We're all familiar with the term climax in reference to the point of a story where the action has reached its peak, the conflict is at its tensest, and the rest of the plot is a movement towards the resolution.
But did you know that climax also is a figure of speech that you can use in your storytelling?
Photo by Feliciano Guimarães
Climax Is a Figure of Speech
Climax is a figure of speech that orders phrases or words in increasing importance. The word climax actually comes from the Greek klimax, which means “staircase” or “ladder”, so it's fairly logical that the ordering within a climax is from least to most important.
If you could read ancient Greek, you would see the world klimax in 1 Corinthians 13, that famous passage from the Bible that you hear at 85% of all weddings, “There are three things that will endure: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest (i.e. klimax) of these is love.”
Other examples of climaxes include the American Declaration of Independence, when Jefferson makes reference to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Anticlimaxes Creates Comedic Effect
On the other side of climax is anticlimax, which is when a list of words, phrases, or clauses is ordered in reverse importance.
This can be used for comedic effect, when a character or group of characters are in a moment of crisis, and the final item in the list of crisis points is significantly less serious than the other two. In an episode of How I Met Your Mother, Robin tells Ted that he goes after the wrong women, including a woman who tried to ruin his career, was married when he met her, and wore stupid hats.
Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events series uses this figure of speech often as well.
Using climax and anticlimax can add an air of importance or humor to your writing. You can combine climax and anticlimax with the Rule of Three to enhance the humor or solemnity, depending on the route that your writing plans to take.
PRACTICE
You've got a few characters making Halloween plans.
Spend fifteen minutes and write a dialogue between these characters discussing these plans, using climaxes and anticlimaxes as often as possible. When you've finished, post your practice in the comments and leave feedback for your fellow practitioners.
John, Paul, his wife Linda, and their granddaughter Morgan were deciding how they would dress for the Hallowe’en/Birthday party, Paul’s and Linda’s birthdays falling within a couple of days of each other at the end of October.
“Morgan Abigail, what do you want to be for Hallowe’en this year?” Linda asked. The three-year-old did not hesitate a bit, but went up on her toes, held her hands above her head, and executed a quite graceful pirouette. “Balle-REE-na !!” she cried, her face glowing with the pleasure of her latest passion, for which she was showing intense interest, an ear for the music, and not insignificant natural talent.
John, Paul, and Linda jokingly batted around the idea of the two men dressing as their respective namesake Beatles, John Lennon and Paul McCartney. They had come of age in the proper era, loved the Beatles’ music — and neither of them could carry a tune in a bucket! They determined to refuse all requests to sing.
Lind, after studied reflection, announced that she would be Queen Elizabeth this year. She absolutely loved the hats, could do a spot-on imitation of the regal voice — and was quite accustomed to ruling!
Good start John. It was fun to read about your characters getting ready for their Hallowe’en fancy dress party. I enjoyed how you played upon the Beatles’ name theme. I think you could take this theme further IMO. I’d love it if Linda went as Linda Mc, and was confronted by a Yoko lookalike (Oh no!) 😉
…….Hey, that’s a GREAT idea! Ha-HAA!!
What I like about this piece is the use of climaxes at the points of decision. The discussion between the characters peaks at “ballerina”, the “Beatles”, “Ted Cruz” and “Queen Elizabeth”. The anticlimaxes come in the discussion of how they would execute these various costumes. I felt the up and down of the conversation and you nailed the exercise perfectly.
Thank You Jay!
“Do we have to go, Ellen?” Jane demanded, sounding exasperated. But Ellen
knew better—she could hear the undertone of a plaintive whine, and the notion
brought a ghost of a smile to her lips.
“Yes. You’re going to make a creative
costume and actually take a night off from your job!” Ellen said firmly, her
tone unusually solid, and leaving no room for argument.
For anyone but Jane, anyway. The girl was stupidly stubborn.
“It’s not my job! It’s my life,” Jane said reasonably. “Those people rely on me. You know if I leave, by the time I get back, some new powerful Facet will have
launched a fatal attack on the HQ, Adev will have convinced everyone that I’m a murderous traitor, and the Darkers will be released to wreak havoc on my
planet.” Her voice was sour and upset, but Ellen refused to give in. That was a
hyperbole if there ever was one.
“And Phirmisa will have been resurrected by those scientists, Etiam will have been murdered–” this earned Ellen a nasty, probably well-deserved glare “—and Rim will have turned the TC [training centre] into a glamorous party.”
“You’re not helping,” Jane pointed out.
“Oh, come on. You’re only one dimension away.”
“Two. The Night Walker dimension is technically closer.”
“Oh, you know what I mean!” Ellen was starting to snap, and she made a substantial effort to tone down her irritation.
“But we’ll take up a lot of power going back and forth, and for such a frivolous thing as Halloween–” She began to protest, but Ellen overrode them, her voice climbing in volume.
“You know with the new system it’ll be perfectly okay! Now OUT!”
Her friend tossed her one more sullen glare before she stomped out of her bed chambers to emerge in the stone-hewn living room that ran adjacent to the main hallway of the Residential Sect.
“Yes!” Ellen crowed happily, dancing down the room in front of Jane. Despite her bravado, she hadn’t dared to believe that Jane would actually come. “Please tell me you’re going to dress up as a Vampire!”
Jane flashed me a look of annoyance, but Ellen could see the undercurrent of amusement. “Maybe. Although only you and I would get it. It would be lost on all those mundane humans.” Her tone was mild, and Ellen knew she’d one for sure now.
“It’ll be fun.”
“For that one night. Fine. I’ll find a spooky dress, some fake blood and a strange hat. But you have to be a mad scientist!”
Ellen laughed gaily. “Okay, it’s only fair I suppose. It won’t be hard to locate a costume for that around here!”
The three of them sat getting their candy sorted,
“Come on,” Spiderman said. We gotta’ go.
“No,” the Barbie lookalike responded. “Mom said to check our candy before we eat it.”
The little dinosaur sat looking at his pumpkin full of candy. Chewing on a tootsie roll he was content to just wait.
And then she spotted it. Just sticking out a little, but just enough. A needle!
She found a needle in one of her candies.
“Look!” she screamed, contrary to her character.
“I could have bitten that!”
Spiderman nearly flew across the room and snatched the candy.
“Don’t tell Mom,” he warned. “She won’t let us go back out.
Both of them looked over at the chewing dinosaur. “Charlie, you can’t tell mom about this.”
“About what?” Charlie asked innocently.
“Whew!” Spiderman said, “that was close.”
In a matter of seconds the candy was put back in it’s perspective places. And they ran out the door with Charlie’s tail dragging behind him.
Up the stairs they walked to the old house before them. With each step they heard creaks, imagining the scariest things possible.
And before the dinosaurs tail cleared the top step they heard a scream. A scream that made them shake.
Just then they saw a clown, an angel and a business man start laughing.
“Trick or Treat! Great doorbell sound!”
Barbie and Spiderman breathed again. The little dinosaur just kept chewing his candy oblivious to anything that wasn’t chocolate.
And then they came down ready to ring the next doorbell, to see the next treasure they would be offered.
“I wish every day was Halloween,” said the dinosaur.
“Or that one day was Halloween, one day was Christmas and one day was my birthday, and that’s all.”
“Oh you’re so silly,” Charlie, Spiderman’s double said. “That can’t happen.”
Just then Dad caught up with this trio.
“Sorry I’m late, guys. I’m glad you stayed on the block as I asked you to.”
Spiderman was glad his mask covered his embarrassment. Barbie blushed but not enough to notice in the dark.
Would they have to tell Dad they disobeyed him and went down a couple of blocks? They only hit about eight houses. That’s not a lot of disobeying.
But what about the needle? That stupid needle. Why would anyone give candy that had a needle sticking through it?
Dumb store that sells faulty candy.
Up and down the street the trick or treaters passed little groups of kids. Most of the kids were accompanied by a parent. Unless of course you were older. When you were thirteen you could go without a mom or dad. And that will be a blast. Then you can go for hours until you almost can’t hold the candy anymore.
Until your arms feel like they are just gonna fall right off. That would be so cool.
It seemed with every step the dinosaur was dragging. Finally Dad said the words no one wanted to hear.
“Okay guys, I think we’re just about done. Just a couple more.”
Spiderman gave a quick look at Barbie and both of them looked at Dad.
“Come on Dad, just a little longer. Please.”
“No, Charlie is getting tired,” Dad replied. “Besides you guys have a lot of candy.
Minutes later the four of them trudged up the steps.
Mom swung open the door and said,
“You’ll never guess what I found in here?”
Both Barbie and Spiderman froze. The little dinosaur kept chewing.