Rhetorical Question - Examples and Definition

Definition of Rhetorical Question
A rhetorical query is asked simply for effect, or to lay emphasis on a few factor being discussed, while no actual answer is anticipated. A rhetorical question may also have an obvious solution, but the questioner asks it to lay emphasis to the factor. In literature, a rhetorical question is self-evident, and used for style as an excellent persuasive device.

Broadly speaking, a rhetorical query is asked when the questioner himself knows the answer already, or an answer isn't certainly demanded. So, an answer is not anticipated from the audience. Such a query is used to emphasize a factor or draw the audience’s interest.

Common Rhetorical Question Examples
Rhetorical questions, even though nearly needless or meaningless, appear a basic want of day by day language. Some commonplace examples of rhetorical questions from each day lifestyles are as follows:

“Who knows?”
“Are you stupid?”
“Did you listen me?”
“Ok?”
“Why now not?”
Mostly, it is straightforward to identify a rhetorical question due to its position in the sentence. It occurs straight away after a comment made, and states the other of it. The concept once more is to make a factor extra prominent. Some rhetorical query examples are as follows. Keep in mind that they're additionally called “tag questions” if used in normal conversation.

“It’s too warm today, isn’t it?“
“The actors played the roles well, didn’t they?“
Examples of Rhetorical Question in Literature
Rhetorical questions in literature are as critical as they're in every day language, or perhaps even more so. The purpose is the massive trade a rhetorical query can bring about. The absence or presence of a rhetorical query in some of the most well-known lines in literature could trade the impact altogether. Some examples of rhetorical questions in literature show that writers once in a while ask questions, and then is going on to answer them to produce a desired effect.

Example #1: Romeo and Juliet (By William Shakespeare)
JULIET:
” ’Tis but thy name that is my enemy.
Thou art thyself, though no longer a Montague.
What’s Montague? It is nor hand, nor foot,
Nor arm, nor face, nor another part
Belonging to a man. O, be a few other name!
What’s in a name? That which we name a rose
By any other name could odor as sweet.”

A very good instance of rhetorical question in literature is from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. Here, Juliet makes a statement that a man’s call does no longer define him as a person. She draws interest to this problem by means of asking two important rhetorical questions, as cited in bold.

Example #2: Ode to the West Wind (By Percy Bysshe Shelley)
Percy Bysshe Shelley ends his masterpiece Ode to the West Wind with a rhetorical question:

“…O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?”

In this excerpt, Shelley achieves the favored effect with the aid of asking a rhetorical question, as opposed to making a assertion. The solution to this query is not sought; instead, an impact is efficaciously created giving a high-quality of entirety to the ode.

Example #3: Creation (By Hladia Porter Stewart)
Mrs. Hladia Porter Stewart in her poem Creation employs rhetorical inquiries to create impact and attain the desired enchantment of the poem.

“What made you think of love and tears
And delivery and death and pain?”

Without rhetorical question, it'd have been not possible for the poet to express herself as impressively as she does here.

Example #4: The Solitary Reaper (By William Wordsworth)
“Will no one inform me what she sings?”

Notice, an solution isn't always predicted to this query. The poet prefers a rhetorical question to a plain assertion to emphasise his feelings of satisfactory surprise. Thus, the poem’s that means is enhanced by way of using a rhetorical question.

Example #5: The Merchant of Venice (By William Shakespeare)
“If you prick us, do we now not bleed?
If you tickle us, do we not laugh?
If you poison us, do we not die?
And in case you wrong us, shall we no longer revenge?”

The character Shylock, in Shakespeare’s play The Merchant of Venice, asks a sequence of rhetorical questions on this excerpt. The questions don’t necessarily want answers. They are neither questions nor plain statements, but rather something in among the two.

Function of Rhetorical Question
Writers hire rhetorical questions for rhetorical effects, and we can't without problems quantify the impact rendered by a rhetorical query. The idea will become all of the greater powerful, and our interest is aroused to preserve to read and enjoy the technical and aesthetic beauty that a rhetorical question generates. Moreover, it's miles a requirement in persuasive speeches.