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Definition of Hyperbole
Hyperbole is a figure of speech in which a writer or speaker exaggerates for the sake of emphasis. Hyperbolic statements are usually quite obvious exaggerations intended to emphasize a point... read full definition
Hyperbole is a figure of speech in which a writer or speaker exaggerates for the sake of emphasis. Hyperbolic statements are usually quite obvious exaggerations... read full definition
Hyperbole is a figure of speech in which a writer or speaker exaggerates for the sake of emphasis. Hyperbolic statements... read full definition
Key Examples in To the Lighthouse
Time Passes, 2
Explanation and Analysis—The Dark Tide:
When the Ramsays leave the house in the beginning of "Time Passes," the rooms are plunged into darkness. In the beginning of Chapter 2, Woolf describes the steady onslaught of darkness using a potent combination of hyperbole, metaphor, and personification:
...with the lamps all put out, the moon sunk, and a thin rain drumming on the roof a downpouring of immense darkness began. Nothing, it seemed, could survive the flood, the profusion of darkness which, creeping at keyholes and crevices, stole round window blinds, came into bedrooms, swallowed up here a jug and basin, there a bowl of red and yellow dahlias, there the sharp edges and firm bulk of a chest of drawers. Not only was furniture confounded; there was scarcely anything left of body or mind by which one could say 'This is he' or 'This is she.'
The Lighthouse, 11
Explanation and Analysis—Mrs. Ramsay's Infinitudes:
To say Mrs. Ramsay is simply "beautiful" would be an understatement. Throughout To the Lighthouse, it becomes increasingly clear that Mrs. Ramsay has an indefinable, infinite sort of beauty—particularly in the eyes of Lily Briscoe, the artist tasked with capturing Mrs. Ramsay on canvas. Lily uses hyperbole to suggest as much in Chapter 11 of "The Lighthouse":
Unlock with LitCharts A+One wanted fifty pairs of eyes to see with, [Lily] reflected. Fifty pairs of eyes were not enough to get round that one woman with, she thought. Among them, must be one that was stone blind to [Mrs. Ramsay's] beauty.
Related Themes:
