Have you ever expressed a thought, experienced dissatisfaction with the expression and so immediately qualified or taken back the initial statement? In that case, you have engaged in epanorthosis. Epanorthosis is an act of verbal retraction. No wait! It’s an immediate and emphatic self-correction. Knowingly employed, Epanorthotic statements are powerful rhetorical devices. Unwittingly used, they often reveal an indecisive mind or a soul at war with itself. Etymology from Greek Epanorthosis (to set straight again), from epi (upon) + ana (again) + orthosis (make straight).

“Lady Melville swooned and insisted it was a disaster. Presently she came to and reconsidered her prognosis; the loss of her brooch was now a tragedy. Tiring of his wife and her damned brooch, Lord Melville paid the epanorthosis little heed.”