What is hyperbole?

Hyperbole is exaggeration .
It puts a picture into the reader’s mind.
Example: You could have knocked me over with a feather.
Hyperbole is used for emphasis
(makes that part more important) or humorous effect. With hyperbole, an author makes a point by overstating it.

Hyperbole makes qualities of people or things stand out by exaggerating them.
Examples: The skin on her face was as thin and drawn as tight as the skin of onion.
-Flannery O’Connor, “Parker’s Back”
She’s the funniest girl I’ve ever met.
Create your own example!

Hyperbole can also be used to describe a person’s emotions (feelings).
In the following selection, a boy is pulling a man up from a deep hole.
“It was not a mere man he was holding, but a giant; or a block of granite. The pull was unendurable. The pain unendurable.”
—James Ramsey Ullman, "A Boy and a Man"
What makes this hyperbole?

There did not seem to be brains enough in the entire nursery, so to speak, to bait a fishhook with.
—Mark Twain, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court
People moved slowly then. There was no hurry, for there was nowhere to go, nothing to buy and no money to buy it with, nothing to see outside the boundaries of Maycomb County.
—Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird

Hyperbole is common in humorous poetry.
Hyperbole can make a point in a light-hearted way. It can be used to poke fun at someone or something. For example, read this description of a dull town.
It's a slow burg—I spent a couple of weeks there one day.
—Carl Sandburg, "The People, Yes"

Hyperbole:
-is exaggeration
-is used for emphasis
-is used for humorous effect
-is used in descriptions
-of people
-of emotions

Hint: If you’re reading
, look on pages 13, 16, 34, 35, 75, 77, 95,
96, 104, 112, and then keep looking!
Find at least four and be able to explain why they are hyperbole!
Please enjoy the most fun language arts activity ever!