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Definition of Hyperbole
Hyperbole is a figure of speech in which a writer or speaker exaggerates for the sake of emphasis. Hyperbolic statements are usually quite obvious exaggerations intended to emphasize a point... read full definition
Hyperbole is a figure of speech in which a writer or speaker exaggerates for the sake of emphasis. Hyperbolic statements are usually quite obvious exaggerations... read full definition
Hyperbole is a figure of speech in which a writer or speaker exaggerates for the sake of emphasis. Hyperbolic statements... read full definition
Chapter 23
Explanation and Analysis—The Light:
Kirsten worriedly repeats an alarming section of the Prophet’s “light and darkness” sermon to August, trying to figure out what this moral imperative implies. As she does so, she uses hyperbole and metaphor to explore the dangerous consequences of seeing the world in these absolute terms:
"If you are the light,” she said, “then your enemies are darkness, right?” [...] If you are the light, if your enemies are darkness, then there’s nothing that you cannot justify. There’s nothing you can’t survive, because there’s nothing that you will not do."
The metaphor of “light and darkness” that the Prophet uses to explain his philosophy to his followers is a simplistic, moralistic view of the world. In his ideology, one side—the “light,” or the people that follow him— represents goodness, and the other can only be absolute evil. This division is plausibly appealing to desperate people seeking a sense of moral clarity, as many characters are after the pandemic. However, in the context of survival, this idea becomes dangerous. It divides the world into good and bad people and implies that anything that the “good” people do is necessarily also morally good. As she mulls over this idea, Kirsten is considering how this statement pushes the idea of what is permissible in their dangerous world to the extreme. She explains to August that she thinks the Prophet’s words might allow people to justify any action or choice in the service of survival, no matter how ruthless.
The hyperbolic phrasing of “there’s nothing that you cannot justify” and “nothing that you will not do” exaggerates the logical endpoint of this “light and dark” mindset. If survival depends on believing oneself to be “the light,” then any action—no matter how violent or unethical—is permissible as long as it extends that survival. Rather than reinforcing moral and ethical boundaries, this kind of moral absolutism actually erases them.
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