Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: Version 1.0 Netnews CMS/BITNET 5/19/85; site PSUVM.BITNET Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!whuxlm!harpo!decvax!genrad!panda!talcott!harvard!seismo!rochester!cmu-cs-pt!cadre!psuvax1!psuvm.bitnet!gmp From: GMP@psuvm.BITNET Newsgroups: net.nlang Subject: Re: Rhetorical Device Query Message-ID: <2133GMP@psuvm> Date: Thu, 22-Aug-85 21:39:16 EDT Article-I.D.: psuvm.2133GMP Posted: Thu Aug 22 21:39:16 1985 Date-Received: Sun, 25-Aug-85 02:37:13 EDT References: <277@mit-athena.UUCP> <3318@dartvax.UUCP> <723@ptsfa.UUCP> <> <181@proper.UUCP> <634@psivax.UUCP> <> 225@proper.UUCP Lines: 30 In a book I wrote some years ago, I found it necessary to put together a list o f "rhetorical devices." Working from A SYSTEM OF FIGURES AND TROPES which date s to the seventeenth century, Henry Peacham lists what he calls the authori- tative list of literary figures and tropes used in the rhetorical works, mostly by Cicero. Risking providing more information than anyone cares to have Alliteration onomatopoeia synechdoche allegory metonymy autonomasia hyperbole sarcasm catachresis ecphonesis epanorthosis aposiopesis apophasis (made famous by Richard Nixon) anacoenosis anastrophe erotesis epanaphora apostrophe periphrasis euphemism eupuism synchoresis asyndeton oxymoron enanctiosis hypotyposis prosopopoeia parabole epiphonema Cicero in De Inventione noted that he often found it necessary to return a phrase to its original meaning. Cartagena delenda est thus became a direct reference to a military attack each time he used the word, although the phrase had taken on the meaning of a routine exhortation to the impossible. Aristotle did a great deal with the commonplace, best exemplified in the title ^ "Who s afraid of Virginia Woolf?" which takes on the context of juxtaposition of petty human mind with the great literature of history, but in the final act refers to its direct meaning as a commonplace, literally, fear of the destruction of the illusion. We could go on with this, but if anyone is really interested, drop me a line and I will send you xerox copies of some pages hardly anyone read, on which I made hardly a dime, but which do rejuvenate some of the classic wisdom of those who did their literary work without wordprocessors. ILLEGITIMI NON CARBORUNDUM INQUIRIES TO GMP, 225 SPARKS, PSU, UNIVERSITY PARK, PA 16802 !mcnc!akgua!psuvax!psuvm.bitnet!gmp