Hyperbole (pronounced /haɪˈpɜrbəli/,[1] from ancient Greek Ancient Greek is the historical stage in the development of the Greek language spanning the Archaic , Classical (c. 5th–4th centuries BC), and Hellenistic (c. 3rd century BC – 6th century AD) periods of ancient Greece and the ancient world. It is predated in the 2nd millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek. Its Hellenistic phase is known as Koine (& ὑπερβολή 'exaggeration') is a rhetorical device In rhetoric, a rhetorical device or resource of language is a technique that an author or speaker uses to convey to the listener or reader a meaning with the goal of persuading him or her towards considering a topic from a different perspective. While rhetorical devices may be used to evoke an emotional response in the audience, there are other in which statements are exaggerated A caricature can refer to a portrait that exaggerates or distorts the essence of a person or thing to create an easily identifiable visual likeness.[citation needed] In literature, a caricature is a description of a person using exaggeration of some characteristics and oversimplification of others. It may be used to evoke strong feelings or to create a strong impression, but is not meant to be taken literally.
Hyperboles are figures of speech that are exaggerated in order to create emphasis or effect. Hyperbole is a literary device A literary technique, literary device, or literary motif is an identifiable rule of thumb, convention or structure that is employed in literature and storytelling often used in poetry Poetry is a form of literary art in which language is used for its aesthetic and evocative qualities in addition to, or in lieu of, its apparent meaning. Poetry may be written independently, as discrete poems, or may occur in conjunction with other arts, as in poetic drama, hymns, lyrics, or prose poetry. It is published in dedicated magazines (, and is frequently encountered in casual speech. An example of hyperbole is: "The bag weighed a ton".[2] 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 Rhetoric is the art of using language to communicate effectively. It involves three audience appeals: logos, pathos, and ethos, as well as the five canons of rhetoric: invention or discovery, arrangement, style, memory, and delivery. Along with grammar and logic or dialectic, rhetoric is one of the three ancient arts of discourse. From ancient, some opposites of hyperbole are meiosis In rhetoric, meiosis is a euphemistic figure of speech that intentionally understates something or implies that it is lesser in significance or size than it really is. Meiosis is the opposite of auxesis, and also sometimes used as a synonym for litotes The term is derived from the Greek μειόω, litotes In rhetoric, litotes are figures of speech in which a certain statement is expressed by denying its opposite. For example, rather than merely saying that something is attractive , one might say it is "not unattractive", understatement Understatement is a form of speech which contains an expression of less strength than would be expected. This is not to be confused with euphemism, where a polite phrase is used in place of a harsher or more offensive expression, and bathos Bathos , strictly speaking, refers to the discovery or expression of humor in a linguistic phrase through some ironic combination of ideas, whether done deliberately through the use of an incongruous combination of ideas in order to provide a seemingly unintended humorous aspect, or unintentionally, providing fun for the critical reader. If bathos (the 'letdown' after a hyperbole in a phrase).
References
- ^ The Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary
- ^ Mahony, David (2003). Literacy Tests Year 7. Pascal Press. p. 82. ISBN The International Standard Book Number is a unique numeric commercial book identifier based upon the 9-digit Standard Book Numbering (SBN) code created by Gordon Foster, now Emeritus Professor of Statistics at Trinity College, Dublin, for the booksellers and stationers W.H. Smith and others in 1966 9781877085369.
Categories: Eccentricity | Rhetorical techniques Categories: Rhetoric | Philosophical arguments | Communication of falsehoods | Literary techniques | Literary terms
