Figure of Speech
HangYuan Zou
Introduction
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A figure of speech is a use of a word that diverges from its
normal meaning, or a phrase with a specialized meaning not
based on the literal meaning of the words in it such as a
metaphor, simile, or personification. Figures of speech often
provide emphasis, freshness of expression, or clarity.
However, clarity may also suffer from their use, as any figure
of speech introduces an ambiguity between literal and
figurative interpretation. A figure of speech is sometimes
called a rhetoric or a locution.
Classical rhetoric detected four fundamental operations that
can be used to transform a sentence or a larger portion of a
text. They are: expansion, abridgement, switching,
transferring.
Examples
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"It's raining cats and dogs" means it's
raining intensely.
"Break a leg" is a saying from theatre
meaning "Good luck."
"Butterflies in your stomach" figuratively
describes nervousness.
Categories of figures of speech
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Schemes are figures of speech that change
the ordinary or expected pattern of words.
Tropes change the general meaning of
words.
Schemes - Climax
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In rhetoric, a climax is a figure of speech in which words,
phrases, or clauses are arranged in order of increasing
importance. It is sometimes used with anadiplosis, which uses
the repetition of a word or phrase in successive clauses.
Examples:
"There are three things that will endure: faith, hope, and love.
But the greatest of these is love."
"...Lost, vaded, broken, dead within an hour." William
Shakespeare
"...the unalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness." Martin Luther King
Schemes - Parallelism
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Parallelism means giving two or more parts of the
sentences a similar form so as to give the whole a
definite pattern.
Examples
“Veni, vidi, vici (I came, I saw, I conquered).” a
comment reportedly written by Julius Caesar
"The inherent vice of capitalism is the unequal sharing
of blessing; the inherent virtue of socialism is the equal
sharing of miseries." Churchill
"But let judgment run down as waters,
righteousness as a mighty stream." Amos
and
Schemes - Polyptoton
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Polyptoton is the stylistic scheme in which words
derived from the same root are repeated.
Examples
"The Greeks are strong, and skillful to their strength,
Fierce to their skill, and to their fierceness valiant;"
William Shakespeare
"With eager feeding food doth choke the feeder."
William Shakespeare
 "Thou art of blood, joy not to make things bleed." Sir
Philip Sidney
Schemes - Anadiplosis
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Anadiplosis is the repetition of the last word of a
preceding clause. The word is used at the end of a
sentence and then used again at the beginning of the
next sentence.
Examples
"For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime, Young Lycidas
and hath not left his peer." John Milton
 "Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads
to suffering." Yoda
 "The frog was a prince / The prince was a brick /
The brick was an egg / The egg was a bird" Genesis
Schemes - Antimetabole
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In rhetoric, antimetabole is the repetition of words in
successive clauses, but in transposed grammatical order. It is
similar to chiasmus although chiasmus does not use repetition
of the same words or phrases.
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Examples
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"Eat to live, not live to eat" Attributed to Socrates
 "Live to fly, fly to live" Iron Maiden
 "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can
do for your country." John F. Kennedy
Schemes - Isocolon
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Isocolon is a figure of speech in which parallelism is
reinforced by members that are of the same length.
Examples
"Let each man search his conscience and search his
speeches." Winston Churchill
 "I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to
men, and German to my horse." Charles V
 "Many will enter. Few will win" Nabisco
Tropes - Antanaclasis
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In rhetoric, antanaclasis is the stylistic trope of repeating a
single word, but with a different meaning each time.
Antanaclasis is a common type of pun, and like other kinds of
pun, it is often found in slogans.
Examples
"We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang
separately." Benjamin Franklin
 "If you aren't fired (up) with enthusiasm, you will be fired,
with enthusiasm." Vince Lombardi
 "The long cigarette that's long on
advertisement for Pall Mall cigarettes
flavor."
from
an
Tropes - Simile
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A simile is a figure of speech that indirectly compares two
different things by employing the words "like", "as", or "than".
Even though similes and metaphors are both forms of
comparison, similes indirectly compare the two ideas and
allow them to remain distinct in spite of their similarities,
whereas metaphors compare two things directly. A mnemonic
for a simile is that "a simile is similar or alike.” Similes have
been widely used in literature for their expressiveness as a
figure of speech:
Curley was flopping like a fish on a line.
He was as brave as a lion in the fight.
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She swims like a dolphin.
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Conclusion
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Figures of speech are ways of using words
and phrases to add interest and 'color' to
what you are saying or writing. They vary in
different countries and regions. Sometimes
a figure of speech doesn’t translate literal,
so we need to pay attention in our
translation.
Reference
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Figure_of
_speech
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Thank you...