enallage · noun — transformation from one grammatically correct form to another. It carries an Arena rating of 1579, earned across 49 head-to-head judged battles.
Definition from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
Among words judged in Lexicurio's Arena, enallage ranks #577 of 17,205 for The Improbable, #3,266 of 17,176 for Most Incisive Words, #3,736 of 17,162 for Most Elegant Words, #4,468 of 17,180 for Most Ingenious Words.
enallage is pronounced /ɛˈnæləd͡ʒiː/.
Why “enallage” is a great word
Enallage is the deliberate rhetorical substitution of one grammatical form for another to achieve a striking stylistic effect. From Ancient Greek ἐναλλαγή (enallagḗ, 'interchange, variation'). Unlike the specific transposition of hypallage (which shifts a modifier, as in 'a sleepless night') or the accidental clumsiness of a solecism, enallage is a conscious, elegant bending of a rule. It is the poet's 'I knows it' to lend a voice its rough grain; the general's 'Lay on, Macduff,' where the shift carries the weight of inevitability; the shift to the present tense to make the past breathe again—a small, calculated fracture in the expected order that lets a more urgent truth shine through.
❧ Essay by Lexicurio’s AI · definition, etymology & citations from published sources
Etymology
From Ancient Greek ἐναλλαγή (enallagḗ, “interchange, variation”).
noun
- Transformation from one grammatically correct form to another.
- The substitution of one grammatical form for another that violates a grammatical rule.e.g.“And when all men shall have adopted this enallage, the fault indeed will be banished, or metamorphosed, but with it will go an other sixth part of every English conjugation.” — 1851, Goold Brown, The Grammar of English Grammars:
Definitions & examples from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 3.0).
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