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== Figurative language == A [[figure of speech]] is any way of saying something other than the ordinary way. Figurative language is language using figures of speech.<ref>{{harvp|Arp|Johnson|2009|p=705}}</ref> ===Simile=== The easiest stylistic device to identify is a [[simile]], signaled by the use of the words "like" or "as". A simile is a comparison used to attract the reader's attention and describe something in descriptive terms. :'''Example: '''"From up here on the fourteenth floor, my brother Charley looks ''like'' an insect scurrying among other insects." (from "Sweet Potato Pie," Eugenia Collier) :'''Example: '''The beast had eyes as big ''as'' baseballs and teeth as long ''as'' knives. :'''Example: '''She put her hand to the boy's head, which was steaming ''like'' a hot train. ===Metaphor=== A [[metaphor]] is a comparison that does not use the words "like" or "as". Metaphors can span over multiple sentences. '''Example:''' "That boy is like a machine." is a simile but "That boy is a machine!" is a metaphor. ===Synecdoche=== [[Synecdoche]] occurs when a part of something is used to refer to the whole.<ref name="AJ712">{{harvp|Arp|Johnson|2009|p=712}}</ref> Many examples of synecdoche are idioms, common to the language. :'''Example: '''Workers can be referred to as 'pairs of hands', and a vehicle as one's 'wheels'. ===Metonymy=== [[Metonymy]] is similar to synecdoche, but instead of a part representing the whole, a related object or part of a related object is used to represent the whole.<ref name="AJ712"/> Often it is used to represent the whole of an abstract idea. :'''Example: '''The phrase "The king's guns were aimed at the enemy," using 'guns' to represent infantry. :'''Example: '''The word 'crown' may be used metonymically to refer to the king or queen, and at times to the law of the land. ===Personification=== {{main article|Personification}} Giving human or animal characteristics to inanimate objects. :'''Example:''' The sun smiled down on the travelers. (the sun does not smile, humans smile) ===Apostrophe=== {{main article|Apostrophe (figure of speech)}} Similar to 'personification' but direct. The speaker addresses someone absent or dead, or addresses an inanimate or abstract object as if it were human.<ref>{{harvp|Arp|Johnson|2009|p=711}}</ref> ===Charactonym=== This is when the name of a character has a symbolic meaning. For example, in Dickens' ''Great Expectations'', Miss Havisham has a sham or lives a life full of pretense. In Hawthorne's ''The Scarlet Letter'', Rev. Dimmesdale metaphorically fades away (dims) as the novel progresses, while Chillingworth has a cold (chilled) heart. ===Symbol=== A symbol may be an object, a person, a situation, an action, a word, or an idea that has literal meaning in the story as well as an alternative identity that represents something else.<ref>{{harvp|Arp|Johnson|2009|pp=284, 726}}</ref> It is used as an expressive way to depict an idea. The symbol generally conveys an emotional response far beyond what the word, idea, or image itself dictates. :'''Example:''' A heart standing for love. (One might say "It broke my heart" rather than "I was really upset") :'''Example:''' A sunrise portraying new hope. ("All their fears melted in the face of the newly risen sun.") ===Allegory=== An [[allegory]] is a story that has a second meaning, usually by endowing characters, objects or events with symbolic significance. The entire story functions symbolically; often a pattern relates each literal item to a corresponding abstract idea or principle. Although the surface story may have its interest, the author's major interest is in the ulterior meaning.<ref>{{harvp|Arp|Johnson|2009|pp=291, 734}}</ref> ===Imagery=== {{main article|Imagery}} This is when the author invokes sensory details. Often, this is simply to draw a reader more deeply into a story by helping the reader visualize what is being described. However, imagery may also symbolize important ideas in a story. For example, in [[Saki#"The Interlopers"|Saki's "The Interlopers"]], two men engaged in a generational feud become trapped beneath a fallen tree in a storm: "Ulrich von Gradwitz found himself stretched on the ground, one arm numb beneath him and the other held almost as helplessly in a tight tangle of forked branches, while both legs were pinned beneath the fallen mass." Readers can not only visualize the scene but may infer from it that it is the feud that has trapped him. Note also the diction used within the imagery: words like "forked" and "fallen" imply a kind of hell that he is trapped in. ===Motif=== {{main article|Motif (narrative)}} When a word, phrase, image, or idea is repeated throughout a work or several works of literature. For example, in Ray Bradbury's short story, "There Will Come Soft Rains", he describes a futuristic "smart house" in a post-nuclear-war time. All life is dead except for one dog, which dies in the course of the story. However, Bradbury mentions mice, snakes, robins, swallows, giraffes, antelopes, and many other animals in the course of the story. This animal motif establishes a contrast between the past, when life was flourishing, and the story's present when all life is dead. Motifs may also be used to establish mood (as the blood motif in Shakespeare's ''[[Macbeth]]''), for foreshadowing (as when Mary Shelley, in ''Frankenstein'', mentions the moon almost every time the creature is about to appear), to support the theme (as when, in Sophocles' drama ''Oedipus Rex'', the motif of prophecy strengthens the theme of the irresistibility of the gods), or for other purposes. ===Paradox=== In literary terminology, a [[paradox]] is an apparent [[contradiction]] that is nevertheless somehow true.<ref>{{harvp|Arp|Johnson|2009|pp=749β751}}</ref> Paradox can take the form of an [[oxymoron]], overstatement or understatement. Paradox can blend into [[irony]].
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