Rhetorical Tropes

Question 1

Anaphora

Answer 1

Repetition of a word or a sequence of words in neighboring clauses.

(I needed a drink, I needed a vacation, I needed a home in the country.)

Question 2

Antithesis

Answer 2

Opposite words or ideas placed close together.

We must learn to LIVE together as brothers or PERISH together as fools.

Question 3

Aposiopesis

Answer 3

Breaking off a sentence before completion.

If you don’t stop this right now I swear to god I’m going to-

Question 4

Assonance

Answer 4

Grouping the same or very similar vowels together in a sequence of words.

(She lOves the thUnder.)

Can only occur in stressed syllables.

Question 5

Asyndeton

Answer 5

Deliberately omitting conjunctions.

He was a bag of bones, a floppy doll, a broken stick, a maniac.

Question 6

Captatio Benevolentiae

Answer 6

Appealing to the goodwill of the audience, often by undermining yourself.

(I realize I’m not the likeliest candidate for this office. I don’t fit the typical pedigree, and haven’t spent my career in the halls of Washington.)

Question 7

Anadiplosis

Answer 7

Repeating the final word in the first phrase/clause at the beginning of the second, the last word of the second phrase/clause at the beginning of the third, etc.

(Why, the whole world were but as an empire, that empire as a province, that province as a bank, that bank as a private purse..)

Question 8

Consonance

Answer 8

Repetition of non-initial consonants.

As the wiND will beND.

Question 9

Ekphrasis

Answer 9

When a visual object is vividly described in words.

Question 10

Erotema

Rhetorical question

Answer 10

A question not expecting a reply, but asked for the sake of emotional/logical emphasis.

(And how many deaths will it take till we know, that too many people have died?)

Question 11

Hyperbaton

Answer 11

Deviating from the expected word order.

Sorry I be but go you must.

Question 12

Hyperbole

Answer 12

Exaggeration.

I love hyperboles I use them like 400 times a day.

Question 13

Irony

Antiphrasis

Answer 13

Using a word or statement in the opposite sense to what would normally be understood.

(A little water clears us of this deed.)

Question 14

Alliteration

Answer 14

Repetition of the same consonant at the beginning of each word in a sentence.

(Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.)

Question 15

Metaphor

Answer 15

Describing one thing directly in terms of another which shares some characteristics with it.

(Between the lower east side tenements the sky is a snotty handkerchief.)

Question 16

Onomatopoeia

Answer 16

When the sounds of words mimic or reinforce their meaning.

Bang! went the pistol.

Question 17

Oxymoron

Answer 17

Terms that seem to contradict each other.

A faith unfaithful kept him falsely true.

Question 18

Parison

Answer 18

When corresponding/parallel grammatical structures are used in a series of phrases or clauses.

(We shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe.)

Question 19

Periphrasis

Answer 19

An expansive way of saying something that might be said more concisely.

(He burnt the topless towers of Ilium.)

Question 20

Polysyndeton

Answer 20

Using more conjunctions than is necessary.

Let them have their money and power and segregation and sarcasm and big houses and schools and laws and books.

Question 21

Praeteritio

Answer 21

Invoking a subject by saying you won’t.

Our nation is great, not by the height of its skyscrapers, or the power of its military, or the size of the economy.

Question 22

Prosopopoiea

Personification

Answer 22

Attributing human qualities to inanimate objects.

The wind stood up and gave a shout.

Question 23

Puns (Antanaclasis)

Answer 23

A word is repeated with two different meanings.

If you aren’t fired with enthusiasm, you’ll be fired with enthusiasm.

Question 24

Puns (Paranomasia)

Answer 24

A play on words which sound identical but have different meanings.

(Your children need your presence more than your presents.)

Question 25

Simile

Answer 25

Likening one thing to another using ‘like’ or ‘as’.

The plants filled the place with nasty meaty leaves LIKE the newly washed fingers of dead men.

Question 26

Synecdoche

Answer 26

Part for the whole or whole for the part.

‘Hollywood’ to describe the American mainstream film industry.

Question 27

Tricolon

Answer 27

A series of three parallel words/phrases/clauses.

Veni, vidi, vici.

Question 28

Ascending tricolon

Answer 28

Three items in a series that increase in size.

Remember this day, this week, this month.

Question 29

Descending tricolon

Answer 29

Three items in a series that decrease in size.

I love building rafts out of driftwood, eating breakfast, and sleeping.