Prolepsis.

This is nothing to do with a prolapsed womb! She is now long dead and gone: my own grandmother who had that prolapse, who gave birth to no less than four children, one of whom was my own father. She lived did my Grannie before it was invented - the NHS - you see.

Teachers teach that you use the noun – in this case my Grannie – and then change it for a pronoun – in this case she – so that the noun always precedes the pronoun.

So it "should" read like this:

My Grannie had a prolapsed womb. She also had four children in the days before the NHS.

How utterly mundane and boring!

Prolepsis puts the pronoun before the noun. 

It makes for very elegant and slightly unusual English does prolepsis.

He was a funny old chap was Henry VIII. 

It was like cutting down a harvest of young men was the Somme. 

She was a feisty old lady was Queen Elizabeth.

A neat little trick is prolepsis.

For some people (mainly Americans) prolepsis means foreseeing what is going to happen.

“I am not afraid”, said Luke Skywalker. 

“You will be…” came the reply.

 Or it can be even more clever, can prolepsis: foreseeing the other side's argument.

They are wrong the people who think that the transgender issue is going to fade away. It will never do that.

He will never get into a muddle who keeps things as simple as possible. 

She ties herself in knots who thinks she can see into the future. 

There is just one person who knows what the future will hold and He isn't speaking.

A Level Students only:

This is a really good tip for those essays, this prolepsis: it makes you look mature and slightly cynical. They will have their socks blown off will the examiners.

Adynaton (ad-in-aah-ton)

It just means “impossible”.

The idea is that you say “NO" or "NEVER" in a flowery way.

The Labour Party will win an election when pigs fly...

Not everything impossible is an adynaton. 

For example Peterborough United winning the cup is not an adynaton because it is a stand alone. But Caroline Lucas becoming Prime Minister is about as likely as Peterborough United winning the cup is.

In the first we just get a statement of the impossible. In the second, we actually use the impossible idea to prove that something will never happen.

And adynatons are fun to do.

“The Titanic will never sink”, said Captain Smith, “until all the icebergs in Arctic waters have melted.” (He didn't really say this: I made this one up.)

If you want to tell someone you love them, use an adynaton.

Doubt not that the stars are fire;
Doubt not that the sun doth move;
Doubt truth to be a liar;
But never doubt my love.

Hamlet was telling the wretched Ophelia that he loved her.

Selling stuff?

We will keep on producing delicious chocolate until it goes out of fashion.

Religion:

“Can a woman's tender care / Cease towards the child she bare? / Yes, she may forgetful be,/ Yet will I remember thee.” William Cowper.

WH Auden.

For some reason he is getting fashionable now. He flourished about a century ago.

“I’ll love you, dear, I’ll love you 

Till China and Africa meet, 

And the river jumps over the mountain
 

And the salmon sing in the street,

I’ll love you till the ocean
's folded and hung up to dry

And the seven stars go squawking
Like geese about the sky …”

Adynaton? It will end when English ceases to be the world's premier language.

Hyperbole – over the top.

We all do it. Every single one of us.

I waited for ages. (Since the stone age?)

I've told you a million times not to do that! Don't you ever listen?

She collapsed in a flood of crocodile tears.

You have to go to religion for really good hyperbole.

WARNING the next paragraphs contain the word “Jesus”.

And why do you look for the speck in your brother's eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, “Let me remove the speck from your eye”; and look, a plank is in your own eye! First remove the plank in your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.

Jesus was quite witty for a religious person. He loved exaggeration. A rich man going to heaven? Have you ever seen a camel passing through the eye of a needle? If you do not actually hate your own family, mother, father, brothers, sisters, you will never get to the promised Kingdom.

I think he depended on people using their sense of humour – but – hey – that is impossible! Jesus was a religious figure he completely lacked any

sense of the ridiculous!

If hyperbole isn't fun, then it isn't funny. It is about as funny as a woke comedian in fact.

Go over the top for heaven's sake!

"I think this is the most extraordinary collection of human talent, of human knowledge, that has ever been gathered at the White House-with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone."

-President John F. Kennedy, White House dinner honoring Nobel Prize winners. This is the dining room:

I shall keep doing adynatons until hell freezes over.

Personification.

Virtue won't hurt you, but vice is nice. Witty eh? Ogden Nash. Clever stuff. But it is just that. Clever stuff.

Please do not forget to put on your handbrake when you park your car. (stifles yawn.)

Remember, telling the truth never hurt anyone. (Yeth Mummy.)

All very boring.

Now personalise it.

Good girls go to heaven. Bad girls go to night clubs.

Mother loses baby in river after forgetting to secure the handbrake. (This is a story which is tragic – and true.)

George Washington owned up when he had cut down the cherry tree.

Works every time. A million deaths, said Stalin, is a statistic. One death is a tragedy. An abstract noun is – an abstract noun.

The BBC and ITV love personification. 

What better than a weeping family to talk about failures in the NHS?
Who better to explain homelessness than a pretty little girl with a dirty face living alone out on the street in winter?
Greta Thunberg personified Climate Change. Look where that got her. 

Politics?

Boris Johnson, Jeremy Corbyn (remember him?), Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, all familiar faces.

Chinese? Indians? South Americans? No faces so they do not appear on the screens.

Muslims – ah yes, Osama bin Laden!

Who said the Germans have no sense of humour? This is a very hilarious cartoon from Germany. You will laugh. Personification of the demon Brexit!

Advertising.

Remember him?

Or these?

An abstract noun is a fluttering butterfly. Personification produces that little pin and displays that fluttering butterfly so that everyone can inspect its beautiful wings in all their shining detail. Even though the fluttering has stopped forever.

A level students only:

Look for personification in your English Literature and point it out to the tired examiner. Use the word! Shakespeare used personification all the time.

O son! The night before thy wedding day
Hath death lain with thy wife. There she lies,
Flower as she was, deflowered by him.
Death is thy son-in-law, Death is my heir;
My daughter he hath wedded: I will die,
And leave him all; life, living, all is Death's.

(Romeo and Juliet). There are others...

Personification is hiding, like a little elf, all over the place if you know where to look for him.

Epanalepsis or Round and Round.

In my beginning is my end...

Were you ever taught that in a speech you should go round in a circle? You start with a story about, say, a fish swimming upstream against all the currents and compare the person you are making a speech about to that fish. At the end of the speech, you gently remind the audience of the fish so you finish exactly where you started.

Epanalepsis is an old journalists' trick. A story starts and ends with the same words.

Start: “An MP was complaining to me about the lack of transgendered people in parliament. Why, she asked, is this?”
Finish: “And that is why, in parliament, there is not one transgendered MP.”

Start: “Mr Buggins is a man who breeds horses just outside Birmingham in Wolverhampton. He maintains that breeding horses in Birmingham itself is impossible for the following reasons.”
Finish: “So horses do not flourish in Birmingham but they do in Wolverhampton. You are quite correct, Mr Buggins.”

It works very well for sentences too.

The king is dead, long live the king!

Man's inhumanity to man.

Make sure the first word and the last are exactly the same! Otherwise the epanalepsis doesn't work at all.

Man's inhumanity to woman. 

The king is dead, long live the queen!

Epanalepsis! Advertisers, the Bible, authors - all love completing the circle with an epanalepsis!

"Always Low Prices. Always." (Walmart slogan)

"Rejoice in the Lord always: and again I say, Rejoice." (The Bible, Phil. 4.4)

We know nothing of one another, nothing. Smiley mused. However closely we live together, at whatever time of day or night we sound the deepest thoughts in one another, we know nothing." (John le Carré, Call for the Dead, 1961)

And now a very sad epanalepsis:

"They went home and told their wives,
 that never once in all their lives,
 had they known a girl like me,
 but… they went home."
"They Went Home," Maya Angelou.

In my end is my beginning.

A level students only

Did you get the TS Eliot quote? Picture at top of page. Ugly old devil wasn't he!

Pleonasm

If you want to make absolutely sure that people have completely understood what you are trying to say, repeat yourself again and again and again.

And again.

Most of the tricks on this website are there to show you how to repeat yourself.

African joke which I picked up (as you do) in Sierra Leone while teaching there: “Repeat yourself again for the second time once more.”

I think you had to be there really...

Most people don't bother with marriage any more, especially not in church. But for those who do, here is the part where the actual marriage is about to take place:

Dearly Beloved, we are gathered together in the sight of God, and in the face of this congregation, to join together this man and this woman in Holy Matrimony...

Three repeats in one sentence!

Too much? That is exactly what the word pleonasm means – too much of a good thing.

We do it all the time without thinking or using our heads.

(absolutely) essential
(absolutely) necessary
(actual) facts
advance (forward)
(advance) planning
(advance) preview
(advance) reservations
(advance) warning
add (an additional)
add (up)
(added) bonus
(affirmative) yes
(aid and) abet
(all-time) record

More pleonasm to add to your list? Click with your mouse just here on these words.

And the pleonasm can be quite sinister and forbidding too.

Here is your free gift...
They reached a safe haven...
Congratulations! You have won a free prize...

Or pleonasms can actually be quite nice and pleasant too:

Free, gratis and for nothing.
You do not have to pay a penny.
I saw it with my own two eyes.

Advertising something?

We are looking for a loving home for some adorable, lovable and cuddly kittens...(you then go on to explain that your cat has just had them and that you want them to be happy.)
Our cars are roomy, comfortable and spacious inside...(But outside, they are compact and they park really easily in tight spaces).
Tasty, rich and delicious! Come in and see for yourself!

A level students only:

NB Examiners are paid by the page: NEVER use pleonasms in exams. You are wasting the examiner's time.

Transferred epithet.

You have to have a rash computer to write a transferred epithet. As the tired snowflakes of your memory float down outside the uncaring windows, why not reach for a comforting sip of consoling coffee and begin the beckoning work? The shortest day peeps round the corner its eyes dark, its hair tattered but invisible in the blue mists of the mothering Fen.

Things do not have emotions. That may hurt them, but they do not. They are just – things.
It is only people who do things that have emotions and characteristics.
If we transfer our own feelings onto the things round us, a wonderful, magic world peeps at us through the murk.

He smoked a thoughtful cigarette.
He had been given a careless haircut.
He ate a hurried breakfast.

Charles Dickens was the master of this.

Mr Jaggers never laughed: but he wore bright red creaking boots; and in poising himself on these boots, with his large head bent down and his eyebrows joined together, awaiting an answer he sometimes caused the boots to creak, as if they laughed in a dry suspicious way.
With Dickens you are right there in the threatening chambers looking up at Mr Jaggers in his terrifying boots.

It is great fun to carry this a lot further.

He walked through the nonchalant door into the welcoming street where merry cars hurried along beside the bustling pavements eager to get to their next appointment. The shops peered down, squinting through benign windows to see what the fuss was all about.

Writings with and without transferred epithets:

Compare these two poems about war:

This time it’s oil, not markets.
This time it’s oil, not borders.
This time it’s oil, not ideas.
This time it’s money and power –
like last time and every time before.

Steve Ely doing his levelbest for the poetry society.

Or

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares(2) we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest(3) began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots(4)
Of tired, outstripped(5) Five-Nines(6) that dropped behind.
Gas!(7) Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets(8) just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime(9) . . .
Dim, through the misty panes(10) and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all...

That is Wilfrid Owen. We are there. And some very kind person has noted all the places where careful pencils should notice the tell-tale words that will usher in that tantalising offer beckoning you, too, to the joyful world of drunken University.

A transferred epithet is for life, not just for Christmas.

Connotation.

Everything brings out feelings and emotions.

So, for instance, a suit may bring back memories of a wedding – or a funeral. A pair of socks might bring back memories of getting soaked in a downpour and wading through a puddle. A Christmas cake might bring back many happy memories of Christmas past.

Connotations.

Some people – let's be frank – smell of sweat. Some people smell of Frederic Malle. Some wear dirty shoes. Some have Calvin Klein boxers. There are people who drive BMWs with just out of date number plates. Then there are others who depend on their “driver” as they step into this year's Mercedes...

We have connotations on everyone we meet. We just cannot help it.

So how about using the connotations as a Descriptor? (I love using that word. It sounds so powerful! Like Raptor)

For instance, we often talk about people as “suits”. We have nicknames too like Droopy Drawers or Mrs Overall.

Here's a little exercise. How would you describe this man in one word?

(The moustache? Mr Smile? Blue tie? Mr Eyebrows?)

This very useful trick is excellent for dismissing people, especially unimportant ones like soldiers, teenagers or religious nuisances.

Boots on the ground are what is needed in war torn Syria.
The side part with high fade was very proud of his new wheels.
“Jesus Saves” was taken away by two white coats.

But we often use this trick without thinking about it.

He asked for her hand in marriage.
She put her plastic on the little screen.
Downing Street announced that...
You don't have to be a grey beard to know that climate change is real.

And of course you can use it in a horrid way too.

Pearl necklace wanted to lock 'em up and throw away the key.
Dreadlocks admitted that she was a pupil at Roedean.
Alcohol breath swore he hadn't touched a drop.

Poets love it. William Blake with the unofficial National Anthem, Jerusalem:

And did those feet in ancient time?

Can you do a connotation for this little group?

A Level Students only:

Connotations in Greek is Synekdoche. Use it. And look for it in poetry, and especially Shakespeare, to give a good impression to that critical red pen!

Litotes

From the Greek ‪απλότης‬ meaning “simple”.

We all use it.

That is not bad. (Means: It is OK).
It is not unusual. (It is often done).
The dinner did not disappoint.

Historically the classic is Emperor Hirohito. When, for the first time the sacred Son of Heaven spoke to his people on the new radio the situation in Japan was dire. The country fced the entire might of the US airforce. The Imperial navy was at the bottom of the sea and the Shikoku (Air force) almost entirely wiped out. On top of all this, two atom bombs had been dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and there was a real threat that the sacred soil of Japan would soon be facing a mighty invasion force.

His divine words?

“The war situatiojn has developed not necessarily to Japan's advantage.”

That is litotes at its very best. Not bad eh?

English does not like a double negative, so when we use it, we always make sure that we are, how shall we say? - not exactly telling an untruth and not exactly being ironic. We are, however, without exception, not ungrateful for a wry smile.

It is Christmas 2019 when I am presenting this. Here is your Christmas Quiz: How many examples of litotes can you find?

Catachresis

Using words against each other – that's what this word means in ancient Greek.

Here are some examples from some once loved lyrics:

Dance me to the end of love.
She lives on love street.
Love in the first degree.
Bad case of loving you.
What time is love?
Lay a whisper on my pillow.

Every single one of the above, though sometimes beautiful, can be only scarcely an exact use of language. Dance me to the end of love, for just one example. What? Love's end? Where exactly is that? Love in the first degree? What is the third degree please? And so on. You can do the rest!

Catachresis – getting it deliberately wrong.

Thunderbirds are go.

Tom Robbins on a Full Moon

"The moon was full. The moon was so bloated it was about to tip over. Imagine awakening to find the moon flat on its face on the bathroom floor, like the late Elvis Presley, poisoned by banana splits. It was a moon that could stir wild passions in a moo cow. A moon that could bring out the devil in a bunny rabbit. A moon that could turn lug nuts into moonstones turn Little Red Riding Hood into the big bad wolf."

(Tom Robbins, Still Life with Woodpecker, 1980)

Catachresis – so like other magical tricks! So like other imaginations!

Metaphors and similes are its first cousins. Even so, the dear old catachresis gets put in the corner and given the dunce's hat. It is called “abuse” (abusio) and even an outrage (audacia) by the otherwise great Quintillian, the ancient Roman expert on language, who ought to have known better.

Advertising worships catachresis with incense:

Here's how to do it.

Think of your product – say a car.

Now think of something that you like very much.

Add both and stir...

Let's take one car at random – say, the long established Datsun. If we include all makes of car it will be boring. So let's don't.

One thing everyone can learn from catachresis: push the boat out to the moon! Think puffy clouds in a stormy sky!

(The catachresis is the elder brother to the metaphor, which depends on sense not sensibility.)

PS Exposing catachresis in some meetings might be a good thing to do? There seems to be a lot of it about in management-speak.

Magic Numbers

The Chinese I Ching has nine lines in groups of three. The 8^th line from the bottom is the strong, lucky line. The line fourth from the bottom is the unlucky weak line. There are strong male lines and broken female ones. If you can interpret the gua, you can see into the future...

Did the US government actually orchestrate the Twin Towers destruction?

In August 2004, a poll by Zogby International showed that 49 per cent of New York City residents, with a margin of error of 3.5 percent, believed that officials of the U.S. government “knew in advance that attacks were planned on or around September 11, 2001, and that they consciously failed to act.” [2] In a Scripps-Howard Poll in 2006, with an error margin of 4 percent, some 36 percent of respondents assented to the claim that “federal officials either participated in the attacks on the World Trade Center or took no action to stop them.” [3] Sixteen percent said that it was either very likely or somewhat likely that “the collapse of the twin towers in New York was aided by explosives secretly planted in the two buildings.”

Numbers prove it. So they did orchestrate it.

(NB I do not believe that myself.)

Magic numbers!

A dark cave. In the middle, a boiling cauldron.
Thunder.
Enter the three Witches
First Witch
Thrice the brinded cat hath mew'd.
Second Witch
Thrice and once the hedge-pig whined.
Third Witch
Harpier cries "'Tis time, 'tis time."
First WitchRound about the cauldron go;
In the poison'd entrails throw.
Toad, that under cold stone
Days and nights has thirty-one
Swelter'd venom sleeping got,
Boil thou first i' the charmed pot.
All
Double, double, toil and trouble; (10)
Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.

Good old Shakespeare! Nailed it thrice. (Macbeth).

At the beginning of the education revolution in the last century, an edict came down that we teachers had to give each “student” a mark out of twenty for attitude and achievement. I was faced with making up a lot of numbers fast.

So I did.

But there were no 10s or 20s! 19, 14, 11 – all difficult numbers giving the impression that I knew what I was doing. One particularly badly behaved boy, I remember, got 7 and a half.

I handed them in so that they could be checked as fact.

And everyone believed them: hey! - they were numbers!

I am not alone in this.

Numbers matter. They add gravitas:

This Christmas, 23,000 young homeless people like Mark won't have a place to call home.

Seven days to save the NHS!

Use numbers. There are 101 reasons to do so. 

Here is just one: it convinces everyone.

Assonance

Alliteration is all the same consonants:

Round the rugged rock the ragged rascal ran.

Assonance is all the same vowels:

Blue moon you saw me standing alone.

Deep heat for tired feet.

We have two problems here with assonance.

The first is that, despite Animal Farm and the Pigs, not all vowels are equal. Blue moon has two long vowels. Eat meat has long vowels. But usually we use short vowels. 

(It reads like this: bt usly we us(e) shrt vowls: try it for yourself.)

But repeating lots of short vowels isn't much use really.

Standard Arabic is much easier here: it simply leaves out all the short vowels and just includes the long ones. We don't do that, we sort of put the short vowels in, which makes our spelling almost impossible. Assonance too.

Then there are the different vowel sounds in the English speaking world. This comes from Singapore where Singlish is all the rage:

They are different in Scotland, in the North of England, in Wales and in London too. And they are different in Australia, Canada and the West Indies. Indians, too, have different ways of saying English vowels.

So assonance is very hard to get right

.

For those who study the English classics, too, it is very hard to understand assonance because of the Great Vowel Shift.

Of course, if you combine assonance and alliteration, you get a pun.

Shakespeare did some very clever puns. But they don't work today. I seem to remember a lot of clever stuff punning dollar and douleur...

Here is a good example or assonance being used as a pun:

"From forth the fatal loins of these two foes,
A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life."

The word ‘loins’ would originally have been pronounced the same as ‘lines’.

This pun refers to the fatal blood lines of Romeo and Juliet – the families that they descended from are the reason for their death, as well as their ‘loins’ (their physical relationship). 

When assonance works without alliteration, though, the result is very pleasant:

I met a traveller from an antique land. (Five short “a”). Ozimandias by Wordsworth.

Rage against the dying of the light. (two long “i"s). Dylan Thomas.

Proverbs and catch phrases are good at assonance so they can be easily remembered:

High as a kite.
Happy as Larry.
How now brown cow.
A stitch in time saves nine.

Cats have nine lives.
Many hands make light work.
Rain, rain, go away, comae again another day.

And advertisers know this too:

Company names:

sweetgreen
Patagonia
Asda

Rhyme flows from assonance easily and it is easily remembered

An apple a day keeps the doctor away.
A Mars a Day helps you work rest and play.

Play it again Sam!

Chiasmus – 2.

Here are two famous chiasmuses: (OK chiasmoi then if you must).

All crime is vulgar, just as all vulgarity is crime.

(Oscar Wilde).

“It's not the men in my life, it's the life in my men.” (The often quoted Mae West.)

OK So chiasmus is very clever.

Let us build on that.

Words have meanings and of course chiasmus can enhance the meanings: A is B; but B is A.

Beauty is truth: truth beauty. (Keats).

You can play with this.

How about a chiasmus of vowels?

Symmetry of vowels by Samuel Taylor Coleridge:

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan

(In) An – Ah – Oo –-- I --– Oo – Ah – An

Poets love this. Here is Alfred Lord Tennyson:

Beneath the thunders of the upper deep.

(Be) ee-e-u-e---o---e-u-e-ee

Not a bad idea if you want a phrase to sound good on your Mission Statement or strapline.

It is very difficult to do this – unless you happen to be a genius. Test your skills now. Any sequence of vowels will do.

Now try it with consonants.

(Confession: I myself, genius that I am, cannot do this. But then, I am not Byron or Coleridge.)

Or you can do a chiasmus with adjectives – nouns – nouns adjectives.

Tomorrow to fresh woods and pastures new.

(John Milton)

By day the frolic and the dance by night.

Samuel Johnson.

Advertisers use the chiasmus too.

You like what we do: We do what you like. 

Eat to live or live to eat? We do both.

This is quite complicated to think up. If you have got that sort of mind, though, use it!

Chiasmus.

Sounds almost gynaecological doesn't it.

In Greek this letter is pronounced like the ch in loch – Chi. As in Christmas, chiropody and chiropractor. It looks – and you need to pay attention here – like this:

And you can use it in sentences too – a crossover which is rather clever.

Like this:

Nature is not symmetrical; and symmetry is not natural.

Explanation:

Nature is not symmetrical; and symmetry is not natural.

Bruce Forsyth made a career out of his 

“Nice to see you!” Audience shouts back: “To see you nice!”

The three musketeers:

One for all, and all for one!

As Plato never said: Eat to live or live to eat.

We must bring our enemies to justice – or justice to our enemies.

How to construct your own chiasmus:

Think of two words which go with your idea: handsome celebrity

A celebrity has to be handsome, but you don't have to be handsome to be a celebrity. Then start talking about your chosen celebrity.

Terrible and frightening.

Frightening is something terrible, but something terrible is not something to be frightened of. Then start talking about your recent operation.

It can be very simple:

I like dogs; dogs like me. Now tell about the dog who unexpectedly went for you on your walk through Exmoor.

A Level Students only:

What use is the Chiasmus in exams though?

Well, a half decent examiner will spot a chiasmus a mile off and s/he will then be right behind you looking for ways to increase your mark. Increasing your mark is just what you want from an examiner who is right behind you.

Henry VIII married six wives, but let us not forget that six wives married Henry VIII. 

We can then start talking about his wives from their point of view.

Or Henry VIII liked insulting Francis of France, but Francis liked insulting Henry too. 

You can then trot out the foreign policy which you so carefully revised.

Chiasmus gives the impression of giving both points of view; both points of view are the essence of chiasmus.

(Added emphasis is most important for exams because exams depend on added emphasis.)

Paradox.

A paradox sounds ridiculous until you realise it is true.

Have you read Nineteen eighty four yet? Out of date, yes. But bang up to the minute in its approach.

"War is peace."
"Freedom is slavery."
"Ignorance is strength."

(George Orwell, 1984)

Truth is lies! 

Politicians! Honestly! (I write this on the day of our General Election 2019.)

Mr Corbyn never laid that wreath on the grave of a murderous terrorist in Tunisia. There will be no border down the Irish Sea. For the many not the few. Get Brexit done!

Truth is lies. "Now let me be perfectly clear on this…" (As Mrs May used to say before a huge fib.) "I never had sex with that woman…" (Bill Clinton).

Truth is lies.

But let us move on.

Oscar Wilde was a master of paradox: 

The only way to get rid of a temptation is to give in to it.

There are two tragedies in life. One is to lose your heart's desire. The other is to gain it. 

George Bernard Shaw was a master of paradox too.

Paradox, one of the most complicated tricks of style, it actually easy to write.

Think of grumbling.

It is very expensive to run a family.

(Now throw in the word not.)

It is not very expensive to be lonely.

Having to go to work is a chore. (Now throw in the word not.) Not having to go to work is hell.

Or play with words (especially good in politics):

Vote Blue – go Green.
Left is Right!
Labour isn't working!
Liberal Democrats – neither liberal nor democratic.

Back to the future. Can you remember that film?

Dream the impossible dream.

Why did the Roman Emperor believe in Christianity?

Credo quia absurdum – I believe it because it is ridiculous.

Rome has no equal; even the ruins show its greatness.

A good Paradox sounds stupid; but it is loved by the clever.

Zeugma – yoking sentences together.

Of course when you are writing English and you are faced with that huge space to fill with words, it has got to be tempting to spread yourself a bit...

Zeugma is just the opposite!

It cuts bits out.

So if you were writing this:

In summer I like to wear a nice pair of shorts and a cotton shirt. Winter is a horrible time when I like to wear as many clothes as possible.

Zeugma makes it elegant.

In summer I like to wear a nice pair of shorts and a cotton shirt; in winter as many clothes as possible.

The good end happily; the bad unhappily.

My true love hath my heart, I his.

In quick succession, Susan lost her job, then her mind!

To be witty – add something frivolous on the end of the list:

"They tugged and tore at each other's hair and clothes, punched and scratched each other's nose, and covered themselves with dust and glory." - The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Mark Twain

 

Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard his spots? - (Jeremiah, the old Testament Prophet. 13.2)

The same words are not repeated, neither the verb. You trust the reader to fill in the gaps.

Yoking sentences together is just like two oxen pulling one plough. Elegant English, like all style, depends on saying as little as possible. Less is more...

Dusky mysteries are intriguing, in your face not so much.

Enallage: Copy and Paste.

This little trick has a proper name – Enallage. It comes, of course, from the Greek and it means copying and pasting: putting stuff in. You switch stuff over, however bad the English.

We know it as copy and paste. You just take the words as spoken or written and paste them, mistakes and all, onto the page.

You can always translate it.

“Ah no sabby Sah!” the Sergeant snapped.
“I don't think anyone knows,” Major Carruthers replied and looked him in the eye. He respected the West African Riot Police.

“ 'Ow are we today, Monsieur Jones?” The French
Policeman smiled as he replaced his pistol in its holster.

“Vell,” shouted the German teacher who could not keep order, “who has neeeckt my pen?” 

Here is a comment which was written on a local discussion group about capital punishment. Someone suggested that it be restored in UK for terrorist offences:

“it wont happen, the police have to deal with these people in the streets as they come across them, if it means shooting them then they will “

If the English had been corrected, the rawness of the comment would have been lost.

And advertisers love enallage.

And so did William Shakespeare.

And so do song writers who simply copy and paste their thoughts and words onto the tune as they flow out:

I'm leaving today
'Cause I gotta do what's best for me
You'll be okay
I've got to move on and be who I am
I just don't belong here
I hope you understand
We might find a place in this world someday
But at least for now
I gotta go my own way

The thing about enallage – copying and pasting – is that it brings what you are saying to life.

Don't it.

Balanced sentences (Isocolon)..

Equal sentences give balance.

One sided sentences give imbalance.

Seeing both points of view is right: blindness to the other point of view is dangerous.

If you happen to be a genius, you can string lots of them together:

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair…” - Dickens loved balanced sentences.

So did Shakespeare:

As Caesar loved me, I weep for him; as he was fortunate, I rejoice at it; as he was valiant, I honour him; but, as he was ambitious, I slew him.

(Brutus in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar.)

Here are some more homely isocolons. 

Climate is what we expect; weather is what we get.

 "It takes a licking, but it keeps on ticking!"(Timex watches.) 

Roses are red, violets are blue...

You can balance the syllables if you like. Read this aloud to see how it works.

Down in a deep, dark hole, sat an old cow munching a beanstalk.
Into her mouth there came yesterday's dinner and tea.

Very soon you get into poetry this way, no doubt as many Rappers have discovered.

Earth hath not anything to show more fair. Dull would he be of soul who could pass by a sight so pleasing in its majesty...

(William Wordsworth: On Westminster Bridge.)

But now we are straying from the subject and we are losing the thread. This is prose: it is not poetry!

Repeating thoughts in a balanced way is impressive: everyone likes a good isocolon.

Cassius Clay/Mohammed Ali, one of the best boxers the world has ever known, said this: 

“Float like a butterfly: sting like a bee.”

Advertisers adore the isocolon. It keeps them in work.

Have a break, have a Kit Kat.
The future's bright. The future's Orange.

Patriots love it: this is the Polish National Anthem:

Poland has not yet succumbed. As long as we remain,
What the foe by force has seized, Sword in hand we'll gain.

The Ghanayan National Anthem:

God bless our homeland Ghana 

And make our nation great and strong,

The simple little isocolon works every time. It is so easy to use.

Syllepsis: linking words together.

How about this for clever?

Miss Bolo rose from the table considerably agitated, and went straight home, in a flood of tears and a sedan chair.

Dickens at his best.

When I address Fred (pictured above) I never have to raise either my voice or my hopes. 

Vegetarianism is harmless enough, though it is apt to fill a man with wind and self-righteousness. 

You took my hand and breath away.

Dorothy Parker:

It's a small apartment. I've barely enough room to lay my hat and a few friends.

Hat tip

It is easy – you take a verb and add objects which have no connection to each other. Examples show you can and up the people who can't.

When surprised by a maid entering his hotel bathroom, he stood up covered himself as best he could. In his panic he lost his soap, his honour and his sponge.

He opened the door and his heart to the homeless boy.

It can be very simple if you use other parts of speech:

Get up and shut up. 

She shut her handbag and her mouth. 

The police shot at the man and off after his stooge.

See? You have to get it absolutely right or other people won't get it.

She ate the linguini with a fork and a twinkle in her eye.

 

He wore a suit and a smirk.

Take on your own syllepsis and off that look of despair!

Erm...

Yoking words up.

Two or three oxen pulling a plough. Both doing the same job. Different animals. Under the same yoke.

Staying in ancient Greece for a moment. The ancient Greeks thought hand movements during speeches were very important to making a point. The great orator Demosthenes was asked what the three most important things in rhetoric were. He replied: “Action. Action. Action.”

The three most important things about starting a business? Location. Location. Location.

Tony Blair loved it. Here are two classics:

“Ask me my three main priorities for government and I tell you: education, education, education.”

Destroying John Major at the end of his premiership:

“Isn't it extraordinary that the Prime Minister of our country can't even urge his Party to back his own position? Weak. Weak. Weak!”

Mrs Thatcher:

"The President of the Commission, M. Delors, said at a press conference the other day that he wanted the European Parliament to be the democratic body of the Community, he wanted the Commission to be the Executive and he wanted the Council of Ministers to be the Senate. No. No. No."

"Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow creeps in this petty pace from day to day."

Macbeth going mad.

Is works with three repeats: with two it doesn't stick out so much.

Tiger Tiger burning bright in the forests of the night. 

I am shocked, shocked, to find gambling going on in here. 

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

It is really like banging your shoe or the flat of your hand on the table. Works every time. Try it.

You must, however, ration yourself very strictly.

If you do it too much, it just looks silly. Try it and see for yourself. A bit like a toddler...