euphuism

noun

1. (historical, rhetoric, uncountable)An ornate style of writing (in Elizabethan England) marked by the excessive use of alliteration, antithesis and mythological similes.

   “The second was a fancy, which amounts to a mania, for similes, strung together in endless lists[…]. It is impossible to open a page of Euphues without finding an example of this eccentric and tasteless trick, and in it, as far as in any single thing, must be found the recipe for euphuism, pure and simple.”

2. (countable)An instance of euphuism.

   “I have not the slightest faith in Carlyle. In ten years–possibly in five–he will be remembered only as a butt for sarcasm. His linguistic Euphuisms might very well have been taken as prima facie evidence of his philosophic ones; they were the froth which indicated, first, the shallowness, and secondly, the confusion of the waters.”

   ““Generalstaatsverordnetenversammlungen” seems to be “Generalstatesrepresentativesmeetings,” as nearly as I can get at it,—a mere rhythmical, gushy euphuism for “meetings of the legislature,” I judge.”

3. (alt-of, countable, misconstruction, uncountable)Misconstruction of euphemism.

   “Is he one who has led a wild and struggling and isolated life,—seeing few but plain and outspoken Northerns, unskilled in the euphuisms which assist the polite world to skim over the mention of vice?”

   “He became noisy and violent, so I desisted from this aspect of his lesson. “And then,” said I, “you committed the sin of euphuism. You called it not Fat, which is just and inglorious, but Weight. You—””

4. (alt-of, countable, uncountable)Alternative letter-case form of euphuism.

   “I have not the slightest faith in Carlyle. In ten years–possibly in five–he will be remembered only as a butt for sarcasm. His linguistic Euphuisms might very well have been taken as prima facie evidence of his philosophic ones; they were the froth which indicated, first, the shallowness, and secondly, the confusion of the waters.”

   “Modern eyes see less of the wit than of the dregs in the works of [Robert] Greene and his compeers; but the attacks which [Thomas] Nash directed against the Puritans and his rivals were the first English works which shook utterly off the pedantry and extravagance of Euphuism.”

   “[I]t differs radically from [John] Lyly’s Euphuism in the employment of arguments from the “topics” as proof rather than as mere amplification, in the much less frequent use of figures of sound or of word (like alliteration, assonance, similiter cadens or similar sounding terminations), and in the relative freedom from ornamentation for its own sake, […]”