Clever, very

Figure of speech. Lenehan's comment on Ignatius Gallaher's journalistic coup ("— Clever, Lenehan said. Very") is transformed in one of the newspaper-like headlines into something that sounds syntactically much stranger: "CLEVER, VERY." Gilbert and Seidman cite this as an example of hysteron proteron, a rhetorical figure in which the conventional order of words is reversed so that what should come last comes first. This is debatable, but the phrase is certainly an example of hyperbaton, a broader term referring to any inversion of normal word order to call attention to some element of a sentence. Other examples in Aeolus include "Hell of a racket they make" and "Was he short taken?"

John Hunt 2023

Source: ffolliet.com.

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