Rhetorical Figures of Speech
Figures of speech, or tropes, are used to make language more effective by adding special strength and beauty. They are words used in meanings not their own designed to secure a peculiarly happy effect. Thus when the poet writes:
“But yonder comes the powerful king of day,
Rejoicing in the East..........”
he uses “king of day” for “sun”; and no one can fail to notice the pleasureable effect produced.
Chief Rhetorical Figures of Speech
| Horizontal brace | ||
| Resemblance. | Contiguity. | Contrast or Surprise. |
|---|---|---|
| a. Comparison or Simile. | a. Autonomasia— Individual for class. | a. Antithesis and Epigram. |
| b. Metaphor— | b. Hyperbole. | |
| 1. Identification of like quali- ties. | b. Synecdoche— Part for whole. | |
| c. Irony and Euphemism. | ||
| 2. Identification of like things. | c. Metonymy— Cause for effect, badge for class, etc. | |
| Arrangement. | ||
| a. Climax. | ||
| c. Personification. | b. Anti-climax. | |
| d. Allegory. | c. Emphasis, or Inversion. | |
But the new word images introduced must really be suited to add strength or beauty. Notice the contrast between these two descriptions of morning:
The saffron morn, with early blushes spread,
Now rose refulgent from Tithonus’ bed,
With new-born day to gladden mortal sight,
And gild the courts of heaven with sacred light.
—Pope’s Homer.
The sun had long since in the lap
Of Thetis taken out his nap;
And, like a lobster boiled, the morn
From black to red began to turn.
—Butler’s Hudibras.
Principal Figures—The common figures are metaphor, simile, allegory, personification, apostrophe, euphemism, hyperbole, antithesis, epigram, irony, climax, onomatopœia (ŏn-ŏm-a-tō-pœ´-ĭ-a), and alliteration.
Simile.—A simile is a comparison between objects that are not of the same class, and usually expressed by either like or as.
Examples:—The warrior fought like a lion.
Examples:—His spear was like the mast of a ship.
Examples:—His wrath was as the storm.
Metaphor.—A metaphor is a comparison which is implied between two objects that are not of the same class. Unlike the simile, it does not state the resemblance, it takes that for granted and proceeds as if the two things were one—we no longer say, “He fought like a lion,” but, “He was a lion in the fight.”
Allegory.—Under which head fall Fables and Parables, is an extended Metaphor generally accompanied by Personification.
Example:—Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress; Spenser’s Faerie Queene.
Personification.—Attributes life to inanimate objects. It speaks of “The childhood of a nation,” of “a learned age” of “the thirsty ground,” of “eager darts,” of “winged words.”
Apostrophe.—Is a Personification accompanied by an address, or an address to an absent person.
Example:—
Ye hills and dales, ye rivers, woods, and plains,
And ye that live and move, fair creatures, tell.
Hyperbole is effective exaggeration.
Example:—
Her eye in heaven
Would through the airy region stream so bright,
That birds would sing and think it were not night.
Antithesis is a contrast of words or thoughts.
Examples:—
Better be first, he said, in a little Iberian village
Than be second in Rome.
Epigram is a short antithesis. It is often of the nature of a proverb.
Examples:—
Some are too foolish to commit follies.
The child is father of the man.
Irony is hidden satire.
Example:—
’Tis pretty, sure, and very probable,
That eyes, that are the frail’st and softest things,
Should be called tyrants, butchers, murderers.
Metonymy.—Metonymy is a figure of rhetoric in which the name of one object is put for another, the two being so related that the mention of one recalls the other.
Examples:—
He writes a good hand (handwriting).
Death fell in showers (bullets).
The kettle boils (water).
The pen is mightier than the sword (intelligence vs. force).
Synecdoche occurs where the part is taken for the whole, the species for the genus, the material for the thing made of it, where the person is designated by the most conspicuous trait of his character or the effect he produces.
Thus we may speak of “all hands being at work,” of so many “head” of cattle.
Climax.—Climax, or the rhetorical ladder, is the arrangement of a succession of words, or clauses, in such a way that the weakest may stand first; and that each in turn may rise in importance and make a deeper impression on the mind than that which preceded it.
Anti-climax reverses the order: this is often used in humorous writings.
Examples:—
I came, I saw, I conquered.
Since concord was lost, friendship was lost, fidelity was lost, liberty was lost—all was lost.
We have petitioned, we have remonstrated, we have supplicated, we have prostrated ourselves before the throne.—Patrick Henry.
Alliteration repeats the same sound in words for the purpose of adding to the euphony.
Examples:—
Silently out of the room there glided the glistening savage,
Bearing the serpent’s skin and seeming himself like a serpent,
Winding his sinuous way in the dark to the depths of the forest.
*Onomatopœia emphasizes the meaning by adapting the sound to the sense.
Example from Cataract of Lodore:—
And sounding and bounding and rounding,
And bubbling and troubling and doubling,
And grumbling and rumbling and tumbling,
And clattering and battering and shattering.
* Name-making; the formation of words in imitation of the sounds made by the things signified: as, buzz, hiss, peewit, etc. It is held by some philologists that all language had its origin in onomatopœia, words formed by this principle being the most natural, and readily suggesting the actions or objects producing the sounds which the words are intended to represent.
Euphemism is the form of expression by which bad or dangerous things are spoken of in gracious terms. As an example we say death is “parting” or “falling asleep.”
Emphasis, or Inversion, adds greatly to the precision as well as vigor of style when temperately used. That is, when the predicate or object are much more impressive or mentally prominent than the subject they may with advantage precede it.
Any special emphasis may justify inversion. It is frequently used to indicate a swift or abrupt action—Commands frequently assume this form and owe to it half their force.
Examples:—
Great is Diana of the Ephesians,
Sweet is the breath of morn.
Low she lies who blessed our eyes.
Silver and gold have I none.
Go he shall. Stay not here.
Up goes the fool, and gets sent down again.