Ecphonesis
exclamatory phrase in poetry, drama, and song
Ecphonesis (Greek: ἐκφώνησις) is an emotional, exclamatory phrase (exclamation) used in poetry, drama, or song. It is a rhetorical device that originated in ancient literature.
Examples
Literature
A Latin example is "O tempora, o mores", which translates as "Oh, the times! Oh, the morals!".
American writer Edgar Allan Poe used ecphonesis in his short story The Tell-Tale Heart:
Almighty God!—no, no! They heard!—they suspected!—they knew!—they were making a mockery of my horror! This I thought, and this I think. But anything was better than this agony! Anything was more tolerable than this derision! I could bear those hypocritical smiles no longer!
The public source identifies “Ecphonesis” as exclamatory phrase in poetry, drama, and song. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Ecphonesis, exclamatory and phrase.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Ecphonesis”, the useful work is to connect “exclamatory phrase in poetry, drama, and song” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jan 4, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q788419. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
Later fame can flatten the distinction between original context, subsequent adaptation and institutional collecting history. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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Three-step research path
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Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “Ecphonesis” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.