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Hyperbaton is a figure of speech that rearranges words in a sentence to emphasize a particular word or phrase. It can be used in poetry to fit the structure of the poem and is more common in inflected languages like Latin. Anastrophe and hysterology are related terms.
Hyperbaton is a figure of speech in which the words in a sentence are not in the expected order. He is classified as a nuisance figure and is often used to emphasize a particular word or phrase. In English its effect can be quite startling or occasionally confusing, but in a heavily inflected language like Latin it is much more common.
Like other figures of disorder, the hyperbatic interrupts the expected flow of a sentence. In English, for example, it is common for a sentence to have the basic subject-verb-direct object word order, as in “Michael ate the fish.” If it is rearranged as “Michael ate the fish,” which has direct subject-object-verb word order, the sentence draws more attention to itself. The misplaced word or phrase is particularly emphasized, in this case “the fish”. The hyperbatic’s point in this example may be to point out that Michael ate fish, as opposed to chicken, beef, or vegetables.
In metrical or rhyming poetry, hyperbath is sometimes employed to fit a sentence into the structure of the poem. When done wrong, this can result in awkward phrasing, but when done right, it can also add emphasis where desired. Shakespeare does this in Othello when he writes: “Neither slash his skin whiter than snow,” instead of the expected, ‘Nor slash his skin that is whiter than snow’. The purpose of hyperbath here is twofold. On the one hand it indents the line in iambic pentameter, but also moves the word “whiter” closer to the start of the line for emphasis.
Hyperbaton can be used much more naturally with inflected languages, which tend to have more flexible word order than English. In Latin, for example, the most common sentence structure is subject-object-direct verb. So much grammatical information is stored in the endings of the words themselves that this order can more easily be changed without excessive confusion. This would place a slight emphasis on the word that comes before, just as an English speaker might change his or her inflection slightly for emphasis.
There are a number of closely related literary terms that refer to specific types of hyperbatus. Anastrophe, for example, is sometimes used interchangeably with hyperbatus, but anastrophe more technically refers to shifting a single word out of its intended syntax rather than an entire sentence. Hysterology is a form of hyperbath in which a word or phrase is inserted between a preposition and its object.
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