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litotes |
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litotesThe use of understatement for effect (‘He is no Einstein’ = ‘He is a bit dim’). It is the opposite of hyperbole. How to thank TFD for its existence? Tell a friend about us, add a link to this page, add the site to iGoogle, or visit webmaster's page for free fun content. |
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| In this reading the poem seems to invoke litotes, the rhetorical trope of understatement familiar from the bumper sticker "One atom bomb can spoil your whole day," but the usual form requires a strong sense of the scale of the event against which the understatement plays. Paul uses the rhetorical figure litotes, the denial of its opposite, to stress a point. Strings of negatives, litotes, double negatives, and antitheses in the Liberata are catalogued and interpreted in light of the Counter-Reformation's emphasis on prescription, censorship, and "the drive towards narrative closure" (109). |
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