Epicrisis (e-pi-cri’-sis): When a speaker quotes a certain passage and makes comment upon it.
Related figures: anamenesis–calling to memory past matters. More specifically, citing a past author from memory–and chreia (from the Greek chreiodes, “useful”) . . . “a brief reminiscence referring to some person in a pithy form for the purpose of edification.” It takes the form of an anecdote that reports either a saying, an edifying action, or both.
“Pink, pink, you stink.” The great portrait painter, Nolo Stroketti, said this. He is one of the first human beings to realize that colors are multidimensional. He paid the price and was sentenced to 2 years in prison for what he unguardedly said about pink.
Back then, colors were colors. People believed the earth would come flying out of its orbit if colors were granted qualities other than their colors. Pink was pink. It was not permitted to stink under any circumstances. In short, pink did not, and would not ever stink.
But hundreds of people demonstrated on behalf of Stroketti, chanting “Pink, pink, you stink.” This rattled the Kingdm of Penseel’s scientists, They could feel the earth beginning to wobble on its axis. Since they were in charge of everything, they told the army to mow down the demonstrators “and be done with it.” The soldiers locked and loaded and headed for the prison. Their only fear was that they’d run out of ammunition before shooting all the demonstrators.
Suddenly a man standing in a donkey cart blocked the street. He was wearing a pink robe and it stunk. The soldiers started coughing and falling to the ground. One of them said in a strangled voice “Pink, pink, you stink” as he fell to the ground. The man in the cart said, “Lo unto you, I am immune to the stench. My Father hast given me the remedy. Now thou shalt see, pink mayest stink, but not in itself, it is a medium that mayest stinketh. So, Stroketti is not altogether wrong. Free him or my Father will destroy the Kingdom of Penseel with famine, disease, penury, and corn hole.”
The man in the cart was burned at the stake.
The Kingdom of Penseel remained mired in misbelief for another 75 years when they were invaded and conquered by the Blasphimites who didn’t believe “jack shit.” The old theory of color was the first go. Pink was allowed to stink, red could be dead, yellow was mellow.
Definition courtesy of “Silva Rhetoricae” (rhetoric.byu.edu).
The Daily Trope is available on Amazon in paperback under the title of The Book of Tropes for $9.95. It is also available in Kindle format for $5.99.
The Daily Trope 