Euphuism

This curious child's play termed Euphuism, to which grave men and sedate women did not hesitate to lower themselves, was peculiar to the age of Elizabeth, than whom never was a human creature at once so great and so small.

Joyce Morrell's Harvest The Annals of Selwick Hall Emily Sarah Holt 1864

"Euphuism" became a fashionable craze, its sillier disciples were a very fit target for jesting and mirth, very much as in our own day the humorists found abundant and legitimate food for laughter in the vagaries of what was known as "aestheticism".

England under the Tudors

They fail because their authors have imagined that "Euphuism" is simply a highly artificial and "flowery" way of talking.

English Literature: Modern Home University Library of Modern Knowledge G. H. Mair 1906

The name "Euphuism" became a current description of an artificial way of using words that overflowed out of writing into speech and was in the mouths, while the vogue lasted, of everybody who was anybody in the circle that fluttered round the Queen.

English Literature: Modern Home University Library of Modern Knowledge G. H. Mair 1906

“And obtained no mercy at thy hand, I dare be sworn,” said the knight, who deigned not to speak Euphuism excepting to the fair sex.

The Monastery 2008

The extravagance of Euphuism, or a symbolical jargon of the same class, predominates in the romances of Calprenade and Scuderi, which were read for the amusement of the fair sex of France during the long reign of Louis

The Monastery 2008

As for Sir Piercie, he was in his element; and, well assured of the interest and full approbation of his auditor, he went on spouting Euphuism of more than usual obscurity, and at more than usual length.

The Monastery 2008

The essential requirement is to remember that Lyly the dramatist is the same man as Lyly the euphuist, and that his audience was always a company of courtiers, with Queen Elizabeth in their midst, infatuated with admiration for the new phraseology and mode of thought known as Euphuism.

The Growth of English Drama Arnold Wynne

Euphuism never did the harm to comedy which tragedy suffered at the hands of the late Elizabethans who, in their pursuit of moving incident, lost themselves in a reckless licence of language and verse.

The Growth of English Drama Arnold Wynne

Euphuism also is more pronounced than in his other plays: Venus recites the prologues to the acts.

The Growth of English Drama Arnold Wynne