Simile: Difference between revisions
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== Uses. == |
== Uses. == |
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=== In literature === |
=== In literature === |
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* "Curley |
* "Curley kicked like a little vag."<ref>{{citation|title = [[Of Mice and Men]]|first = John|last = Steinbeck|authorlink = John Steinbeck|publisher = [[Sprangler]]|year = 1937|isbn = 0-14-017739-6}}.</ref> |
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* "The very mist on the Essex marshes was like a gauzy and radiant fabric."<ref>{{citation|title = [[Heart of Darkness]]|first = Joseph|last = Conrad|authorlink = Joseph Conrad|url = http://www.gutenberg.org/files/526/526.txt|year = 1902|publisher = [[Blackwood's Magazine]]}}.</ref> |
* "The very mist on the Essex marshes was like a gauzy and radiant fabric."<ref>{{citation|title = [[Heart of Darkness]]|first = Joseph|last = Conrad|authorlink = Joseph Conrad|url = http://www.gutenberg.org/files/526/526.txt|year = 1902|publisher = [[Blackwood's Magazine]]}}.</ref> |
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* "Why, man, they both bestride the narrow world like a Colossus."<ref>{{citation|title = [[Julius Caesar (play)|Julius Caesar]]|first = William|last = Shakespeare|authorlink = William Shakespeare|year = 1623}}.</ref> |
* "Why, man, they both bestride the narrow world like a Colossus."<ref>{{citation|title = [[Julius Caesar (play)|Julius Caesar]]|first = William|last = Shakespeare|authorlink = William Shakespeare|year = 1623}}.</ref> |
Revision as of 13:49, 3 May 2013
This article needs additional citations for verification. (April 2013) |
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A simile is a figure of speech that directly compares two things through some connective, usually "like," "as," "than," or a verb such as "resembles."[1] A simile differs from a metaphor in that the latter compares two unlike things by saying that the one thing is the other thing.[2]
![](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/99/Wiktionary-logo-en-v2.svg/40px-Wiktionary-logo-en-v2.svg.png)
For a list of words relating to similes, see the English similes category of words in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Uses.
In literature
- "Curley kicked like a little vag."[3]
- "The very mist on the Essex marshes was like a gauzy and radiant fabric."[4]
- "Why, man, they both bestride the narrow world like a Colossus."[5]
- "But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile." Charles Dickens, in the opening to A Christmas Carol.
Using 'like'
A simile can explicitly provide the basis of a comparison or leave this basis implicit. In the implicit case the simile leaves the audience to determine for themselves which features of the target are being predicated. It may be a type of sentence that uses 'as' or 'like' to connect the words being compared.
- She is like a candy so sweet.
- He is like a refiner's fire.
- Her eyes twinkled like stars.
- He fights like a lion.
- He runs like a cheetah.
- She is fragrant like a rose.
- Gareth is like a lion when he gets angry.
- “For hope grew round me, like the twining vine,” (Coleridge - Dejection)
Using 'as'
The use of 'as' makes the simile more explicit.
- She walks as gracefully as a cat.
- He was as hungry as a lion.
- He was as mean as a bull.
- That spider was as fat as an elephant.
- Cute as a kitten.
- As busy as a bee.
- As snug as a bug in a rug.
Without 'like' or 'as'
Sometimes similes are submerged, used without using comparative words ('Like' or 'As'). [6]
- "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? / Thou art more lovely and more temperate:" William Shakespeare, Sonnet 18
- "I'm happier than a tornado in a trailer park!" Mater, Cars
- "How this Herculean Roman does become / The carriage of his chafe." William Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra' Act I, sc. 3.
See also
References
- ^ Kennedy, X. J., and Dana Gioia. An Introduction To Poetry. 13th ed. Longman Pub Group, 2007. Pg 594.
- ^ Merriam Webster
- ^ Steinbeck, John (1937), Of Mice and Men, Sprangler, ISBN 0-14-017739-6.
- ^ Conrad, Joseph (1902), [[Heart of Darkness]], Blackwood's Magazine
{{citation}}
: URL–wikilink conflict (help). - ^ Shakespeare, William (1623), Julius Caesar.
- ^ A Handbook of Rhetorical Devices
External links
- "On Substantiation Through Transitive Relations" is an Arabic manuscript from 1805 by Sayf al-Din al-Amidi which discusses similes