Read the following passage from "The Happy Man."

"Inside him, he felt a boundless power, an imperishable energy, an ability to achieve anything with confidence, precision, and obvious success. His heart was overflowing with love for people, animals, and things and with an all-engulfing sense of optimism and joy. It was as if he were no longer troubled or bothered by fear, anxiety, sickness, death, argument, or the question of earning a living. Even more important than that, and something he could not analyze, it was a feeling which penetrated to every cell of his body and soul; it played a tune full of delight, pleasure, serenity, and peace and hummed in its incredible melodies the whispering sound of the world which is denied to the unhappy."

Which of the following stylistic elements is used by the writer in these lines to create humor?

A. Hyperbole

B. Incongruity

C. Irony

D. Sarcasm

Question

Lena Wall

English

1 January, 15:22

Read the following passage from "The Happy Man."

"Inside him, he felt a boundless power, an imperishable energy, an ability to achieve anything with confidence, precision, and obvious success. His heart was overflowing with love for people, animals, and things and with an all-engulfing sense of optimism and joy. It was as if he were no longer troubled or bothered by fear, anxiety, sickness, death, argument, or the question of earning a living. Even more important than that, and something he could not analyze, it was a feeling which penetrated to every cell of his body and soul; it played a tune full of delight, pleasure, serenity, and peace and hummed in its incredible melodies the whispering sound of the world which is denied to the unhappy."

Which of the following stylistic elements is used by the writer in these lines to create humor?

A. Hyperbole

B. Incongruity

C. Irony

D. Sarcasm

+4

Answers (1)

Know the Answer?

Cameron Robinson · Answer 1

A. Hyperbole

There is happiness, and then there is the happiness described in this passage. Hyperbole is an extreme exaggeration, and the author here is extremely exaggerating the happiness that the man is feeling. He is overemphasizing aspects of happiness and stretching them to the farthest explanation in order to create humor in the passage.