Zeugma
Zeugma (ZOOG-ma) is the use of a single word or phrase, often a verb, to govern or modify two or more other words, the governing word having different meanings as applied to the different words it governs. “Golden Lads, and Girls all must / As chimney-sweepers come to dust” (Cymbeline 4.2.331). Sometimes the repetition is elided (see ellipsis), as in, “Let’s have a dance ere we are married, that we may lighten our own hearts and our wives’ heels” (Much Ado About Nothing 5.4.121). Zeugma is sometimes used interchangeably with syllepsis but some rhetoricians argue there are differences between the two. This website treats all variations as zeugmas.
Quotes including the Figure of Speech Zeugma
How oft, when thou, my music, music play’st
Read the SonnetHow oft, when thou, my music, music play’stAnastrophe, Antanaclasis, Epizeuxis & Metaphor
Upon that blessèd wood whose motion sounds
With thy sweet fingers when thou gently sway’st
The wiry concord that mine ear confounds,Anastrophe & Synecdoche
Do I envy those jacks that nimble leap
To kiss the tender inward of thy hand,
… continue reading this quote