conceit

Hansen uses this as a metaphor for the “To Catch a Predator” conceit.

From Salon ● Sep. 26, 2026

Its defining achievement is ordered liberty: suspicion of ideological conceit, faith in common decency, respect for tradition and a preference for gradual change.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 10, 2026

That conceit ended up an unsubtle but no less effective metaphor for our new Gilded Age.

From Slate ● Sep. 1, 2026

The conceit of the movie, that you took 12 years to make it, became largely what the movie was about: time and growth and what happens to people as they get older.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 27, 2026

I didn’t know then if I had witnessed the gravest humility or conceit.

From "Native Speaker" by Chang-rae Lee

All of Mr. Horowitz’s conceits are present here: a murder mystery within the murder mystery, winking nods at the author’s real-life career as a novelist and screenwriter, and playful experimentation with the detective-story form.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 1, 2026

He followed it with a succession of intensely theatrical divertissements, often revolving around unexpected intellectual conceits or bizarre juxtapositions and featuring brilliant dialogue, puns, repartee, double meanings and misunderstandings.

From BBC ● Nov. 29, 2025

“Gladiator II” and “Alien: Romulus” are Ridley Scott properties that heavily retread ground covered in the original conceits that inspired them.

From Salon ● Dec. 9, 2024

One of the conceits of the musical is that not only Morton’s personal suffering but the history of his people’s suffering — a history that he kept aloof from — is encoded in the music.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 4, 2024

“But she is employing the literary conceits and techniques of a novel. And the meeting you speak of has already occurred—you have been reading it for the past quarter of an hour.”

From "Code Name Verity" by Elizabeth Wein