metaphor
Other forms: metaphors
If you brag that "the world's your oyster," you're using a metaphor from Shakespeare, who knew a thing or two about figures of speech.
Good writers know their way around a metaphor, where you make an analogy between two things to show how one resembles the other in some way. When a character from Shakespeare calls the world his oyster, that's his boastful way of saying that all the riches of the world are his for the taking, like plucking a pearl from an oyster shell. Shakespeare also wrote, "All the world's a stage." Oyster? Stage? Come on, Will, get your metaphors straight!
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a figure of speech in which an expression is used to refer to something that it does not literally denote in order to suggest a similaritytypes:dead metaphor, frozen metaphora metaphor that has occurred so often that it has become a new meaning of the expression (e.g., `he is a snake' may once have been a metaphor but after years of use it has died and become a new sense of the word `snake')mixed metaphora combination of two or more metaphors that together produce a ridiculous effectsynesthetic metaphora metaphor that exploits a similarity between experiences in different sense modalitiestype of:
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metaphor / simile
Vocabulary lists containing metaphor
One of the stumbling blocks when trying to study poetry is that it seems like a different world. Familiar things, like words, are put to unfamiliar use, and there is an entire descriptive vocabulary that is completely foreign and quite often puzzling. This list seeks to explain the words used to describe poetry through examples from famous poems. Nassim Nicholas Taleb said, "If you want to annoy a poet, explain his poetry," but we are willing to take that risk to make the world of literary analysis a little clearer and further illuminate the mystery of poetry.
A thorough survey of various textbooks, assignments, content area standards, and examinations yields the following list of words compiled by Jim Burke. You cannot expect to succeed on assignments if you do not understand the directions.
If you want to understand the tools and techniques that great writers use, learn these literary devices and figures of speech. Review this vocabulary list and you'll be a master of metaphor, an expert on euphemism, and a pro at puns.