Rhetorical Question
Rhetorical Question: A question asked for effect, where the answer is obvious or supplied by the asking itself.
A rhetorical question deputises the reader: instead of being told the conclusion, they are made to supply it, which converts an audience into accomplices.
Rhetorical Question examples
"If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh?"
— The Merchant of Venice, Shakespeare
"O Wind, / If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?"
— Ode to the West Wind, Percy Bysshe Shelley
"Sojourner Truth's 1851 speech is remembered by the question it kept returning to: Ain't I a woman?"
— Sojourner Truth, 1851
"And who, exactly, was going to stop him?"
— original example
Spot the Rhetorical Question
Score: 0/0A question asked for effect, where the answer is obvious or supplied by the asking itself.
"If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh?"
Which work is this from?
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Rhetorical Question: common questions
What is rhetorical question in literature?
A question asked for effect, where the answer is obvious or supplied by the asking itself. A rhetorical question deputises the reader: instead of being told the conclusion, they are made to supply it, which converts an audience into accomplices.
What is an example of rhetorical question?
A classic example is "If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh?" (The Merchant of Venice, Shakespeare).
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