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Literary notes about oxymoron (AI summary)

Literature often employs the term "oxymoron" to convey a rich interplay of contradictory ideas that invite readers to contemplate deeper meanings. Lucretius, for instance, artfully presents such juxtapositions in classical texts [1], while modern linguistic critiques use the term to highlight ironic discrepancies, as seen in the description of "oral literature" [2]. The device also appears in character dialogues where familiar greetings are twisted into markers of indifference [3] and in broader observations that capture the inherent contradictions in concepts like market prediction [4]. This technique, whether used to challenge perceptions or to underscore a playful ambiguity—as in witty commentaries and rhetorical flourishes [5], [6]—enriches the texture of language by melding opposites into a unified expression.
  1. Lucretius uses a similar oxymoron respecting the same subject, i. 99.
    — from The Tragedies of Euripides, Volume I. by Euripides
  2. (The term oral literature is regarded as a sad oxymoron by linguists who specialize in oral cultures.)
    — from The Civilization of Illiteracy by Mihai Nadin
  3. It was his version of 'hello' distorted as it was in an oxymoron of informal indifference.
    — from Tokyo to Tijuana: Gabriele Departing America by Steven David Justin Sills
  4. Market prediction seems to be an oxymoron.
    — from The Civilization of Illiteracy by Mihai Nadin
  5. In the oxymoron contradictions meet: to reconcile these, Irish ingenuity delights.
    — from Tales and Novels — Volume 04 by Maria Edgeworth
  6. Who ever composed with greater spirit and elegance because he could define an oxymoron or an aposiopesis?
    — from Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay. Volume 1 by George Otto Trevelyan

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