Here we refer tropes and figures of speech based on the comparison of two different objects or phenomena having a common feature expressed with a certain degree of intensity, if this feature characterizes the referent in a deliberately greater degree, it may be regarded as hyperbole, if this feature is ascribed to the referent in a deliberately less degree, it is considered to be meiosis or litotes, as a structural variety of the latter.
Hyperbole is a deliberate overstatement or exaggeration aimed at intensifying one of the features of the object in question. An overstatement may be considered hyperbole only when the exaggeration is deliberate and both the speaker and the listener are aware of it. Hyperbole is mainly used to intensify physical qualities of objects or people: size, colour, quantity, age etc., e.g. Her family is one aunt about a thousand years old (F.Sc. Fitzgerald).
The use of hyperbole may show the overflow of emotions, e.g. I loved Ophelia; forty thousand brothers could not, with all their quantity of love, make up my sum (W.Shakespeare).
Hyperbole in oral speech is often used to intensify a statement, e.g. She was a giant of a woman (Fl. O'Connor).
Hyperbole, as any other semasiological EM, may become trite through frequent repetition: e.g. for ages, scared to death, I beg thousand pardons etc.
Meiosis is a figure of speech opposite to hyperbole. This is a deliberate understatement, or underestimation of some feature of an object or phenomena with the aim of intensifying the expressiveness of speech. The features stressed are usually size, volume, distance, time etc. Meiosis is mainly used in oral speech where it usually emphasizes the insignificance of an object, e.g. She wore a pink hat, the size of a button (J.Reed), a pretty penny, Tom Thumb etc.
Litotes differs from meiosis by both its contents and structure. Litotes presents a statement in the form of negation. Like rhetorical questions, litotes can be regarded as the transposition of a syntactical construction. Litotes has a specific semantic and syntactic structure: the usage of not before a word with a negative prefix, e.g. Julia was not dissatisfied with herself (W.S. Maugham).
This EM is used in oral speech to weaken positive characteristics of a thing or person; to convey the speaker's doubts as to the exact value or significance of the object of speech, e.g. Her face was not unpretty (K. Kesey).
In scientific prose litotes underlines carefulness of judgement or stresses the writer's uncertainty.
