The figures, though, are a cruel parody.

The likeliest intent of the Roman soldiers was a cruel parody of the civic crown worn by the emperor.

Surely this is just a test, a cruel parody of independence lasting only until she comes home empty-handed, when Whilky might feel justified in tightening her leash.

For these two were emotionally fixated on that monster, bonded to it by sentiments which were the cruellest parody of love and of family attachment.

White social engineers made such a cruel parody of ethnicity in order to reinforce apartheid that to talk of such things now sounds vaguely reactionary.

The play provoked bitter controversy, especially from people who saw its central character, a ruthless politician, as a cruel parody of Australia's deputy prime minister, Peter Costello.

This was not the elderly sorcerer but some cruel parody.

One has collapsed into itself, a cruel parody of a smile, and yellow foam peeks out from the gashes in the fabric of its arms.

It is clear early on that it would not take a lot of doctoring to turn this piece into a comic, if cruel, parody of itself and the genre.

Their faces were like the grotesque masks of street carnivals, their clothes the cruel parodies of stamping clowns.