SIMILE and METAPHOR

SIMILE

A simile is a word that compares words in a sentence.  You can usually tell if a simile is present in a sentence when you see the words as or like. 

• I am as poor as a church mouse.
• He is hungry like a wolf.
• She sings like an angel.

Here are some similes by famous people:

·         A room without books is like a body without a soul.

(Roman philosopher Marcus Tullius Cicero, 106 BC - 43 BC)

·         Writing about music is like dancing about architecture.

(Credited to English singer-songwriter Elvis Costello)

·         Perhaps too much of everything is as bad as too little.

(American novelist Edna Ferber, 1887-1968)

Here are some funny similes:

·         He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

·         Duct tape is like the force — it has a light side, a dark side, and it holds the universe together. (Carl Zwanzig).

·         Dealing with network executives is like being nibbled to death by ducks. (Eric Sevareid).

·         I'm as pure as the driven slush. (Tallulah Bankhead, 1903-1968)

·         Her vocabulary was like, yeah, whatever.

Significance of Simile in Literature

Simile can be an excellent way for an author either to make an unusual thing seem more familiar or a familiar thing seem more unique. Good similes can also make readers think about things in a new way, and can sometimes create a lasting effect. Simile can also sometimes be used to show a comparison, though with the conclusion that these two things really are unalike or even at odds with each other.

Simile can help to make new connections for the reader. One of literature’s purposes is to help better explain the world around us, and the technique of simile is one of those ways in which we are able to see things in a new way. All types of analogies are cognitive processes of transferring meaning from one thing to another, and thus the use of simile in literature has real synaptic effects. For this reason, and for aesthetic purposes, simile has been a popular literary technique for many hundreds of years.

There are examples of Simile in Literature:

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up

like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

(“Harlem” by Langston Hughes)

Langston Hughes uses five examples of simile in this short poem, “Harlem.” Each simile is one possibility that Hughes imagines for “a dream deferred.” The imagery was so striking in this poem that playwright Lorraine Hansberry named her famous play A Raisin in the Sun after the first simile in the poem. All of the similes in this poem share a sense of decay and burden, just like a dream that does not come to fruition.

My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun;
Coral is far more red than her lips’ red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.

(“Sonnet 130” by William Shakespeare)

This excerpt from Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 130” is an example of a negative simile. Shakespeare goes against the expectation praising his mistress’s beauty and instead says what she is not like. Her lips are not as red as coral, her skin is not pure as snow, and so on. This striking simile example plays with both the tradition of sonnets as well as the usual function of similes.

METAPHOR

A metaphor compares words in a sentence; however, instead of saying that one thing is like something else, a metaphor actually makes one thing become something very different by renaming it.  A metaphor can sometimes use words like is, are, or was (and other words) to signal that a metaphor is present.  However, a metaphor never uses the words like or as to compare.

• My brother was boiling mad. (This implies he was too angry.)
• The assignment was a breeze. (This implies that the assignment was not difficult.)
• It is going to be clear skies from now on. (This implies that clear skies are not a threat and life is going to be without hardships)
• The skies of his future began to darken. (Darkness is a threat; therefore, this implies that the coming times are going to be hard for him.)
• Her voice is music to his ears. (This implies that her voice makes him feel happy)

There are examples of Metaphor in Literary:

1.      “She is all states, and all princes, I.”

John Donne, a metaphysical poet, was well-known for his abundant use of metaphors throughout his poetical works. In his well-known work “The Sun Rising,” the speaker scolds the sun for waking him and his beloved. Among the most evocative metaphors in literature, he explains “she is all states, and all princes, I.” This line demonstrates the speaker’s belief that he and his beloved are richer than all states, kingdoms, and rulers in the entire world because of the love that they share.

2.      “Shall I Compare Thee to a summer’s Day”,

William Shakespeare was the best exponent of the use of metaphors. His poetical works and dramas all make wide-ranging use of metaphors.

“Sonnet 18,”also known as “Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day,” is an extended metaphor between the love of the speaker and the fairness of the summer season. He writes that “thy eternal summer,” here taken to mean the love of the subject, “shall not fade.”

PERSONIFICATION

Personification is the act of giving non-living things human characteristics. Here is a sample of a short paragraph that uses personification to describe a house.  

“Our house is an old friend of ours.  Although he creeks and groans with every gust of wind, he never fails to protect us from the elements.  He wraps his arms of bricks and mortar around us and keeps us safe.  He’s always been a good friend to us and we would never leave him”.

References:

http://grammar-monster.com/glossary/simile.htm

http://www.literarydevices.com/simile/

http://literarydevices.net/metaphor/

E-book of Level 5, Lesson 8 –Similes, Metaphors, and Personification