RhetoricalDevicesEmployedintheTexts.doc

Rhetorical Devices Employed in the Texts
Unit1
n Onomatopoeia: words imitating the sounds associated with the thing concerned
n creak: (to make) the sound of a badly-oiled door when it opens
n When you move in a wooden bed, it creaks.
n The hinge of the door needs oiling, it creaks every time it is opened.
n squeak: (to make) a short very high but not loud sound
n the squeak of a mouse
n rumble: (to make) a deep continuous rolling sound
n The thunder / the big guns rumbled in the distance.
n I am hungry, my stomach is rumbling.
n grunt: (of certain animals, to make) short deep rough sounds in the throat, as if the nose were closed, such as the deep short sound characteristic of a hog, or a man making a similar sound expressing disagreement, boredom, irritation
n sigh: (to let out) a deep breath slowly and with a sound, usu. expressing tiredness, sadness, or satisfaction
n We all heaved a sigh of relief when the work was done.
n groan: (to make) a sound caused by the movement of wood or metal parts heavily loaded, (to make) a deep sound forced out by pain, or expressing despair
n The patient groaned as he was lifted on to the stretcher.
n The ancient chair gave a groan when the fat woman sat down on it.
n The roof creaked and groaned under the weight of the snow.
n Personification: a figure that endows objects, animals, ideas, or abstractions with human form, character, or sensibility,
n The Middle Easter bazaar takes you...
n dancing flashes
n The beam sinks…taut and protesting
n Hyperbole: a device of comparison using exaggeration or obvious overstatement for comic or dramatic effect.
n takes you ...hundreds even thousands of years
n every conceivable
n innumerable lamps
n incredibly young
n with the dust of centuries:
n antithesis:
n dwarf---tower
n tiny apprentice---huge bellows
n heat---cool;
n glare---dark
n sumptuous dinner---humble meal…
n parallel structure: regularly employed in the listing of facts, ideas, events
n there is the …;
n The din of …
Unit2
l Alliteration: the repetition of an initial sound that is usu. a consonant in two or more neighbouring words.
l slip to a stop
l tested and treated
l Rhetorical Question: a question that needs no answer, but used for emphasis
l Was I not at the scene of the crime?
l Anti-Climax: the sudden appearance of an absurd or trivial idea following a serious significant ideas and suspensions. This device is usu. aimed at creating comic or humorous effects.
l a town known throughout the world for its---oysters
l The duties of a soldier are to protect is country and peel potatoes.
l Irony: a figure of speech in which the meaning literally expressed is the opposite of the meaning intended and which aims at ridicule, humour or sarcasm.
l Hiroshima---the Liveliest City in Japan
l Each day of suffering that helps to free me from earthly cares
l congratulate myself on the good fortune that my illness has brought me
l Metonymy:借喻 a figure of speech that consists in using the name of one thing for that of something else with which it is associated.
l Humour: serious looking men, bob up and down, the cab driver, the usher, meeting the mayor in his socks, spinal column flexible, Hiroshima---oysters, small man with very large eye-glasses, his eyes nearly closed behind their thick lenses, etc.
Unit3
Metaphor:
understatement:
保守的陈述, 掩饰；轻描淡写
既不能说得不够(understatement)，更不能说过头(Overstatement)。...
Unit4
1. simile
· E.g. My skin like an uncooked barley pancake. (para. 5, P 54)
· The scalding humor that erupted like bubbles in lye. (para. 15, P 57)
2. metaphor
· E.g. It’s really a new day for us.(P 65)
· She tries to dig a well in the sand with her toe. (para. 18, P 58)
3. rhetorical question
· E.g. Who ever knew a Johnson with a quick tongue? (para. 6, P 55)
· Who can ever imagine me looking a strange white man in the eye? (同上)
· Why don’t you do a dance around the ashes? (para. 9, P 55)
· Symbolism
4. understatement
保守的陈述, 掩饰；轻描淡写
既不能说得不够(understatement)，更不能说过头(Overstatement)。...
Unit5
1. Parallelism:
n The past, with its crimes, its follies, and its tragedies, flashes away.
n Pray…for the return of the bread-winner, of their champion, of their protector.
n We shall fight him by land, we shall fight him by sea, we shall fight him in the air.
More example:
n I see the Russian soldiers standing….
I see them guarding….
I see the ten thousand villages of Russia….
I see advancing upon….
I see also the dull, drilled, docile, brutish masses….
I see the German bombers and fighters….
I see that small group of villainous….
n the return of the bread-winner, of their champion, of their protector
n We shall fight him by land, ...by sea..., in the air
n Any man or state... Any man or state...
n Let us... Let us...
Function:
n concise in language
n balance in structure
n forceful in tone
n distinguished in significance
n add clarity and coherence to what one wishes to communicate
Features:
n detailed description
n concrete words:
n “stand”,
n “threshold”,
n “till”,
n “laugh”,
n “pray”.
2. Alliteration:
n for his hearth and home
n with its clanking, heel-clicking...
n I see also the dull, drilled, docile, brutish masses of the Hun soldiers…
Alliteration phrases:
n chop and change
n might and main
n rack and ruin
n time and tide
n hale and hearty
n mud and mire
n rhyme or reason
n weal and woe
n sink or swim

n 多变
n 力量
n 毁灭
n 岁月
n 健壮
n 泥沼
n 条理
n 祸福
n 沉浮

n But these difficulties, these differences, should not deter us. ( Richard Nixon )
n All of these are written to show us how we can squeeze all we want to do out of day, those twenty-four hours which cannot be stopped, stored or stretched.
3. Simile:
n ...Hun soldiery plodding on like a swarm of crawling locusts.
Other examples
This momentous decree came as great beacon light of hope to millions of Negro slaves…( Martin Luther King )
n The United Nations, like a mirror, reflects the changing scenes of the
international landscape. As the world political structure changed from time to time, the United Nations has also undertaken a bumpy and tortuous journey. ( Jiang Zemin )
Function:
n an association between the large quantity, disgusting way of advancing of German soldiers and locusts.
n Increase the impact of the language.
4. Onomatopoeia: vivid impression
n I see advancing upon all this in hideous onslaught the Nazi war machine, with its clanking, heel clicking, dandified Prussian officers,…

5. Antithesis: sharp and forciful
Antithesis: deliberate arrangement of contrasting words / ideas in balanced structure / form to achieve e emphasis
n devoid of all theme and principle except appetite and racial domination
n Any man or state who fights on against Nazidom will have our aid. Any man or state who marches with Hitler is our foe.
Other examples:
n Without the assistance of that Divine Being who ever attended Him, I cannot succeed. With that assistance, I cannot fail. ( Abraham Lincoln )
n And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you --- ask what you can do for your country. ( John F. Kennedy) 
n Not that I loved Caesar less
But that I loved Rome more. (Shakespeare)
6. Periodic Sentence:
n When I awoke on...invasion of Russia.
n When I spoke of Hitler's bloodlust...one deeper motive.
n If Hitler imagines that his attack on Soviet Russia will cause the slightest divergence of aims or slackening of effort in the great democracies who are resolved upon his doom, he is woefully mistaken.
n Any man or state who fights on against Nazidom will have our aid. Any man or state who marches with Hitler is our foe.
function:
n a sentence has its main idea at the end of the sentence.
n This brings an effect of tenseness, suspense and dramatic climax.
n Add variety to an otherwise monotonous sentence structure.
n Increase the difficulty of understanding.
7. Metaphor:
They will be rounded up in hordes.
...was not bowing down in the House of Rimmon.
I see Russian soldiers standing on the threshold...
Means of existence is wrung from the soil...
cataract of horrors
rid the earth of his shadow...liberate people from his yoke
The scene will be clear for the final act.
8. Assonance:
Assonance: The use of the same or related, vowel sounds in successive words
n clanking, heel-clicking,...cowing and tying...plodding on like crawling locusts, ...smarting from many a British whipping... 
n easier and safer prey
More Examples
9. Metonymy: 借喻
n means of existence  
10. Rhetorical Question:
n Can you doubt what our policy will be?
n Passive voice:
n News was brought to me...
n Notice should be given ...
n He was never to be woken up...
11. Repetition:
n devoid of all theme and principle
n We have but one aim and one single purpose
n nothing will turn us---nothing.
n We will never parley, we will never negotiate...
n This is our policy and this is our declaration
n as we shall faithfully and steadfastly
n Noun phrases:
n I had not the slightest doubt where ...
n I asked that notice should be given...
Unit6

• Metaphor:
• ...the nerves of both ... were excessively frayed...
• his wife shot him a swift, warning glance.
• The words spat forth with sudden savagery.
• Her tone ...withered...
• ...self-assurance...flickered...
• The Duchess kept firm tight rein on her racing mind.
• Her voice was a whiplash.
• eyes bored into him
• I’ll spell it out.
• Euphemism:
• ...and you took a lady friend.
• Metonymy:借喻
• won 100 at the tables
• lost it at the bar
• they'll throw the book,...
¨ Onomatopoeia:
¨ appreciative chuckle
¨ clucked his tongue
Unit7
¨ Synecdoche:提喻
Synecdoche (ti yu) has often been confused with Metonymy, and sometimes even treated synonymously. This is not surprising, as both figures of speech involve substitution. The distinction lies in the fact that while metonymy involves the substitution of the name of one thing for that of another, synecdoche involves the substitution of the Part for the WHOLE or vice versa.
· eye-ball to eye-ball consultations with...on the TUBE...
· The computer revolution is ...liberating LIMBS...
· Parallelism
· ...everything from automobile engines to universities and hospitals, from farms to banks and corporate offices, from outer space to a baby's nursery
· Onomatopoeia
· alarm clock burrs
· percolator starts burbling
· Alliteration
· Next to health, heart and home, happiness for mobile Americans depends upon the automobile.
5