Irony & Understatement
Bathos
A sudden drop from the lofty to the trivial. Accidental, it is failed grandeur; deliberate, it is comedy that punctures pretension by letting the reader feel the fall.
"Here thou, great Anna! whom three realms obey, / Dost sometimes counsel take — and sometimes tea." — Pope
Don't confuse it with. Pathos moves; bathos drops. Anticlimax is the structural name for the same descent.
In the Reader — 2 excerpts
Tom appeared on the sidewalk with a bucket of whitewash and a long-handled brush. He surveyed the fence, and all gladness left him and a deep melancholy settled down upon his spirit. Thirty yards of …
A very little boy stood upon a heap of gravel for the honor of Rum Alley. He was throwing stones at howling urchins from Devil's Row who were circling madly about the heap and pelting at him.
The rest of the family
Irony Hyperbole Litotes Meiosis / Understatement Euphemism Periphrasis Apophasis