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Hyperbole is a stylistic device which is also based on the interaction of logical and emotive
meaning, it gives a deliberate exaggeration:
million - coloured rainbow (Shelley)
Actually, there are seven colours in the spectrum, Shelley’s hyperbole
emphasises the beauty of
that rainbow.
So hyperbole is a statement fancifully exaggerated through excitement or for a effect. By such
overstatement something is represented
as much greater or less, better or worse:
When people say «I’ve told you fifty times
They mean to scold and very often do (Byron)
Hyperbole can be trite and genuine:
I beg you a thousand pardons; to be scared to death; to be tickled to death.
“Dombey and Son” by Dickens conveys the idea of Mr. Dombey’s life with the help of
hyperboles:
The earth was made for Dombey to trade in and the sun and the moon were made to give them
light. Rivers and seas were formed to float their ships, rainbows gave them promise of fair weather,
winds blew for or against their enterprises; stars and planets circled in their orbits topreseve a system of
which they were the centre.
The notions expressed by hyperboles generally do not co-respond to reality but both the writer and
the reader are fully aware of this fact.
The main stylistic function of hyperbole is to express emotions. In hyperbole the emotive meaning
usually dominates over the logical one.
I would give worlds to see you I would give the world to find you a pin.
Hyperbole is widely used in the oral type of speech. The speaker uses hyperbole to make his speech
vivid and convincing:
I had to drag it out of him It seems ages since we had a real talk.
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