Which of the following best describes litote, a favorite rhetorical device in Old English poetry ?
Correct answer: C. ironic understatement
- A. embellishment at the service of Christian doctrine
- B. repetition of parallel syntactic structures
- C. ironic understatement
- D. stress on every third diphthong
Explanation
Litotes expresses an idea through deliberate understatement, often by denying its opposite, and it may create irony. The other choices describe Christian allegory, parallelism, or a nonexistent metrical rule.
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