Simple Examples:
* "That was a pretty ugly dress." (Pretty and ugly are opposites.)
* "He was a deafening silence." (Deafening and silence are opposites.)
* "The living dead walked among us." (Living and dead are opposites.)
More Complex Examples:
* "The comedian was painfully funny." (Painful and funny are opposites, but the sentence emphasizes how much the audience laughed.)
* "She had a cruel kindness in her eyes." (Cruel and kindness are opposites, suggesting a contradiction in her personality.)
* "It was a bittersweet victory." (Sweet and bitter are opposites, highlighting a mixture of joy and sadness.)
* "The politician was a master of eloquent silence." (Eloquent and silence are opposites, emphasizing the politician's power to speak without words.)
Oxymorons can be used for various purposes:
* To create a humorous effect: "That was a pretty ugly dress"
* To highlight a contradiction: "She had a cruel kindness in her eyes"
* To create a sense of irony: "The living dead walked among us"
* To emphasize a particular point: "He was a deafening silence."
Remember, oxymorons are a literary device that combines two contradictory words or phrases to create a surprising and thought-provoking effect.