Newsletter Lesson #08
Metaphor
Hello, and welcome to the latest AB51 English School newsletter lesson. Each of these short messages provide quick introductions to an idea to help students studying English. Today is the turn of metaphors.
Remember that English classes are available by contacting me at jamie.wills@ab51.org. Additionally, more information on this subject, classes, and other English materials are available at the AB51 English School website.
Now, on to the lesson.
What is a metaphor?
A metaphor uses the ideas and characteristics of one object or situation to describe another object or situation.
The need to work is a hammer that breaks your dreams.
(= the need to work destroys you like a hammer)What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.
(= Juliet warms me like the sun)
An extended metaphor – one that carries the metaphor across several ideas, or goes into great depth – is called conceit.
Metaphors are commonly found in poetry, prose, advertising.
Why use it?
Clarify a difficult idea by linking it to another idea that the reader already understands.
Add a philosophical tone to a description.
Describe something in an unusual manner.
Examples
When she heard he was single, she pounced on him, trapping him under her paws, refusing to let him go.
(= she treated him like a cat pouncing on a mouse)Computers are quicksand from which it is impossible to escape, and the more you struggle to break free, the more stuck you become.
(= computers trap you like quicksand traps you)Truth is a hurricane, and no matter how strong we build our shelters it shall always break them down and leave us exposed.
(= truth is an unstoppable force)
Examples in literature
As You Like It
by William Shakespeare
Excerpt from Act II, Scene VII (adapted from Elizabethan English):
Duke Senior: Thou seest we are not all alone unhappy:
This wide and universal theatre
Presents more woeful pageants than the scene
Wherein we play in
Jaques: All the world’s a stage
And men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms.
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwilling to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’ eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon’s mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper’d pantaloon,
With spectacles on his nose and puch on side,
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
Classroom questions
Skimming, Scanning and Basic Comprehension
1. Briefly, what is the passage discussing?
2. What are men and women ‘merely’?
3. In what way is Jaques’s speech divided into two separate parts?
Identifying Techniques
4. What alliteration is used in the passage? Highlight it.
5. Consonance is a common feature within this passage. Underline it.
6. What is the metaphor used in this passage? Is it effective?
7. What literary technique is used in the final line of this passage?
Text Analysis
8. In what way does Duke Senior show positivity?
9. What does Shakespeare mean when he says ‘they have their exits and entrances’?
10. What phrases suggest ‘the justice’ represents a more mature individual than any seen before?
11. What tone is used in the final two lines of the passage?
Provoking Opinion
12. What do you think are the ‘seven ages’ of life? Is seven the right number?
13. If life is ‘a stage’, what type of play or story (e.g. comedy, action, romance) would you like your life to be?
14. What other possible metaphors would you give for life?
Tasks
Task 1: Create an example of both a simple metaphor and an extended metaphor.
Task 2: Write a short poem or paragraph that uses conceit.
More information on metaphors, including a second example from literature, can be found here.
Meanwhile, if you want a class about metaphors and other literary techniques, do ask.
Finally, if this newsletter lesson was useful, or you feel it would help someone else, here are the share and subscribe buttons:
Thank you all for your time, and enjoy your new year.