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/læmpˈun/ Listen

noun

Lampoon n.

A personal satire in writing; usually, malicious and abusive censure written only to reproach and distress. "Like her who missed her name in a lampoon, And grieved to find herself decayed so soon."

Hence: Any satire ridiculing or mocking a person, activity, or institution by representing its character or behavior in an exaggerated or grotesque form; the representation may be written, filmed, or performed as a live skit, and may be intended as a severe reproach, or as good-natured humor.

verb

Lampoon v. t. (past & past part. lampooned; pres. part. lampooning) To subject to abusive ridicule expressed in a work of art; to make (a person, behavior, or institution) the subject of a lampoon. "Ribald poets had lampooned him."

Synonyms: To libel; defame; satirize; lash.

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Etymology of 'Lampoon'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Lampoon" Quotes from Famous Books

... Severus, or a Menas; but is to correct the vices and the follies of his time, and to give the rules of a happy and virtuous life. In a word, that former sort of satire which is known in England by the name of lampoon is a dangerous sort of weapon, and for the most part unlawful. We have no moral right on the reputation of other men; it is taking from them what we cannot restore to them. There are only two reasons for ...

— Discourses on Satire and Epic Poetry • John Dryden

... through faithless leather meet the dirt, And oftener chang'd their principles than shirt. The transient vestments of these frugal men, Hastens to paper for our mirth again: Too soon (O merry melancholy fate!) They beg in rhyme, and warble through a grate: The man lampoon'd forgets it at the sight; The friend through pity gives, the foe through spite; And though full conscious of his injur'd purse, Lintot relents, nor Curll can wish them worse. So fare the men, who writers dare commence Without their patent, probity, and sense. From these, their politics our quidnuncs ...

— The Poetical Works of Edward Young, Volume 2 • Edward Young

... caricature of a person on the stage is almost as old as the drama. Aristophanes so lampooned Euripides in "The Acharnians" and Socrates in "The Clouds," to mention no other examples; and in English drama this kind of thing is alluded to again and again. What Jonson really did, was to raise the dramatic lampoon to an art, and make out of a casual burlesque and bit of mimicry a dramatic satire of literary pretensions and permanency. With the arrogant attitude mentioned above and his uncommon eloquence in scorn, vituperation, ...

— Every Man In His Humour • Ben Jonson

... to conceive of him as Vizier to the only Englishman of the day whose greatness can be compared with his; to imagine him playing Aristotle to Cromwell's Alexander. We have seen him freely tendering Cromwell what might have been unpalatable advice, and learn from Du Moulin's lampoon that he was accused of having behaved to the Protector with something of dictatorial rudeness. But it seems impossible to point to any direct influence of his mind in the administration; and his own department of Foreign Affairs was neither one which he ...

— Life of John Milton • Richard Garnett

... and the sport of rustic boors, was soon to become the delight of princes, the theme of all tongues and ages, the dictator to the human mind and was to confer immortality on his oppressor by a caricature and a lampoon? ...

— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving

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