LITOTES

Litotes

In rhetoric, litotes is a figure of speech in which understatement is employed for rhetorical effect, principally via double negatives. For example, rather than saying that something is attractive, one might merely say it is "not unattractive".

The above text is a snippet from Wikipedia: Litotes
and as such is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

litotes

Noun

  1. A figure of speech in which the speaker emphasizes the magnitude of a statement by denying its opposite; a figure of speech in which understatement is used with negation to express a positive attribute; a form of irony


The above text is a snippet from Wiktionary: litotes
and as such is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

Need help with a clue?
Try your search in the crossword dictionary!