Guide to Literary Terms Group

Question:

lemai792003
lemai792003
Student
College - Senior

How can one distinguish between LITOTES, IRONY and EUPHEMISM in the following two sentences?

 

1. John cried a little when he lost $100

 

2. Jim was fairly pleased when he won the new car.

Are the two sentences ironies or litotes?

 

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Posted by lemai792003 on Thursday June 18, 2009 at 7:11 PM and tagged with figure of speech, irony, literature, litote.

Answers:

  1. neela
    neela Teacher
    Graduate School

    1. A  Litotes conveys the negative of the opposite in a context.

    The context is the losing of $100. Jhon should have cried. But 'a little', has the effect of negating his crying .  It strongly indicates that he didn't cry.

    There is a litotes here.

    2. A litotes is here.  Jim should have been greatly pleased in the context. But the word 'fairly' reduces  the pleasing  to  a negligible level.

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    Posted by neela on Thursday June 18, 2009 at 8:06 PM