Understatement

A figure of speech in which a writer or speaker deliberately makes a situation seem less important or
serious than it is. Contrast with hyperbole
- describing a very obese person.
- describing a very old person.
- on terrible food.
- instead of saying Mumbai is expensive.
- when the entire area is flooded. - See more at:

Apostrophe: direct address of an absent or dead person or personified thing.

Invocation: an apostrophe to a god or muse.

Examples--

"God help me!"
"Ambition, you're a cruel master!"

Irony: using words to mean the opposite of what is said.

Sarcasm: cutting, sneering or taunting irony
.


Examples--

"He's handsome if you like rodents."

Hyperbole: exaggeration not meant to be taken literally.

Examples--

"I waited forever for him."
"I destroyed that test!"
"The world ended the day my father died."

Understatement: the representation of something as significantly less than it actually is.

e.g. "That was some sprinkle." (in reference to the four inches of rain which fell an hour before)

Metaphor: an implied comparison between things, events, or actions which are fundamentally unlike.

Metonymy: substituting a word--which is suggested by it or which is closely associated with it--for
another word

Examples--

"He hit the bottle soon after his wife died."
"She counted heads."
"The White House denied the allegations."


Synecdoche: using a part for the whole or the whole for a part

e.g. "The pen is mightier than the sword"


Personification: representing a thing, quality, or idea as a person

Examples--

"The book just begged to be read."
"The ocean screamed its fury"
"Fear lived with us in Vietnam."
Paradox: a statement that seems self-contradictory. The effect of this is to jolt the reader into paying
attention.

Examples--

"He who loses his life for My sake will save it."
"One day is sometimes better than a whole year."

Oxymoron: a paradoxical statement in which two contradictory terms or words are brought together.
Examples--

"The quiet was deafening."
"He was clearly misunderstood."
"They were alone together."
Simile: an explicit comparison between things, events, or actions which are fundamentally unlike. .
Typically involves the words "like" or "as"

Examples:

"His arguments withered like grapevines in the fall."
"He was cold as an arctic wind."
"Crooked as a dog's hind leg."
"Casual dress, like casual speech, tends to be loose, relaxed and colorful"
Apostrophe
Breaking off discourse to address some absent person or thing, some abstract quality, an inanimate
object, or a nonexistent character.
"Blue Moon, you saw me standing alone
Without a dream in my heart
Without a love of my own."
(Lorenz Hart, "Blue Moon")
"I believe it is the lost wisdom of my grandfather
Whose 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 me
As my own. I know so little that anything
You might tell me would be a revelation."
(W.S. Merwin, "Sire")
"O stranger of the future!
O inconceivable being!

Hyperbole
An extravagant statement; the use of exaggerated terms for the purpose of emphasis or heightened
effect.
"Ladies and gentlemen, I've been to Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan, and I can say without hyperbole
that this is a million times worse than all of them put together."
(Kent Brockman, The Simpsons)
"I'm so hungry, I could eat a horse!"

Irony
The use of words to convey the opposite of their literal meaning. A statement or situation where the
meaning is contradicted by the appearance or presentation of the idea.
"It is a fitting irony that under Richard Nixon, launder became a dirty word."
(William Zinsser)
"I'm aware of the irony of appearing on TV in order to decry it."
(Sideshow Bob, The Simpsons)

Metaphor
An implied comparison between two unlike things that actually have something important in common.
"The streets were a furnace, the sun an executioner."
(Cynthia Ozick, "Rosa")

Oxymoron
A figure of speech in which incongruous or contradictory terms appear side by side.

"act naturally," "original copy," "found missing," "alone together," "peace force," "definite possibility,"
"terribly pleased," "real phony," "ill health," "turn up missing," "jumbo shrimp," "alone together,"
"pretty ugly"

Paradox
A statement that appears to contradict itself.

"War is peace."
"Freedom is slavery."
"Ignorance is strength."
(George Orwell, 1984)
"There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that concern for one's own safety in
the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind. Orr was crazy and
could be grounded. All he had to do was ask; and as soon as he did, he would no longer be crazy and
would have to fly more missions. Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn't, but if he
was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn't have to; but if he didn't want to he
was sane and had to."
(Joseph Heller, Catch-22)
"Paradox of Success: the more successful a policy is in warding off some unwanted condition the less
necessary it will be thought to maintain it. If a threat is successfully suppressed, people naturally wonder
why we should any longer bother with it."
(James Piereson, "On the Paradox of Success." Real Clear Politics, Sep. 11, 2006)
"Some day you will be old enough to start reading fairy tales again."
(C.S. Lewis to his godchild, Lucy Barfield, to whom he dedicated The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe)


Personification
A figure of speech in which an inanimate object or abstraction is endowed with human qualities or
abilities.
"Fear knocked on the door. Faith answered. There was no one there."
(proverb quoted by Christopher Moltisanti, The Sopranos)
Simile
A stated comparison (usually formed with "like" or "as") between two fundamentally dissimilar things
that have certain qualities in common.

Synecdoche
A figure of speech is which a part is used to represent the whole, the whole for a part, the specific for
the general, the general for the specific, or the material for the thing made from it. (form of metonymy)
9/11
white-collarcriminals
Understatement
A figure of speech in which a writer or a speaker deliberately makes a situation seem less important or
serious than it is.

"I have to have this operation. It isn't very serious. I have this tiny little tumor on the brain."
(Holden Caulfield in The Catcher In The Rye, by J. D. Salinger)