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Burlesque   /bərlˈɛsk/   Listen
noun
Burlesque  n.  
1.
Ludicrous representation; exaggerated parody; grotesque satire. "Burlesque is therefore of two kinds; the first represents mean persons in the accouterments of heroes, the other describes great persons acting and speaking like the basest among the people."
2.
An ironical or satirical composition intended to excite laughter, or to ridicule anything. "The dull burlesque appeared with impudence, And pleased by novelty in spite of sense."
3.
A ludicrous imitation; a caricature; a travesty; a gross perversion. "Who is it that admires, and from the heart is attached to, national representative assemblies, but must turn with horror and disgust from such a profane burlesque and abominable perversion of that sacred institute?"
Synonyms: Mockery; farce; travesty; mimicry.



verb
Burlesque  v. t.  (past & past part. burlesqued; pres. part. burlesquing)  To ridicule, or to make ludicrous by grotesque representation in action or in language. "They burlesqued the prophet Jeremiah's words, and turned the expression he used into ridicule."



Burlesque  v. i.  To employ burlesque.



adjective
Burlesque  adj.  Tending to excite laughter or contempt by extravagant images, or by a contrast between the subject and the manner of treating it, as when a trifling subject is treated with mock gravity; jocular; ironical. "It is a dispute among the critics, whether burlesque poetry runs best in heroic verse, like that of the Dispensary, or in doggerel, like that of Hudibras."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Burlesque" Quotes from Famous Books



... surprising, have seldom anything in them that can be called wit. Mr. Locke's account of wit, with this short explanation, comprehends most of the species of wit, as metaphors, similitudes, allegories, enigmas, mottoes, parables, fables, dreams, visions, dramatic writings, burlesque, and all the methods of allusion: as there are many other pieces of wit, how remote soever they may appear at first sight from the foregoing description, which upon examination will be found ...
— Essays and Tales • Joseph Addison

... anything I know to the contrary; but I must confess it appears to me to be introduced as something loathsome or repulsive, and (on the poet's part) to cap the absurdity of the preceding feat. The use made by other writers of a passage is one of the most valuable kinds of comment. In a burlesque some years ago, I recollect a passage was brought to a climax with the very words, "Wilt eat a crocodile?" The immediate and natural response was—not "the thing's impossible!" but—"you nasty beast!" What a descent then from the drinking ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 68, February 15, 1851 • Various

... opinions, is surely a vague way of translating. It is also, in the present acceptation of the word, improper. Formerly the term wise men denoted philosophers, or men of science and erudition: it is hardly ever used so now, unless in burlesque. Some say Magi; but Magians is better, as having more the form of an English word." CAMPBELL'S Translation of the Four ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox

... as follows: "Flashy people may burlesque these things, but when hundreds of the most sober people in a country, where they have as much mother-wit certainly as the rest of mankind, know them to be true, nothing but the absurd and froward spirit of Sadduceeism can question them. I have not yet mentioned so much ...
— Salem Witchcraft and Cotton Mather - A Reply • Charles W. Upham

... Tales—of the Council of Nice, in the fourth century, Mr. Smith indulges his usual felicitous vein of humour, in a burlesque which he puts into the mouth of a slave of the Bishop of Ethiopia,—"a little, corpulent, bald-headed, merry-eyed man of fifty, whose name was Mark; whose duty it was to take charge of the oil, trim ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 19, Issue 544, April 28, 1832 • Various


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