Ever since Europeans arrived on the shores of America, there has been comparison between the smaller European countries and the large American continent. The un-tilled soil produced bigger fruits and vegetables than the over-worked European soil. The mountains seemed taller, the rivers wilder, the land more vast.
These qualities of the American landscape were embodied in hyperbole, overstatements, or exaggerations to help describe the extent of the American experience. Ever since, overstatement seems to be a distinctly American tool.
Examples of Common Overstatements Involve Weights, Measures, and Numbers
One of the most common overstatements involves school homework and social issues. Almost everyone has heard or said these sentences
- I have a ton of homework
- She has a million boyfriends
- He has a million girlfriends
In Patsy Lynch's photo of a FEMA helicoptor carrying a one-ton bag of sand, it is clear that most people do not literally have a ton of homework. However for people under stress or who would rather not be doing homework, then describing the homework as being "a ton" aptly describes the perspective of the homework.
Examples of Overstatement in Modern Fiction
Patrick Dennis, in his book The Joyous Season, tells the story of a New York City family through the eyes of an eleven-year-old boy named Kerry. Here are some of his overstatements:
Describing his grandmother's mansion, Kerry says, "This house has about a million rooms." (p. 11).
Describing the family Christmas tree, Kerry says, "This year it had nothing but green ornaments and millions of little white lights going off and of at different times like a sign in Times Square." (p. 20).
Here, Patrick Dennis is writing through the voice of a child. One of the ways that Dennis is successful is his use of the type of hyperboles used by an eleven-year-old child.
Examples of Overstatements in Folk Tales
Children's stories often include overstatements. One of the most common is the form of the giant. In America, a common folk story is of Paul Bunyon, a larger-than-life figure, often dressed as a lumber jack.
Johnny Appleseed is another American folk tale that involves hyperbole, or overstatement. According to legend, a man called Johnny Appleseed helped the American pioneers by carrying apple seeds on all his travels, and planting them wherever he went. The results, according to legend, are all the apple trees. While there may have been a man like Johnny Appleseed, he probably didn't plant all the apple trees in the American frontier.
Overstatement in William Shakespeare's Macbeth
In Shakespeare's tragedy Macbeth, in order to gain the crown, Macbeth and his wife, Lady Macbeth, have plotted to successfully murder King Duncan. Yet, Macbeth immediately begins to feel the guilt of his deed when he holds up his hand, with Dunan's blood on it, and asks Lady Macbeth:
"Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood / Clean from my hand?" (Act 2, Scene 2).
In this case, Shakespeare is using an obvious overstatement that nevertheless encompasses the magnitude of the Macbeths's crime of murder. Of course, the blood can easily be washed off with a small amount of water. In fact, Lady Macbeth makes this point, while also understating the murder:
"A little water clears us of this deed."
Yet, Shakespeare provides an unstated analogy, that the blood on their hands equals an ocean of guilt, guilt that will drive Lady Macbeth insane, and signal the end of Macbeth's life.
Overstatement Can Highten or Reduce the Statement's Impact
Overstatement can clearly describe a situation, and therefore be appropriately used. According to the Broadway musical Oklahoma, the corn looks like it can touch the sky. Actually, this viewpoint does describe the tall appearance of crops such as corn, when the land is flat and the stalks appear to reach the sky.
However, overstatement can backfire by causing a sense of melodrama, which ultimately collapses. To always say that one has a "ton" of homework results in the term "ton" being over-used, and therefore diminished to a cliche.
References
Dennis, Patrick. The Joyous Season. New York: Green Mansion Press.1964. 1993 Reprinted by permission of Michael Tanner and Elizabeth Tanner.
Lynch, Patsy. "Army Helicoptor and One-Ton Bag of Sand." FEMA Photo Library. 16 April 2009.
Teresa Knudsen - Teresa's writing appears in the British Library, Harvard, Yale, and Princeton. Online she has written for USA Today and E How.
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