech are stated in context of non-living things, personification is said to have taken place. Through the technique, we describe lifeless things as human. The concept of personification is commonly used in poetry, where things are often described as having feelings. It is also widely used in fiction and children’s literature, though fiction is not likely to stay focused on the personified object for long.

 Personification is believed to be one of the most potent tools of literature. The technique makes it possible to describe something, which may be inexplicable otherwise. As such, the effectiveness of personification has been long recognized. It makes it easier to imagine a particular thing or object by creating its picture in the mind. It enables the reader to relate to the subject and imagine how a lifeless thing would have behaved, had it been human and able to emote. However, using the right description at the right time is the key to meaningfully personify anything. Below given are some examples of personification, which will help you to understand the concept in depth.

2. Examples of Personification   Fear knocked on the door. Faith answered. There was no one there. - Proverb And like the flowers beside them chill and shiver, Will like the flowers beside

them soon be gone - Robert Frost Earth felt the wound; and Nature from her seat, Sighing, through all her works,

gave signs of woe. - John Milton Snow speaks to the people, its falling above in the glooming sunlight. Its white

sparkling voice echoes as it falls through the air - Jake Velvet remembers how it wrapped around me. Keeping me warm on a snowy

day. Velvet remembers how it laid softly on my bed. Velvet tells me not to forget it. - Rachael

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The operation is over. On the table, the knife lies spent, on its side, the bloody meal smear-dried upon its flanks. The knife rests. - Richard Selzer, "The Knife"

Only the champion daisy trees were serene. After all, they were part of a rain forest already two thousand years old and scheduled for eternity, so they ignored the men and continued to rock the diamondbacks that slept in their arms. It took the river to persuade them that indeed the world was altered. - Toni Morrison, “Tar Baby”

The road isn't built that can make it breathe hard! - slogan for Chevrolet automobiles

Oreo: Milk’s favorite cookie. - slogan for Oreo cookies The only monster here is the gambling monster that has enslaved your mother! I

call him Gamblor, and it's time to snatch your mother from his neon claws! - Homer Simpson, “The Simpsons”

Stars bring me up with you, bring me to the place you sleep. How do you do it? Bring me to your home. Bring your thoughts to me. Share them with me. - Alex

Hey Diddle, Diddle, the cat and the fiddle. The cow jumped over the moon; the little dog laughed to see such sport. And the dish ran away with the spoon. - Mother Goose

My computer hates me. The camera loves me. Art is a jealous mistress. Wind yells while blowing. Opportunity knocked on the door. The sun greeted me this morning. Snow had wrapped a white blanket over the city. Time never waits for anyone. Trees were dancing with the wind. The radio stopped singing and continued to stare at me. The picture in that magazine shouted for attention. Plants were suffering from the intense heat. The flowers were crying for my attention. Sun was playing hide and seek, amidst the clouds. The car winked at me. The lightning lashed out with anger. The moon seemed to smile at me from the sky. The sky was full of dancing stars. The flowers begged for water. The wind screamed as it raced around the house. The house was lazy and unkempt. The bit chewed into the horse’s mouth. Lightning danced across the sky. Trees bowed to the ground. The carved pumpkin smiled at me. The vines wove their fingers together to form a braid. The wind whispered softly in the night. The sun played hide and seek with the clouds.

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The stars winked at me. The radio sprang to life at the touch of a button. The bed groaned. The headlights winked. E. Hyperbole

Hyperbole is the use of exaggeration as a rhetorical device or figure of speech. It may be used to evoke strong feelings or to create a strong impression, but is not meant to be taken literally.Hyperboles are exaggerations to create emphasis or effect. As a literary device, hyperbole is often used in poetry, and is frequently encountered in casual speech. An example of hyperbole is: "The bag weighed a ton". Hyperbole helps to make the point that the bag was very heavy although it is not probable that it would actually weigh a ton. On occasion, newspapers and other media use hyperbole when speaking of an accident, to increase the impact of the story. This is more often found in tabloid newspapers, which often exaggerate accounts of events to appeal to a wider audience.In rhetoric, some opposites of hyperbole are meiosis, litotes, understatement, and bathos (the 'letdown' after a hyperbole in a phrase).In hyperbole a statement is made emphatic by overstatement.Here’s the smell of blood still; all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand.O Hamlet! thou has cleft my heart in twain.I Loved Ophelia; forty thousand brothersCould not with all their quantity of loveMake up the sum.

Hyperbole in Drama

Hyperbole in Othello by William Shakespeare“... On horror's head horrors accumulate;Do deeds to make heaven weep, all earth amazed;For nothing canst thou to damnation addGreater than that.”

Hyperbole in Much Ado About Nothing by William Shakespeare“…he is sooner caught than the pestilence, and the takerruns presently mad.”

Hyperbole in Macbeth by William Shakespeare“What hands are here? ha! they pluck out mine eyes.Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this bloodClean from my hand? No, this my hand will ratherThe multitudinous seas in incarnadine,Making the green one red.”

Hyperbole in poetry

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Hyperbole in Paradise Lost by John Milton

“…I thenceInvoke thy aid to my adventurous song,That with no middle flight intends to soarAbove th' Aonian mount, while it pursuesThings unattempted yet in prose or rhyme.”

Hyperbole in A Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Eliot

“…(They will say: "How his hair is growing thin!")My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin--(They will say: "But how his arms and legs are thin!")Do I dareDisturb the universe?”

Hyperbole in Concord Hymn by Ralph Waldo Emerson

“By the rude bridge that arched the flood,Their flag to April's breeze unfurled,Here once the embattled farmers stoodAnd fired the shot heard round the world.”

Hyperbole in prose

Hyperbole in The Adventures of Pinocchio by C. Collodi

“He cried all night, and dawn found him still there, though his tears had dried and only hard, dry sobs shook his wooden frame. But these were so loud that they could be heard by the faraway hills…”

Hyperbole in The Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

“He was a fugitive from all the plagues and catastrophes that had ever lashed mankind. He had survived pellagra in Persia, scurvy in the Malayan archipelago, leprosy in Alexandria, beriberi in Japan, bubonic plague in Madagscar, an earthquake in Sicily, and a disastrous shipwreck in the strait of Magellan.”

Hyperbole in Moby-Dick by Herman Melville

“Next morning the not-yet-subsided sea rolled in long slow billows of mighty

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bulk, and striving in the Pequod's gurgling track, pushed her on like giants' palms outspread. The strong unstaggering breeze abounded so, that sky and air seemed vast outbellying sails; the whole world boomed before the wind.”

Hyperbole in To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee

“A day was twenty-four hours long but seemed longer. There was no hurry, for there was nowhere to go, nothing to buy and no money to buy it with, nothing to see outside the boundaries of Maycomb County.”

A list of my hyperboles:

She nearly drowned in her tears.

The gaping hole would have swallowed an America.

I jumped up to the moon and came back till she finished her makeup.If I were to become any richer, I would have bough a cloud.

Dullness spread to the core of the world when he opened his mouth.

Exhausted, I dropped down dead.

He is not a man; he’s a giant, a titanic.

I lost my sense of humor in 127 B.C, to be precise.

Her beauty eclipsed the sun.

The sound of the shot echoed in the world.

The size of her diamond dictated her mood.

If her masks were to fall, it would fill the earth.

Her voice brought on earthquakes.

You are telling me this one hundred and two million times.

F. Euphemism1. Description

The substitution of an inoffensive term (such as "passed away") for one considered offensively explicit ("died"). Contrast with dysphemism. Adjective: euphemistic.

2. Examples and Observations: Mr. Prince: We'll see you when you get back from image enhancement camp.

Martin Prince: Spare me your euphemisms! It's fat camp, for Daddy's chubby

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little secret!("Kamp Krusty," The Simpsons, 1992)

Paul Kersey: You've got a prime figure. You really have, you know.Joanna Kersey: That's a euphemism for fat.(Death Wish, 1974)

"The 'reconstruction' of New Orleans has become a euphemism for the destruction of the city's cultural and historic heritage."(Ghali Hassan, 2006)

Dr. House: I'm busy.Thirteen: We need you to . . .Dr. House: Actually, as you can see, I'm not busy. It's just a euphemism for "get the hell out of here."("Dying Changes Everything," House, M.D.)

Dr. House: Who were you going to kill in Bolivia? My old housekeeper?Dr. Terzi: We don't kill anyone.Dr. House: I'm sorry--who were you going to marginalize?("Whatever It Takes," House, M.D.)

Pre-owned for used or second-hand; enhanced interrogation for torture; industrial action for strike; misspoke for lie; tactical withdrawal for retreat; revenue augmentation for raising taxes; wind for belch or fart; convenience fee for surcharge; courtesy reminder for bill; unlawful combatant for prisoner of war

"The more syllables a euphemism has, the further divorced from reality it is."(George Carlin)

"Wardrobe malfunction"(Justin Timberlake's description of his tearing of Janet Jackson's costume during a half-time performance at Super Bowl XXXVIII)

Dan Foreman: Guys, I feel very terrible about what I'm about to say. But I'm afraid you're both being let go.Lou: Let go? What does that mean?Dan Foreman: It means you're being fired, Louie.(In Good Company, 2004)

"During the Cold War of 1946-89, NATO had a deterrent (euphemism) against the Russian threat (dysphemism). In the mid 1980s the USSR claimed to have been invited (euphemism) into Afghanistan; the Americans claimed that the Russians were aggressors (dysphemism) there. We get invited in; they are aggressors; the orthophemism is take military action in a foreign land."(Keith Allen and Kate Burridge, Forbidden Words: Taboo and the Censoring of Language. Cambridge Univ. Press, 2006)

"Euphemisms are not, as many young people think, useless verbiage for that which can and should be said bluntly; they are like secret agents on a delicate mission, they must airily pass by a stinking mess with barely so much as a nod of the head. Euphemisms are unpleasant truths wearing diplomatic cologne."(Quentin Crisp, Manners from Heaven, 1984)

"Crazy (and hence crazed and cracked) originally meant 'cracked, flawed, damaged' (cp. crazy paving) and was applicable to all manner of illness; but it has now narrowed to 'mental illness.' It captures the stereotypical mental patient

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as someone 'flawed, deficient' (cf. mentally deficient), and is the basis for many euphemistic expressions for madness: crack-brained, scatter-brained, shatter-brained; head case, nutcase, bonkers, wacko, wacky; falling to pieces; have a (nervous) breakdown; unhinged; having a screw/tile/slate loose; one brick short of a load, not a full load; not playing with a full deck, three cards short of a full deck; one sandwich short of a picnic; two bob short of a quid, not the full quid; his elevator doesn't go to the top floor; a shingle short; and perhaps he's lost his marbles."(Keith Allen and Kate Burridge, Euphemism and Dysphemism: Language Used as a Shield and Weapon. Oxford Univ. Press, 1991)

G. Antithesis1. Definition

A rhetorical term for the juxtaposition of contrasting ideas in balanced phrases or clauses. Plural: antitheses. Adjective: antithetical.

2. Examples and Observations: "Love is an ideal thing, marriage a real thing."

(Goethe) "Everybody doesn't like something, but nobody doesn't like Sara Lee."

(advertising slogan) "Hillary has soldiered on, damned if she does, damned if she doesn't, like most

powerful women, expected to be tough as nails and warm as toast at the same time."(Anna Quindlen, "Say Goodbye to the Virago." Newsweek, June 16, 2003)

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way."(Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities)

"I would rather be ashes than dust! I would rather that my spark should burn out in a brilliant blaze than it should be stifled by dryrot. I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow, than a sleepy and permanent planet. The proper function of man is to live, not to exist. I shall not waste my days in trying to prolong them. I shall use my time." (Jack London)

"You're easy on the eyesHard on the heart."(Terri Clark)

"We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools."(Martin Luther King, Jr., speech at St. Louis, 1964)

"All the joy the world containsHas come through wishing happiness for others.All the misery the world contains

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Has come through wanting pleasure for oneself."(Shantideva)

"The more acute the experience, the less articulate its expression."(Harold Pinter)

"And let my liver rather heat with wineThan my heart cool with mortifying groans."(Gratiano in The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare)

Antithesis as a figure of speech exploits the existence of many 'natural' opposites in the vocabularies of all languages. Small children filling in workbooks and adolescents studying for the antonyms section of the SAT learn to match words to their opposites and so absorb much vocabulary as pairs of opposed terms, connecting up to down and bitter to sweet, pusillanimous to courageous and ephemeral to everlasting. Calling these antonyms 'natural' simply means that pairs of words can have wide currency as opposites among users of a language outside any particular context of use. Word association tests give ample evidence of the consistent linking of opposites in verbal memory when subjects given one of a pair of antonyms most often respond with the other, 'hot' triggering 'cold' or 'long' retrieving 'short' (Miller 1991, 196). An antithesis as a figure of speech at the sentence level builds on these powerful natural pairs, the use of one in the first half of the figure creating the expectation of its verbal partner in the second half."(Jeanne Fahnestock, Rhetorical Figures in Science. Oxford Univ. Press, 1999)

3. Antithesis in Films "Since . . . the quality of a scene or image is more vividly shown when set beside

its opposite, it is not surprising to find antithesis in film . . .. There is a cut in Barry Lyndon (Stanley Kubrick) from the yellow flickers of a flaming house to a still gray courtyard, lined with soldiers, and another from the yellow candles and warm browns of a gambling room to the cool grays of a terrace by moonlight and the Countess of Lyndon in white."(N. Roy Clifton, The Figure in Film. Associated University Presses, 1983)

"It is clear that in every simile there is present both differences and likenesses, and both are a part of its effect. By ignoring differences, we find a simile and may perhaps find an antithesis in the same event, by ignoring likeness. . . .

"In The Lady Eve (Preston Sturges), a passenger boards a liner by tender. This was conveyed by the two vessels' whistling. We see a convulsive spurt of water and hear a desperate, soundless puff before the siren of the tender found its voice. There was a stuttering amazement, a drunken incoordination to these elaborate preliminaries, foiled by the liner's lofty unruffled burst of sounding steam. Here things that are like, in place, in sound, and in function, are unexpectedly contrasted. The commentary lies in the differences and gains force from the likeness."(N. Roy Clifton, The Figure in Film. Associated University Presses, 1983)

H. Oxymoron1. Definition

A figure of speech in which incongruous or contradictory terms appear side by side; a compressed paradox. Adjective: oxymoronic.

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2. Examples and Observations: the expressions "act naturally," "random order," "original copy," "found missing,"

"alone together," "criminal justice," "old news," "peace force," "even odds," "awful good," "student teacher," "definite possibility," "definite maybe," "terribly pleased," "civil war," "real phony," "ill health," "turn up missing," "jumbo shrimp," "loose tights," "small crowd," and "clearly misunderstood"

"How is it possible to have a civil war?"(George Carlin)

Porky Pig: That's an oxymoron, sir.Daffy Duck as Duck Dodgers: What did you call me?Porky Pig: An oxymoron is a figure of speech in which contradictory terms are combined, like "free trade" or "compassionate conservatism."Daffy Duck as Duck Dodgers: That attitude of yours is killing us in the fly-over states.(Duck Dodgers, 2005)

" . . . that great modern oxymoron 'eco-tourism,' suggesting a four-wheel drive hurrying north up the motorway with three mountain bikes bolted to the back."(Ian Jack, "Yours for £1.4m--and You Won't Pay a Penny." The Guardian, Feb. 20, 2010)

"O brawling love! O loving hate! . . .O heavy lightness! serious vanity!Misshapen chaos of well-seeming forms!Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health!Still-waking sleep, that is not what it is!This love feel I, that feel no love in this."(William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet)

"The best cure for insomnia is to get a lot of sleep."(W.C. Fields)

"A yawn may be defined as a silent yell."(G.K. Chesterton)

"I hate intolerant people."(Gloria Steinem)

"Oxymoronic humor, which is more cerebral than visceral, can be deliciously tasteful. Stand-up comics have always recognized this: Life is full of misery, loneliness, and suffering--and it's all over much too soon.Woody Allen

We sleep in separate rooms, we have dinner apart, we take separate vacations. We're doing everything we can to keep our marriage together.Rodney Dangerfield

Last month I blew $5,000 on a reincarnation seminar. I figured, hey, you only live once.Randy Shakes

As you can see from these examples, oxymoronic humor is sophisticated humor. It's directed at the most important organ in the human body--the brain. The self-contradictory aspects of oxymoronic humor appeal to a special part of our mental apparatus, a part that enjoys thinking about some of life's

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most intriguing contradictions and paradoxes."(Mardy Grothe, Oxymoronica: Paradoxical Wit and Wisdom from History's Greatest Wordsmiths. HarperCollins, 2004)

"We picked a bad year to have a good year."(Ken Griffey, Jr., in 1994, the year of the major league baseball strike)

"O miserable abundance, O beggarly riches!"(John Donne, Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions)

"Health food makes me sick."(Calvin Trillin)

"We have to believe in free will. We have no choice."(Isaac Bashevis Singer)

"That building is a little bit big and pretty ugly."(James Thurber)

"'I want to move with all deliberate haste,' said President-elect Barack Obama at his first, brief press conference after his election, 'but I emphasize "deliberate" as well as "haste."'"It’s not easy to be both deliberate and hasty at the same time unless you are consciously embracing an oxymoron--from the Greek word meaning 'pointedly foolish'--and it is a jarring juxtaposition of contradictory words like 'cruel kindness' and 'thunderous silence.'"(William Safire, "Frugalista." The New York Times, Nov. 21, 2008)

"The phrase 'domestic cat' is an oxymoron."(George Will)

"I want to die young at a ripe old age."(Ashley Montagu)

"An oxymoron is formed when two words that don't normally go together are conjoined, creating a compressed paradox. A paradox is interesting because it is false and true at the same time. Paradoxical observations are often extraordinarily thought provoking, helping us see old realities in new ways. Somebody once said--quite wisely--that a paradox is a truth standing on its head to get our attention."(Mardy Grothe, Viva la Repartee: Clever Comebacks and Witty Retorts from History's Great Wits and Wordsmiths. HarperCollins, 2005)

"A log palace is an architectural as well as a verbal oxymoron; so is a short skyscraper, or an urban villa."(J. F. O'Gorman and Dennis E. McGrath, ABC of Architecture. Univ. of Pennsylvania Press, 1998)

I. EpigramDefinitionAn epigram is a brief, clever, and usually memorable statement. The Greek tradition of epigrams began as poems inscribed on votive offerings at sanctuaries – including statues of athletes – and on funerary monuments, for example "Go tell it to the Spartans, passer-by ...". These original epigrams did the same job as a short prose text might have done, but in verse. Epigram became a literary genre in the Hellenistic period, probably developing out of scholarly collections of inscriptional epigrams.Though modern epigrams are usually thought of as very short, Greek literary epigram was not always as short as later examples, and the divide between "epigram" and "elegy" is sometimes indistinct (they

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share a characteristic metre, elegiac couplets); all the same, the origin of the genre in inscription exerted a residual pressure to keep things concise. Many of the characteristic types of literary epigram look back to inscriptional contexts, particularly funerary epigram, which in the Hellenistic era becomes a literary exercise. Other types look instead to the new performative context which epigram acquired at this time, even as it made the move from stone to papyrus: the Greek symposium. Many "sympotic" epigrams combine sympotic and funerary elements – they tell their readers (or listeners) to drink and live for today because life is short.We also think of epigram as having a "point" – that is, the poem ends in a punchline or satirical twist. By no means do all Greek epigrams behave this way; many are simply descriptive. We associate epigram with 'point' because the European epigram tradition takes the Latin poet Martial as its principal model; he copied and adapted Greek models (particularly the contemporary poets Lucillius and Nicarchus) selectively and in the process redefined the genre, aligning it with the indigenous Roman tradition of 'satura', hexameter satire, as practised by (among others) his contemporary Juvenal. Greek epigram was actually much more diverse, as the Milan Papyrus now indicates.Our main source for Greek literary epigram is the Greek Anthology, a compilation from the 10th century AD based on older collections. It contains epigrams ranging from the Hellenistic period through the Imperial period and Late Antiquity into the compiler's own Byzantine era – a thousand years of short elegiac texts on every topic under the sun. The Anthology includes one book of Christian epigrams.

Examples of Epigram Its body brevity, and wit its soul.

— Samuel Taylor Coleridge Little strokes Fell great oaks.

— Benjamin Franklin Here lies my wife: here let her lie! Now she's at rest – and so am I.

— John Dryden I am His Highness' dog at Kew; Pray tell me, sir, whose dog are you?

— Alexander Pope I'm tired of Love: I'm still more tired of Rhyme. But Money gives me pleasure all the time.

— Hilaire Belloc I hope for nothing. I fear nothing. I am free.

— Nikos Kazantzakis To define the beautiful is to misunderstand it.

— Charles Robert Anon (Fernando Pessoa) To be safe on the Fourth, Don't buy a fifth on the third.

— James H Muehlbauer This Humanist whom no belief constrained Grew so broad-minded he was scatter-brained.

— J.V. CunninghamJ. Irony1. Definition

Irony is a mode of speech in which the real meaning is exactly the opposite of that which is literally conveyed..Three kinds of irony:

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a. verbal irony is when an author says one thing and means something else.b. dramatic irony is when an audience perceives something that a character in

the literature does not know.c. irony of situation is a discrepency between the expected result and actual

results. 2. Examples and Observations: Kampenfeldt: This is a grave matter, a very grave matter. It has just been

reported to me that you've been expressing sentiments hostile to the Fatherland.Schwab: What, me sir?Kampenfeldt: I warn you, Schwab, such treasonable conduct will lead you to a concentration camp.Schwab: But sir, what did I say?Kampenfeldt: You were distinctly heard to remark, "This is a fine country to live in."Schwab: Oh, no, sir. There's some mistake. No, what I said was, "This is a fine country to live in."Kampenfeldt: Huh? You sure?Schwab: Yes sir.Kampenfeldt: I see. Well, in future don't make remarks that can be taken two ways.(Raymond Huntley and Eliot Makeham in Night Train to Munich, 1940)

"Gentlemen, you can't fight in here! This is the War Room."(Peter Sellers as President Merkin Muffley in Dr. Strangelove, 1964)

Woman: I started riding these trains in the forties. Those days a man would give up his seat for a woman. Now we're liberated and we have to stand.Elaine: It's ironic.Woman: What's ironic?Elaine: This, that we've come all this way, we have made all this progress, but you know we've lost the little things, the niceties.Woman: No, I mean what does ironic mean?Elaine: Oh.("The Subway," Seinfeld, Jan. 8 1992)

"I'm aware of the irony of appearing on TV in order to decry it."(Sideshow Bob, The Simpsons)

"Math was my worst subject because I could never persuade the teacher that my answers were meant ironically."(Calvin Trillin)

"We're conceived in irony. We float in it from the womb. It's the amniotic fluid. It's the silver sea. It's the waters at their priest-like task, washing away guilt and purpose and responsibility. Joking but not joking. Caring but not caring. Serious but not serious."(Hilary in The Old Country by Alan Bennett, 1977)

Lyn Cassady: It's okay, you can "attack" me.Bob Wilton: What's with the quotation fingers? It's like saying I'm only capable of ironic attacking or something.(The Men Who Stare at Goats, 2009)

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It is sometimes said that we live in an age of irony. Irony in this sense may be found, for example, all throughout The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. Suppose you hear a political candidate give a terribly long speech, one that rambles on and on without end. Afterward you might turn to a friend sitting next to you, roll your eyes, and say, 'Well, that was short and to the point, wasn't it?' You are being ironic. You are counting on your friend to turn the literal meaning of your expression, to read it as exactly the opposite of what your words actually mean. . . ."When irony works, it helps to cement social bonds and mutual understanding because the speaker and hearer of irony both know to turn the utterance, and they know that the other one knows they will turn the utterance. . . .

"Irony is a kind of winking at each other, as we all understand the game of meaning reversal that is being played."(Barry Brummett, Techniques of Close Reading. Sage, 2010)

"Irony has always been a primary tool the under-powered use to tear at the over-powered in our culture. But now irony has become the bait that media corporations use to appeal to educated consumers. . . . It's almost an ultimate irony that those who say they don't like TV will sit and watch TV as long as the hosts of their favorite shows act like they don't like TV, either. Somewhere in this swirl of droll poses and pseudo-insights, irony itself becomes a kind of mass therapy for a politically confused culture. It offers a comfortable space where complicity doesn't feel like complicity. It makes you feel like you are counter-cultural while never requiring you to leave the mainstream culture it has so much fun teasing. We are happy enough with this therapy that we feel no need to enact social change."(Dan French, review of The Daily Show, 2001)

"Alanis Morissette's 'Ironic,' in which situations purporting to be ironic are merely sad, random, or annoying (a traffic jam when you're late, a no-smoking sign on your cigarette break) perpetuates widespread misuse of the word and outrages irony prescriptivists. It is of course ironic that 'Ironic' is an unironic song about irony. Bonus irony: 'Ironic' is widely cited as an example of how Americans don't get irony, despite the fact that Alanis Morissette is Canadian."(Jon Winokur, The Big Book of Irony. St. Martin's, 2007)

"An ironic man, with his sly stillness, and ambuscading ways, more especially an ironic young man, from whom it is least expected, may be viewed as a pest to society."(Thomas Carlyle, Sartor Resartus: The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh, 1833-34)

"It is a fitting irony that under Richard Nixon, launder became a dirty word."(William Zinsser)

"Direct expression, with no tricks, gimmickry, or irony, has come to be interpreted ironically because the default interpretive apparatus says, 'He can't really mean THAT!' When a culture becomes ironic about itself en masse, simple statements of brutal fact, simple judgments of hate or dislike become humorous because they unveil the absurdity, 'friendliness,' and caution of normal public

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expression. It's funny because it's true. Honestly. We're all upside down now."(R. Jay Magill, Jr., Chic Ironic Bitterness. Univ. of Michigan Press, 2007)

"A fine thing indeed!" he muttered to himself.

K. PunDefinitionA pun is employed to produce a ludicrous effect. It consists in the use of a word in such a way that it is capable of more than one application.The usually humorous use of a word in such a way as to suggest two or more of its meanings or the meaning of another word similar in sound. A pun is a figure of speech which consists of a deliberate confusion of similar words or phrases for rhetorical effect, whether humorous or serious. A pun can rely on the assumed equivalency of multiple similar words (homonymy), of different shades of meaning of one word (polysemy), or of a literal meaning with a metaphor. Bad puns are often considered to be cheesy. Walter Redfern (in Puns, Blackwell, London, 1984) succinctly said: "To pun is to treat homonyms as synonyms".

Examples of PunFrom English Talk list Subject: FOR ALL YOU LEXOPHILES ( LOVERS OF WORDS )> 1. A bicycle can't stand alone because it is two-tired.> 2. What's the definition of a will? (It's a dead giveaway).> 3. Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.> 4. A backward poet writes inverse.> 5. In democracy it's your vote that counts; in feudalism it's your count that votes.> 6. She had a boyfriend with a wooden leg, but broke it off.> 7. A chicken crossing the road is poultry in motion.> 8. If you don't pay your exorcist you get repossessed.> 9. With her marriage she got a new name and a dress.> 10. Show me a piano falling down a mineshaft and I'll show you A-flat minor.> 11. When a clock is hungry it goes back four seconds.> 12. The man who fell into an upholstery machine is fully recovered.> 13. A grenade thrown into a kitchen in France would result in Linoleum Blownapart.> 14. You feel stuck with your debt if you can't budge it.> 15. Local Area Network in Australia: the LAN down under.> 16. He often broke into song because he couldn't find the key.> 17. Every calendar's days are numbered.> 18. A lot of money is tainted. 'Taint yours and 'taint mine.> 19. A boiled egg in the morning is hard to beat.> 20. He had a photographic memory which was never developed.> 21. A plateau is a high form of flattery.> 22. The short fortune teller who escaped from prison was a small medium at large.> 23. Those who get too big for their britches will be exposed in the end.> 24. When you've seen one shopping center you've seen a mall.> 25. Those who jump off a Paris bridge are in Seine.> 26. When an actress saw her first strands of gray hair she thought she'd dye.

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> 27. Bakers trade bread recipes on a knead to know basis.> 28. Santa's helpers are subordinate Clauses.> 29. Acupuncture is a jab well done.> 30. Marathon runners with bad footwear suffer the agony of defeat.

MORE PUNS Energizer Bunny arrested -- charged with battery. A pessimist's blood type is b-negative. Practice safe eating -- use condiments. A Freudian slip is when you say one thing but mean your mother. Shotgun wedding: wife or death. I used to work in a blanket factory, but it folded. If electricity comes from electrons... does that mean that morality comes from

morons? A hangover is the wrath of grapes. Corduroy pillows are making headlines. Is a book on voyeurism a peeping tome? Dancing cheek-to-cheek is really a form of floor play. Banning the bra was a big flop. Sea captains don't like crew cuts. Does the name Pavlov ring a bell? Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana. A gossip is someone with a sense of rumor. Without geometry, life is pointless. When you dream in color, it's a pigment of your imagination. Condoms should be used on every conceivable occasion. Reading while sunbathing makes you well-red. When two egotists meet, it's an I for an I. Alarms: What an octopus is. Crick:: The sound that a Japanese camera makes. Dockyard: A physician's garden. Khakis: What you need to start the car in Boston . Oboe: An English tramp. Pasteurize: Too far to see. Propaganda: A gentlemanly goose. Toboggan: Why we go to an auction. Marriage is the mourning after the knot before.

L. MetonymyA figure of speech in which one word or phrase is substituted for another with which it is closely associated (such as "crown" for "royalty").Metonymy is also the rhetorical strategy of describing something indirectly by referring to things around it, such as describing someone's clothing to characterize the individual. Adjective: metonymic.Examples and Observations:

"Many standard items of vocabulary are metonymic. A red-letter day is important, like the feast days marked in red on church calendars. . . . On the level

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of slang, a redneck is a stereotypical member of the white rural working class in the Southern U.S., originally a reference to necks sunburned from working in the fields."(Connie Eble, "Metonymy." The Oxford Companion to the English Language, 1992)

"Detroit is still hard at work on an SUV that runs on rain forest trees and panda blood."(Conan O'Brien)

"Metonymy is common in cigarette advertising in countries where legislation prohibits depictions of the cigarettes themselves or of people using them."(Daniel Chandler, Semiotics. Routledge, 2007)

"I stopped at a bar and had a couple of double Scotches. They didn't do me any good. All they did was make me think of Silver Wig, and I never saw her again."(Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep)

The White House asked the television networks for air time on Monday night. "Whitehall prepares for a hung parliament."

(The Guardian, January 1, 2009) The suits on Wall Street walked off with most of our savings. "The B.L.T. left without paying."

(waitress referring to a customer) "Metaphor creates the relation between its objects, while metonymy

presupposes that relation."(Hugh Bredin, "Metonymy." Poetics Today, 1984)

"Metonymy and metaphor also have fundamentally different functions. Metonymy is about referring: a method of naming or identifying something by mentioning something else which is a component part or symbolically linked. In contrast, metaphor is about understanding and interpretation: it is a means to understand or explain one phenomenon by describing it in terms of another."(Murray Knowles and Rosamund Moon, Introducing Metaphor. Routledge, 2006)

"If metaphor works by transposing qualities from one plane of reality to another, metonymy works by associating meanings within the same plane. . . . The representation of reality inevitably involves a metonym: we choose a part of 'reality' to stand for the whole. The urban settings of television crime serials are metonyms--a photographed street is not meant to stand for the street itself, but as a metonym of a particular type of city life--inner-city squalor, suburban respectability, or city-centre sophistication."(John Fiske, Introduction to Communication Studies, 2nd ed. Routledge, 1992)

M. LilotesA figure of speech consisting of an understatement in which an affirmative is expressed by negating its opposite.

Examples and Observations: "Oh, you think you're so special because you get to play Picture Pages up there?

Well, my five year old daughter could do that and let me tell you, she's not the brightest bulb in the tanning bed."(Allison Janney as Bren in Juno, 2007)

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"[W]ith a vigorous and sudden snatch, I brought my assailant harmlessly, his full length, on the not over clean ground--for we were now in the cow yard."(Frederick Douglass, My Bondage and My Freedom, 1855)

"Because though no beauty by fashion-mag standards, the ample-bodied Ms. Klause, we agreed, was a not unclever, not unattractive young woman, not unpopular with her classmates both male and female."(John Barth, "The Bard Award," in The Development: Nine Stories. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2008)

"The grave's a fine a private place, But none, I think, do there embrace."(Andrew Marvell, "To His Coy Mistress")

"'Not a bad day's work on the whole,' he muttered, as he quietly took off his mask, and his pale, fox-like eyes glittered in the red glow of the fire. 'Not a bad day's work.'" (Baroness Emmuska Orczy, The Scarlet Pimpernel, 1905)

"Now we have a refuge to go to. A refuge that the Cylons know nothing about! It won't be an easy journey." (Battlestar Galactica, 2003)

"I am not unaware how the productions of the Grub Street brotherhood have of late years fallen under many prejudices." (Jonathan Swift, A Tale of a Tub, 1704)

"for life's not a paragraph And death I think is no parenthesis" (e.e. cummings, "since feeling is first")

"What we know partakes in no small measure of the nature of what has so happily been called the unutterable or ineffable, so that any attempt to utter or eff it is doomed to fail, doomed, doomed to fail." (Samuel Beckett)

"Keep an eye on your mother whom we both know doesn't have both oars in the water."(Jim Harrison, The Road Home. Grove Press, 1999)

"We made a difference. We made the city stronger, we made the city freer, and we left her in good hands. All in all, not bad, not bad at all."(Ronald Reagan, Farewell Address to the Nation, January 20, 1989)

"We're all being lobotomized by this country's most influential industry! It's just thrown in the towel on any endeavor to do anything that doesn't include the courting of twelve-year-old boys. Not even the smart twelve-year-olds--the stupid ones! The idiots--of which there are plenty, thanks in no small measure to this network! So why don't you just change the channel? Turn off the TV. Do it right now. Go ahead." (Judd Hirsch as Wes Mendell in the pilot episode of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, 2006)

"Understated instead of hyperbolic, [litotes] often seems to turn attention away from itself, like its cousin, paralipsis, which emphasizes something by pretending to ignore it, and it can disarm potential opponents and avoid controversy; yet it emphasizes whatever it touches." (Elizabeth McCutcheon, "Denying the Contrary: More's Use of Litotes in the Utopia," in Essential Articles for the Study of Thomas More, 1977)

"Litotes describes the object to which it refers not directly, but through the negation of the opposite. . . ."The account given in various rhetorical textbooks reveals a picture of the rhetorical figure litotes which is--to put it aptly--'not very clear.' . . .

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"I want to claim that the rhetorical figure litotes is one of those methods which are used to talk about an object in a discreet way. It clearly locates an object for the recipient, but it avoids naming it directly." (J.R. Bergmann, "Veiled Morality," in Talk at Work: Interaction in Institutional Settings, ed. by Paul Drew and John Heritage. Cambridge Univ. Press, 1992)

"I'm not doing this for my health." (O.J. Simpson, in a paid appearance at a horror comic book convention)

N. ExclamationAn exclamation mark usually shows strong feeling, such as surprise, anger or joy. Using an exclamation mark when writing is rather like shouting or raising your voice when speaking. Exclamation marks are most commonly used in writing quoted speech. You should avoid using exclamation marks in formal writing, unless absolutely necessary.1. Use an exclamation mark to indicate strong feelings or a raised voice in speech:

She shouted at him, "Go away! I hate you!" He exclaimed: "What a fantastic house you have!" "Good heavens!" he said, "Is that true?" "Help!" "Shut up!" "Stop!"

2. Many interjections need an exclamation mark: "Hi! What's new?" "Oh! When are you going?" "Ouch! That hurt."

3. A non-question sentence beginning with "what" or "how" is often an exclamation and requires an exclamation mark:

What idiots we are! (We are such idiots.) How pretty she looked in that dress! (She looked very pretty in that dress.)

4. In very informal writing (personal letter or email), people sometimes use two or more exclamation marks together:

I met John yesterday. He is so handsome!!! Remember, don't be late!! I'll never understand this language!!!!

Remember; try to avoid exclamation marks in formal writing such as an essay or business letter.

O. ClimaxIn rhetoric, a climax (from the Greek κλῖμαξ klimax, meaning "staircase" and "ladder") is a figure of speech in which words, phrases, or clauses are arranged in order of increasing importance. It is sometimes used with anadiplosis, which uses the repetition of a word or phrase in successive clauses.Examples: "There are three things that will endure: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest

of these is love." 1 Corinthians 13:13 "I think we've reached a point of great decision, not just for our nation, not

only for all humanity, but for life upon the earth." George Wald A Generation in Search of a Future, March 4, 1969.

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"...Lost, vaded, broken, dead within an hour." William Shakespeare, The Passionate Pilgrim, XIII

"...the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Martin Luther King, I Have a Dream

Simple, erect, severe, austere, sublimeSimilarly an anti-climax is an abrupt declension (either deliberate or unintended) on the part of a speaker or writer from the dignity of idea which he appeared to be aiming at; as in the following well-known distich:

"The great Dalhousie, he, the god of war,Lieutenant-colonel to the earl of Mar."

An anticlimax can be intentionally employed only for a jocular or satiric purpose. It frequently partakes of the nature of antithesis, as–"Die and endow a college or a cat."It is often difficult to distinguish between "anticlimax" and "bathos"; but the former is more decidedly a relative term. A whole speech may never rise above the level of bathos; but a climax of greater or less elevation is the necessary antecedent of an anticlimax.

P. AnticlimaxIn rhetoric, a climax (from the Greek κλῖμαξ klimax, meaning "staircase" and "ladder") is a figure of speech in which words, phrases, or clauses are arranged in order of increasing importance. It is sometimes used with anadiplosis, which uses the repetition of a word or phrase in successive clauses.Examples: "There are three things that will endure: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest

of these is love." 1 Corinthians 13:13 "I think we've reached a point of great decision, not just for our nation, not

only for all humanity, but for life upon the earth." George Wald A Generation in Search of a Future, March 4, 1969.

"...Lost, vaded, broken, dead within an hour." William Shakespeare, The Passionate Pilgrim, XIII

"...the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Martin Luther King, I Have a Dream

Simple, erect, severe, austere, sublimeSimilarly an anti-climax is an abrupt declension (either deliberate or unintended) on the part of a speaker or writer from the dignity of idea which he appeared to be aiming at; as in the following well-known distich:

"The great Dalhousie, he, the god of war,Lieutenant-colonel to the earl of Mar."

An anticlimax can be intentionally employed only for a jocular or satiric purpose. It frequently partakes of the nature of antithesis, as–

"Die and endow a college or a cat."It is often difficult to distinguish between "anticlimax" and "bathos"; but the former is more decidedly a relative term. A whole speech may never rise above the level of bathos; but a climax of greater or less elevation is the necessary antecedent of an anticlimax.

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