litotes
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.
I had never heard the word litotes, which means “words doctors use to remind you they’re smarter than you are.”
From Time
If you were feeling technical, you might call it "litotes" and Milton pulls a similar trick in his line: "Love, not the lowest end of human life".
From BBC
It's outlined in general and unemotional terms in the climactic sixth and seventh stanzas, with a faint touch of extra-dry humour in the litotes of "pointed questions", "whoever they had come to see", etc.
From The Guardian
V.—I pardon this epitrope, but pray use less metaphor and more litotes in the prosopography you dedicate to my modest entity— J.—What will you?
From Project Gutenberg
The use of tmesis, asyndeton, anacoluthon, aposiopesis, hyperbaton, hyperbole, litotes, in Latin oratory and poetry.
From Project Gutenberg
From Roget's 21st Century Thesaurus, Third Edition Copyright © 2013 by the Philip Lief Group.
