Homer Simpsons Figures of Speech

Homer Simpsons Figures of Speech English? Who needs that? Im never going to England! Woo-hoo! The immortal words of Mr. Homer Simpson- beer-guzzling, donut-popping patriarch, nuclear-power-plant safety inspector, and Springfields resident rhetorician. Indeed, Homer has contributed far more to the English language than just the popular interjection Doh. Lets take a look at some of those rich contributions- and along the way review several rhetorical terms. Homers Rhetorical Questions Consider this exchange from a Simpson family symposium: Mother Simpson: [singing] How many roads must a man walk down before you can call him a man?Homer: Seven.Lisa: No, dad, its a rhetorical question.Homer: OK, eight.Lisa: Dad, do you even know what rhetorical means?Homer: Do I know what rhetorical means? In fact, Homeric logic often depends on a rhetorical question for its expression: Books are useless! I only ever read one book, To Kill A Mockingbird, and it gave me absolutely no insight on how to kill mockingbirds! Sure it taught me not to judge a man by the color of his skin . . . but what good does that do me? One particular type of rhetorical question favored by Homer is erotesis, a question implying strong affirmation or denial: Donuts. Is there anything they cant do? Homers Figures of Speech Though sometimes misjudged as a complete moron, Homer is actually a deft manipulator of the oxymoron: Oh Bart, dont worry, people die all the time. In fact, you could wake up dead tomorrow. And our favorite figure of ridicule is actually quite handy with figures of speech. To explain human behavior, for instance, he relies on personification: The only monster here is the gambling monster that has enslaved your mother! I call him Gamblor, and its time to snatch your mother from his neon claws! Chiasmus guides Homer to new levels of self-understanding: All right, brain, I dont like you and you dont like meso lets just do this, and Ill get back to killing you with beer. And here, in just five words, he manages to combine apostrophe and tricolon in a heartfelt encomium: Television! Teacher, mother, secret lover. Of course, Homer isnt always familiar with the names of such classical figures: Lisa: Thats Latin, Dadthe language of Plutarch.Homer: Mickey Mouses dog? But stop snickering, Lisa: the language of Plutarch was Greek. Simpson Repeats Like the great orators of ancient Greece and Rome, Homer employs repetition to evoke pathos and underscore key points. Here, for example, he inhabits the spirit of Susan Hayward in a breathless anaphora: I want to shake off the dust of this one-horse town. I want to explore the world. I want to watch TV in a different time zone. I want to visit strange, exotic malls. I’m sick of eating hoagies! I want a grinder, a sub, a foot-long hero! I want to LIVE, Marge! Won’t you let me live? Won’t you, please?† Epizeuxis serves to convey a timeless Homeric truth: When it comes to compliments, women are ravenous blood-sucking monsters always wanting more . . . more . . . MORE! And if you give it to them, youll get plenty back in return. And polyptoton leads to a profound discovery: Marge, whats wrong? Are you hungry? Sleepy? Gassy? Gassy? Is it gas? Its gas, isnt it? Homeric Arguments Homers rhetorical turns, especially his efforts to argue by analogy, sometimes take odd detours: Son, a woman is a lot like a . . . a refrigerator! Theyre about six feet tall, 300 pounds. They make ice, and . . . um . . . Oh, wait a minute. Actually, a woman is more like a beer.Son, a woman is like a beer. They smell good, they look good, youd step over your own mother just to get one! But you cant stop at one. You wanna drink another woman!You know, boys, a nuclear reactor is a lot like a woman. You just have to read the manual and press the right buttons.Fame was like a drug. But what was even more like a drug were the drugs. Yes, Mr. Simpson is occasionally word challenged, as in the malapropism that punctuates this distinctively Homeric prayer: Dear Lord, thank you for this microwave bounty, even though we dont deserve it. I mean . . . our kids are uncontrollable hellions! Pardon my French, but they act like savages! Did you see them at the picnic? Oh, of course you did. Youre everywhere, youre omnivorous. Oh Lord! Why did you spite me with this family? Consider as well Homers eccentric (or perhaps dyslexic?) use of hypophora (raising questions and answering them): Whats a wedding? Websters dictionary describes it as the act of removing weeds from ones garden. And now and then his thoughts collapse before he can make it to the end of a sentence, as in this case of aposiopesis: I wont sleep in the same bed with a woman who thinks Im lazy! Im going right downstairs, unfold the couch, unroll the sleeping bauh, goodnight. The Master Rhetorician But for the most part, Homer Simpson is an artful and deliberate rhetorician. For one thing, hes a self-proclaimed master of verbal irony: Owww, look at me, Marge, Im making people happy! Im the magical man, from Happy Land, who lives in a gumdrop house on Lolly Pop Lane! . . . By the way I was being sarcastic. And he dispenses wisdom with dehortatio: The code of the schoolyard, Marge! The rules that teach a boy to be a man. Lets see. Dont tattle. Always make fun of those different from you. Never say anything, unless youre sure everyone feels exactly the same way you do. Next time you catch The Simpsons on TV, see if you can identify additional examples of these rhetorical concepts: analogyanaphoraaposiopesisapostrophechiasmusdehortatioencomiumepizeuxiserotesisfigures of speechhypophoramalapropismoxymoronpersonificationpolyptotonrhetorical questiontricolonverbal irony