Aposiopesis

Aposiopesis is a stylistic figure consisting in the sudden breaking-off of an utterance, when the author or personage does not finish a thought to the end, leaving it incomplete and marking this in writing with an ellipsis of dots. The unspoken word the reader supplies for themselves, and it is precisely this incompleteness that is often more expressive than any direct statement. Aposiopesis conveys strong agitation, indecision, a threat, a hint or an unwillingness to speak further, opening a space for subtext. The figure is widely used in dramatic dialogue, lyric of an agitated type and psychological prose, where the broken-off phrase reproduces the living movement of feeling. Unlike ellipsis, here the omitted element is not unambiguously restored: the thought remains fundamentally open.