In contrast to the hyperbole of Hamlet's harangue from the grave of Ophelia, I now quote a rather more characteristic litotes in which he describes his father:. From what we learn by Hamlet's behaviour throughout the play, it is clear that these words do not do justice to his feelings. It is not that the statement is untrue: rather, it is true in the manner of a platitude - it reveals nothing of the emotion that Hamlet expresses elsewhere.
The term 'litotes' is sometimes reserved for a particular kind of understatement in which the speaker uses a negative expression where a positive one would have been more forceful and direct: 'It's not bad'; 'He's no Hercules'; 'She's no oil painting'; 'She's not exactly a pauper'; etc. These resemble the example from Hamlet in that they are not so much untrue as non-committal. To indicate the positive meaning 'rich', we take the term pauper and negate it: 'not a pauper'.
But as pauper refers to the extreme position at the poverty end of the scale, its negation refers to the whole of the rest of the scale. The part designated by the word rich is only part of this remainder:. Hence, although the speaker intends us to understand 'She is rich', he leaves open, in what he says, the question of whether she is rich or not.
In so far as they mainly apply to evaluative meaning, hyperbole and litotes serve to colour the expression of personal feelings and opinions, which may be either of a positive or a negative kind enthusiasm, disgust, etc.
Litotes expresses an overt lack of commitment, and so implies a desire to suppress or conceal one's true attitude; but paradoxically this may, like hyperbole, be a mode of intensification, suggesting that the speaker's feelings are too deep for plain expression. Because of its two-layer significance-superficial indifference and underlying commitment - litotes is often treated as a category of irony. The ironical import is seen, for example, in the stoical flippancy of Mercutio's reference to his fatal wound in Romeo and Juliet [lILi]:.
Hyperbole is typically used in eulogy, and litotes in disparagement. In everyday speech, they represent antithetical postures, and tend to go with contrasting philosophical attitudes: optimism and idealism in the case of hyperbole, pessimism and cynicism in the case of litotes. An association of sex may even be suggested: hyperbole seems predominantly a characteristic of female speech and litotes of male speech, so that 'It wasn't too bad' as an expression of approval would almost certainly come from a man, and' It was absolutely fabulous' from a woman.
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Related Books Free with a 30 day trial from Scribd. Related Audiobooks Free with a 30 day trial from Scribd. Empath Up! Joanna Esguerra. Jina Mae Pineda. Jessa Marie Diwata. Murtajiz Mehdi. Luche Condiman , Teacher at DepEd. Reina Mae Obinque. It may also be expressed by a syntactic construction a syntactic epithet : Just a ghost of a smile appeared on his face; she is a doll of a baby; a little man with a Say-nothing-to-me, or — I'll- contradict- you expression on his face.
This device consists in the use of a proper name instead of a common name or vice versa. Thus, we may use a description instead of a person's name, creating a kind of nickname: Mister Know-all a character of S. Thackeray ; Mr. Murdstone Ch.
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