Circumlocution or Periphrasis, Classic, Classism

Circumlocution or Periphrasis: 

A roundabout way of stating or writing ideas. In it several words are used where a few words can serve the purpose. 

For examples: “Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,” (Shakespeare: “Sonnet XVIII”) 

Here “the eye of heaven” is a roundabout expression for the “sun”. 

In Keats’ “To Autumn”, “Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness” (for Autumn), “clammy cells” (for beehive), “The red breast” (for robin), etc. are all examples of circumlocution. 

Here are two more examples: 

The Peer now spreads the glittering forfex wide, 

To inclose the Lock; now joins it, to divide. 

Even then, before the fatal engine closed, 

A wretched Sylph too fondly interposed. 

(Pope: The Rape of the Lock 

The “glittering forfex” and the “fatal engine” are circumlocutiong each of them can be replaced by “scissors”. 

Poets use it to impart importance, enhance poetic beauty and, at times, provoke ironic laughter. 

Classic: 

A work of literature which has stood the test of time for its timelesg qualities. A classic engages such human qualities which appeal to the people of all ages, all countries and all races. The classics mean al} the never-dying art and literature of ancient Greece and Rome. The classics are never-dying because they appeal to us, more or less, in the way they appealed to the ancient Greeks and Romans. Modern classics are those modern literary works which, ever since thei appearance, have never lost their appeal to the readers of al} countries. The word classical refers to Greek and Roman literature og any work of art and literature that possess the qualities of Greek and Roman literature. 

Examples of ancient classics: 

Sophocles’ Antigone, Oedipus Rex and. Oedipus at Colonus: Euripides’ Medea and Hippolytus; Aristophanes’ Wasps and Frogs, Seneca’s Thyestes, Phaedra and Medea; Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, Virgil’s Aeneid and many other anciens texts are Greek and Roman classics. 

The examples of modern classics are many. Here are a few: Shakespeare’s great comedies and tragedies, Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot; Earnest Hemingway’s Old Man and the Sea, William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, George Orwell’s Animal Farm, Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness; the famous poems of Milton, Thomas Gray, T. S. Eliot, W. B. Yeats and many many others. 

Classicism: 

The ancient doctrine of art and literature. It was developed in the preChristian era in Greece and Rome. It is opposite to romanticism.. All or most of the following literary criteria contribute to classicism: 

a) Restraint or control (over imagination); 

b) Predominance of reason over emotion; 

c) Adherence to recognized forms; 

d) Symmetry or unity of design and aim; in drama, observance of three unities; 

e) Clarity, simplicity and balance; 

f) Respect for tradition; 

g) Elegance; 

h) Objectivity; 

i) Moral lesson; 

j) Universal subjects rather than temporal or local subjects. 

k) Lofty language. 

Categories: English Literature