climax

[Date: 1500-1600; Language: Latin; Origin: Greek klimax 'ladder', from klinein 'to lean']

Climax may refer to:

• Climax community, a biological community that has reached a steady state because the life there is best adapted to the area
• Climax vegetation, the vegetation that establishes itself after a long absence of humans
• Climax (sexual), another expression for orgasm
• Climax (narrative), the point of highest tension in a narrative work
• Climax (rhetoric), a figure of speech that lists items in order of importance

Definition and Examples of a Climax in Rhetoric (thoughtco.com)

In rhetoric, climax means mounting by degrees through words or sentences of increasing weight and in parallel construction, with an emphasis on the high point or culmination of an experience or series of events. The culmination of something is something, especially something important, which happens at the end of a long period of effort or development.

An example: "There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, 'When will you be satisfied?' We can never be satisfied as long as the Negro is the victim of the unspeakable horrors of police brutality. We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as our children are stripped of their self-hood and robbed of their dignity by a sign stating 'For Whites Only.' We cannot be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream." (Martin Luther King, Jr., "I Have a Dream." August 28, 1963)

A ghetto is a part of a city in which many poor people or many people of a particular race, religion, or nationality live separately from everyone else. Selfhood is the quality that constitutes one's individuality [个性]; the state of having an individual identity.

Figure of Speech - Examples and Definition of Figure of Speech (literarydevices.net)

A figure of speech is a word or phrase that is used in a non-literal way to create an effect. This effect may be rhetorical as in the deliberate arrangement of words to achieve something poetic, or imagery as in the use of language to suggest a visual picture or make an idea more vivid. Overall, figures of speech function as literary devices because of their expressive use of language. Words are used in other ways than their literal meanings or typical manner of application.

Types of Figures of Speech

• Metaphor
• Personification
• Paradox
• Irony
• Pun
• ...

A part of speech is a particular grammatical class of word, for example noun, adjective, or verb.

六级/考研单词: ladder, lean, climax, vegetation, tense, rhetoric, mount, parallel, construct, fatigue, lodge, motel, mobile, rob, dignity, constitute, deliberate, vivid, literal, metaphor, paradox, irony, noun, adjective, verb