The grammatical form denoting more than one person, place, thing, or idea.
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Enter artificial intelligence, which can flag clichés by analyzing the frequency at which figures of speech occur in data sets.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 2, 2026
“His prose is poetic, sensuous, imaginative, adorned with fanciful figures of speech and surprising twists of language.”
From Washington Post ● Jun. 20, 2022
He knows people see his gigantic mustache, hear his cornpone accent and predilection for bombarding everyone with folksy figures of speech, and underestimate him.
From Salon ● Aug. 7, 2021
It inserts itself in conversations with our friends and teaches us its figures of speech, its sense of humor, until we talk like it and find ourselves repeating its jokes even when it isn’t around.
From New York Times ● Jan. 29, 2020
The idioms, the figures of speech that make language rich and full of the poetry of place and time must go.
From "Travels with Charley in Search of America" by John Steinbeck
