See Also: epigram(dictionary)
epigram(encyclopedia)
epigram(dictionary)

epigram (sh)




Short poem treating concisely, pointedly, and often satirically a single thought or event and often ending with a witticism or ingenious turn of thought.

By extension, the term applies to a terse, sage, or witty (often paradoxical) saying, usually in the form of a generalization. Writers of Latin epigrams included Catullus and Martial. The form was revived in the Renaissance. Later masters of the epigram have included Ben Jonson; Fran?ois VI, duke de La Rochefoucauld; Voltaire; Alexander Pope; Samuel Taylor Coleridge; Oscar Wilde; and George Bernard Shaw.