euphuism
Americannoun
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an affected style in imitation of that of Lyly, fashionable in England about the end of the 16th century, characterized chiefly by long series of antitheses and frequent similes relating to mythological natural history, and alliteration.
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any similar ornate style of writing or speaking; high-flown, periphrastic language.
noun
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an artificial prose style of the Elizabethan period, marked by extreme use of antithesis, alliteration, and extended similes and allusions
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any stylish affectation in speech or writing, esp a rhetorical device or expression
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of euphuism
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Above all, none of the grandiosity and architectural euphuism of the American "signature" museum.
From Time Magazine Archive
"We're losing the war," he insists, adding with a flourish of Romneyesque euphuism: "The Viet Nam tail is wagging our global dog."
From Time Magazine Archive
On the other hand, it is possible to trace a feeling towards euphuism among writers who were quite outside this group.
From John Lyly by Wilson, John Dover
The world is so much with us, now-a-days, that we need have something that prates to us, albeit even in too fine an euphuism, of the moon and stars.
From The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1, April, 1851 by Various
There is truth in all these hypotheses, but each misses the true significance of the matter, which is that euphuism must have come, and would have come, without any question of borrowing.
From John Lyly by Wilson, John Dover
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
