Figures of Speech/ Metaphors in Language

1. Figures of Speech/ Metaphors in Language A Source of Depth and Range in Poetry Alexis Gruber, Tim Kunst, Daniel Zizovic

2. Figures of Speech • Definition: Describes organized patterns of comparison that deepen, broaden, extend, illuminate, and emphasize meaning • Types: • Metaphors • Similes

3. Simile • A “showing of likeness or resemblance” • Shows that something unknown is similar to something known • Use like, as if, as though • Ex: your words are like music to me, you are like sunshine in my life, I feel like a squirrel in a cage

4. Metaphor • A “carrying out or change” • Equates known objects with something that is unknown or too be expanded upon • Ex: your words are music to my ears, you are the sunshine of my life, my life is a squirrel cage • Ex: “All the world’s a stage”, “And all the men and women merely players” –Shakespeare

5. Metaphorical Language • Definition: use of complex systems of metaphors • Creates: • Imagery

6. Imagery • Stimulate the imagination and recall of memories (images) of sights, sounds, tastes, smells, sensations of touch and motion • Ex: • Common language: She was happy • Poetic Language: She jumped for joy

7. Vehicle & Tenor • To describe the relationship between a writer’s ideas and the metaphors and similes chosen to objectify them • Vehicle: specific words of the metaphor simile • Tenor: the totality of ideas and attitudes not only of lit. speaker but also of the author

8. Other Figures of Speech: • Paradox • Anaphora • Apostrophe • Personification • Synecdote • Pun/ Paronomasia • Synesthesia • Over/under statements

9. Paradox • “A thought beyond a thought” • Something apparently wrong or contradictory is shown to be truthful and non-contradictory • Reveals truth • Ex: “I, a child, very old”

10. Anaphora • “to carry again or repeat” • Repetition of the same word or phrase throughout a work or a section of work • Provides weight and emphasis • Ex: What the hammer? what the chain? In what furnace was thy brain? What the anvil? what dread gasp Dare its deadly terrors clasp? (Blake’s “The Tiger”)

11. Apostrophe • a “turning away” • A speaker addresses a real/ imagined listener who is not present • Creates drama • Ex: a public speech with readers as audience

12. Personification • Attraction to human traits to abstractions or to non-human objects • Creates drama • Explores relationships to environment, ideals and inner lives • Ex: the cow jumped over the moon

13. Synecdote & Metonymy Synecdote: Metonymy: • “talking one thing out of another” • a part stands for the whole or a whole for a part • Ex: all hands on deck • a “transfer of name” • substitutes one thing for another • Ex: Hollywood, the White House Transfers meanings by parts and associations

14. Pun & Paronomasia Pun Paronomasia • A “pt or puncture” • “something alongside a name” • Word play • Shows that words with similar or identical sounds have different meanings

15. Synesthesia • The “bringing together of feelings” • Describing feelings or perceptions with word that usually refer to different/ opposite feelings or perceptions • Ex: beading bubbles were “winking at the brim” of a wine glass • Demonstrate the oneness or unity of feelings

16. Overstatements & Understatements Overstatements Understatements • Exaggeration used for effect • Types: • Hyperbole • Overreacher • Deliberate underplaying or undervaluing of a thing • Ex: the grave’s a fine and private place, but none, I think, do there embrace. (Marvell’s “ To His Coy Mistress”)

17. Analysis of Remember