A rhopalic sentence

A rhopalic sentence is one in which each word is longer (usually by exactly one letter) than the last. Here’s my effort:

I am not very happy around strange abstract paintings, preferring portraiture; contemporary postmodernism underestimates picturesqueness, antagonistically mischaracterizing bourgeoisification, exhibitionistically, overenthusiastically overintellectualizing nonrepresentationalism.

2 responses to “A rhopalic sentence”

  1. Avatar
    Anonymous

    See Soph’s play at Markfest where each speech was longer than the last by one word.. Building up and then back down to one at the end… Is there a word for that? Laura x

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  2. Richard Avatar
    Richard

    I hadn’t taken on board that the play had that structure – very cool.

    I don’t know if there’s a word for it. “Rhopalic” means club-like, on the basis that clubs are thin at one end and fat at the other. So we’d need the Greek word for a thing which is fat in the middle and tapers off at either end.

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The cover of the book Huge Numbers by Richard Elwes
Huge Numbers
(Basic Books, April 2026)