Footnotes to Plato from the foothills of the Superstition Mountains

Apophasis

I wrote recently, "Fear not, I shall not report on the state of my bowels, which is excellent, nor pull a Trump and crow about the efficacy of my schlong."

The sentence illustrates the literary trope called apophasis.  Wikipedia:

Apophasis is a rhetorical device wherein the speaker or writer brings up a subject by either denying it, or denying that it should be brought up.[1]Accordingly, it can be seen as a rhetorical relative of irony.

The device is also called paralipsis (παράλειψις) – also spelled paraleipsis or paralepsis – or occupatio,[2][3][4][5] and known also as praeteritio,preterition, antiphrasis (ἀντίφρασις), or parasiopesis (παρασιώπησις).


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