Figures Of Speech
When there is a deviation from the ordinary use of words, for the sake of increased effect, this abnormal mode of expression is called a Figure of Speech.
Figures of speech enrich a language and lend increased energy and significance of words. Particularly poetry, figurative language illustrates a subject or throws light upon it and heightens the emotion.
1. In a Simile (=like) a comparison is made between two objects of different kinds, which have at least one point of resemblance. It is always introduced by some such words as like, as, resemble, so, as-so, just-as.
(a) Verbs: He fought like a lion. He drinks like a fish, eats like a pig, runs like a hare.
(b) Adjectives: As good as gold; as quick as lightning; as firm as a rock; brave as a lion; white as snow.
Note: The things compared should be essentially differ ent; an ordinay comparison of two like things is not a simile; as: ‘He is as tall as his brother’ is a comparison but not a simile; while ‘He is as tall as a palm tree’ is a simile.
B. Metaphor (=a carrying over of an attribute of one object to another on account of some resemblance) is a con- densed simile, the comparison being implied, not expressed; as:
Read and Learn more Parts Of Speech
(a) Nouns
(a) He was a lion in the fight (i.e. He resembled a lion in respect of fighting).
(b) My brother is the star (brightest member) of the family.
(c) He is in the sunset (decline) of his days.
(d) The news was dagger to his heart.
(b) Adjectives:
(a) Golden silence; a stony heart; iron courage; a lame excuse.
(b) A fiery speech; a piercing wind; a crystal stream; a transparent false-hood.
(c) Verbs:
(a) The town was stormed after a long siege.
(b) He bridled his thoughts.
(c) To dog one’s foot-steps. (=to follow like a dog).
(d) Many metaphors have been so often used as to a become idioms and proverbial savings; as:- a fish out of water; a bed of roses; turn over a new leaf; add fuel to flame; all his geese are swans.
(e) Some words and expressions have been so much and so long used in a Metaphorical sense that their literal meaning has been lost, so that they are now used with scarcely any consciousness of their figurative quality; such are dead meta- phors; as:
(a) The head of a family.
(b) A fountain of knowledge.
(c) A mine of information.
(d) Yeoman service
(e) A ray of hope.
Note: A metaphor is more effectiv than a simile as it gives cause for surprise. Many similes can be compressed into metaphors, and most metaphors can be expanded into similes.
1. Metaphor ………………….. The ship ploughs the sea.
Simile ………………….. As a plough furrows the land, so a ship cuts her way through the sea.
2. Simile …………………….He was in the fight as bold as a lion.
Metaphor …………………….. He was a lion in the fight.
3. Synecdoche (=the understanding of one thing by tneans of another)..This consists in suggesting one thing by another, as when you’put:
1. (a) The part for the whole; as: A fleet of fifty sails (=ships); A maiden of eighteen summers (=years). No useless coffin enclosed his breast (-body); All hands (=persons) are at work; Uneasy lies the head (=person) that wears the crown.
(b) The whole for the part; as:- The smiling year (=spring); America (= The tennis team) won the Davis cup last year.
2. (a) The particular for the general; as: Give us this day our daily bread (=food).
(b) The general for the particular; as:- A vessel for a ship.
(c) Preach the gospel to every creature (=human being).
3. (a) The concrete for the abstract; as:-
(a) It was the mother in her that sopke thus yearningly.
(b) There is a mixture of the tiger and the ape in the character of a Frenchman.
(c) It is difficult to tame the savage in him.
(b) The abstract for the concrete; as:
(a) Youth (=young men) is thoughtless.
(b) All the intelligence, wit and beauty gathered in that room.
Note: The same figure appears in such phrases; as: His Majesty for King; His Lordship for ‘lord’. His Excellency for a ‘governor or viceroy’.
4. The material for the thing made of it; as:
(a) The marble (=the statue made of marble) speaks.
(b) Gold and silve (=coins) I have none.
(c) The linen (=linen garments).
(d) The canvas (=picture) glows.
5. The individual for the whole class; as:-
(a) A Daniel (=a very wise judge) come to judgment.
(b) Some village Hampden.
(c) A modern Bhishma.
5. Metonomy (=change of name): In this figure a thing is described by the name of some other closely connected with it. The association between the two is so close that the mention. of the one suggests the other.
(1) The sign or symbol for the thing or person signified (=meant); as:
(a) From the cradle to the grave (=from child- hood to death).
(b) Grey hairs (old age or old men) should be respected.
(c) Sceptre or crown for royalty.
(d) Leather (=shoe- making) pays better than learning.
(e) Red tape for official routine
(f) The chair for president.
(g) Bench for the office of the judge.
(2) The insirument for the agent; as: (1) The pen is mightier than the sword (=Those who use the pen have more influence than those who use the sword).
(b) Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice (=Pay heed to what every man says, but, say little yourself).
(c) They carried fire and sword into the country.
(d) He had a smooth tongue.
(3) The container for the contained; as:
(a) He drank the cup (= the contents of the cup).
(b) The kettle (=the water in the kettle) is boiling.
(c) The conqueror smote the city (=the inhabitants of the city).
(4) (a) The author for the book; as:- I am reading Tennyson (=the works of Tennyson).
(b) The maker for the thing made; as:- The miner’s Davy (Davy’s safety lamp) is missing.
(5) The place for the things; as:-
(a) Morocco (=for Morocco leather)
(b) I use China (=China-ware: cups, saucers, etc.) for my house hold purpose.
(6) A feeling for the object that inspires it; as:
(a) A moon- light walk is my delight (=a thing that gives me delight).
(b) Adieu for evermore, My love! (= the person I love)
(c) A bold peasantry is the pride of the village.
(d) My son is my only hope and joy.
(7) The effect for the cause; as:
(a) They sat under the shade (=tree).
(b) The bright death (=sword) quivered at the victim’s throat.
(c) O for a beaker full of the Warm South (wine)-Keats.
(8) The cause for the effect; as:-
(a) Yet oft a sigh prevails and sorrows (=tears) fall… Goldsmith.
(b) And all his greaves and cuisses dash’d with drops of on-set (=blood)… Tennyson.
6. Transferred Epithet: In this figure an adjective is transferred from its proper word to another. Such transference is most common when some personal quality or experience is attributed to something impersonal and inanimate; as :-
(a) Hence to his idle bed (i.e. It is not the bed that is idle, but the person who lies on it).
(b) He passed sleepless nights (It is he that is sleepless, not the nights).
(c) The ploughman homeward plods his weary way (i.e. It is the plough man that is weary, not the way).
7. personification (=making into a person): In per- sonification inanimate objects, abstract ideas or qualities are spoken of as living beings or persons; as:
(a) The Mountains sing together, the hills rejoice and clap hands.
(b) Death lays his icy hand on kings.
(c) Hopes are dupes (deceivers).
Note: The name of the thing or idea personified is usually written with a capital letter.
8. Personal Metaphor: A metaphor is said to be personal when it speaks of inanimate objects as if they were living persons; so it may be otherwise defined as a special form of personification implying comparison; as:-
(a) Personal epithets applied to impersonal nouns :
(a) A frowning mountain (=just as a person’s face looks dark, when he frowns, so the mountain looks gloomy when it is overhang- ing).
(b) A prattling brook (=just as a child makes a ceaseless cheerful noise when it prattles so the brook makes a cheerful noise when it flows).
(c) A sullen sky
(d) Pitiless cold.
(e) A treacherous calm.
(f) The thirsty ground.
(b) Personal nouns in connection with impersonal ones (nouns): -The childhood of the world. The anger of the tempest. (c) Personal verbs used as predicate to impersonal subjects:-
(a) Everything smiled on him.
(b) Weary wave and dying blast.
Sob and moan along the shore; And all is peace at last.
9. Apostrophe: It is a direct address to:
(a) (a) inanimate or (b) some abstract idea as if they were
living persons; as:
(1) Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean, Roll!
(2) (a) O Death, where is thy sting?
(b) O Solitude! Where are thy charms that sages have seen in thy face?
(b) Someone absent as though present; as:
10, Friend! I know not which way I must turn for comfort.
(c) Someone dead as though living; as:
Milton, thou shouldst be living at this hour. Note: So Apostrophe is a special form of personification including address.
11. Pathetic Fallacy: In this figure, nature is personified and represented as taking a definite interest in human affairs; as:-
When the poet dies.
Mute nature mourns her worshipper.
And celebrates his obsequies.
12. Hyperbole (=exaggeration for the sake of greater emphasis); as: The sea rose mountains high (=The waves of the sea rose very high).
(a) All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand:- Shakespeare.
(b) It is a century since we met.
13. Euphemism consists in conveying a disagreeable truth by an agreeable name so as not to give offence; as:
(a) He is no more (=He is dead).
(b) He breathed his last (= He died)
(c) You are telling me a fairy tale (=a lie).
14. Oxymoron (=sharp dull) is the combination in one expression of two terms of contradictory meaning referring at once to the same thing; as
(a) Cruel kindness.
(b) Darkness visible.
(c) His honour rooted in dishonour stood.
(d) Bountiful adversity.
(e) Bitter sweet.
(f) Terrific beauty.
15. Irony (=a dissembler in speech): In irony we say the opposite of what we mean, tone and manner showing what is meant; as:
(a) Well done! bravo! (when a thing has been badly done)
(b) A mighty honest fellow indeed! (when we mean him a thief)
(c) Wisdom shall die with you
(d) Brutus is an honourable man; So are they all, all honourable men.
16. Allegory, Fable, Parable:
The three are intended to teach morals.
(a) An Allegory is the presentation of a subject under the guise of another suggestively similar. The characters and incidents are unreal; the former represents human qualities. (i.e. generally, virtues and vices) not human beings; as:
(a) Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Progress.
(b) Spenser’s Faerie Queen.
(c) Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels and Tale of a Tub.
(d) Addison’s Vision of Mirza.
(b) A Fable is a short Allegory in which birds and beasts and even inanimate objects are made to act and speak like human beings. It is meant to teach lessons of morality or prudence; as: (a) Aesop’s Fables
(b) The Panchatantra and Hito- padesa.
Note: Those fables are so well know that they are used in a Metaphorical sense: as:-
(a) They soon found that in their new president they had only replaced King Lord by King Stork;
(b) He behaves like the Dog in the Manger.
(c) A Parable is a short story which represents some- thing real in life or nature and teaches a moral, or a religious or a spiritual lesson; as: The Good Samaritan (This is intended to give an answer to the question: “Who is my neighbour?”
Thus parables were used by Christ for the pupose of instructing simple people in moral truths.
Note: The parables are often used in a metaphorical sense; as:
(a) See that you avoid the fate of the foolish virgins.
(b) I fear he will prove a prodigal son.
17. Alliteration consists in the repetition of similar sounds or the same sound (generally initial and consonantal) in close’succession; as:-
(a) Round a rugged rock a ragged rascal ran.
(b) By apt Alliteration’s artful aid-Pope.
(c) The man who marries money makes a most miserable mistake.
18. Allusion is a figure of speech by which some word or phrase in a sentence is made to recall some interesting fact, fable, custom, writing or saying; as:- The school was a perfect Bable. He is a Prodigal son.
19. Onomatopoeia: (=word making) is the use of words which by their sounds suggest their meaning; in other words, it is the representation of the sense by the sound of words; as:
(a) hiss; buzz; hum; clang; cuckoo; ia
(b) Rend with tremendous sound your ears asunder.
20. Antithesis (=contrast -i.e. the setting of one thing against another). Just as comparison aids understand- ing, so does contrast. It is a contrast of ideas marked by parallelism of contrasted words or phrases for the sake of emphasis.
In this, contrasts are set and balanced one against an- other in one sentence; as:
(1) Men may come and men may go. But I go on for ever- Tennyson.
(2) A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
(3) Man proposes, God disposes.
(4) To err is human, to forgive is divine.
(5) Hechid their wanderings, but relieved their pain.
(6) Speech is silver, but silence is golden.
(7) Wit laughs at things, humour laughs with them.
(8) Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice.
(9) He makes no friend who never made a foe.
(10) It was the letter that he followed, not the spirit of the law.
(11) As civilization advances, poetry declines.
21. Epigram: It is a brief and pointed saying (often in verse) which contains truth or wisdom in terms which appar- ently contradict each other; and it excites surprise and arrests attention; as:
(1) The child is father of the man… Wordsworth.
(2) Failure is the pillar of success.
(3) In the midst of life we are in death.
(4) By indignities men come to dignities.
(5) Art lies in concealing art.
(6) Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.
(7) Silence is sometimes more eloquent than words.
(8) He is conspicuous by his absence.
(9) Murder, though it have no tongue, will yet speak… Shakespeare.
(10) A favourite has no friend.
N.B. The following phrases can be classed under the heading of ‘epigrammatic’; as:- a white lie; a silent rebuke; an open secret; noble revenge; a pious fraud; expressive silence.
22. Climax (= ladder): It consists in arranging words or statements in the ascending order of their importance; as:- (1) He would cheat, torture and even murder.
(2) Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested.
XXI. Anticlimax (or Bathos): It consists in preparing the reader’s expectation for something remarkable and then suddenly producing a contrast; as:
He is remarkable for intelligence, perfect virtue and above all a snub nose.
23. Periphrasis: It consists in saying something simple, in a round about way; as:-
(1) “The conqueror of the Antarctic” instead of “Captain. Scott”
(2) ” The answer is in the offirmative” instead of ‘Yes’.
24. Paradox: It consists in expressing a truth in a way that seems absurd (at first hearing); as:
(1) It requires much greater talent to fill up a retired life than a life of business.
(2) He who goes against the fashion is himself its slave.
25. Litotes: It is an under-statement for the sake of emphasis; as:—
(1) He is no fool (=a wise man).
(2) I am a citizen of no mean (=distinguished) city.
26. Rhetorical question: It is a question to which no answer is expected. It is an emphatic way of making a state- ment; as:-
Are we to stand by patiently while the enemy destroys our fathers and our very lives?
27. Aposiopesis is a sudden stop in speech for the sake of effect; as:-
(1) I am enstrusted with this work, and if anything went wrong-
(2) H was of great service to our Community; he was-but words will not explain our loss.
28I. Innuendo consists in saying something damag- ing in an indirect manner; as:
(1) He did not consult physicians, for he hoped to die with- out them.
(2) If he knew a little of law, he would know a little of everything.
29. Zeugma: When two nouns are used in the same relation to a verb (or an adjective) that is suited only to the nearer noun, the figure of speech is Zeugma; as:-
(1) Kill the boys and (destroy) the luggage.
(2) With weeping eyes and (broken) hearts.
(3) He left in tears and (was taken in) a bath-chair.
(4) They wear a garment like the Scythians but (speak) a language peculiar to themselves.
(5) See Pan with flocks surrounded with fruits (crowned). Note: The word applicable to the other noun is supplied in brackets.
30. A Pun is a play on words; as:
(a) Is life worth living? It all depends upon the liver. Liver is used in the double sense of
(1) an organ of the body
(2) a person who lives in a certain way.
(b) Anambassador is an honest man who lies abroad for the good of his country.
31. Exclamation is a sudden and emotional utterance for emphasis; as:
(1) How beautiful she is!
(2) What a good man he is?
Ex. 56.
Mention the figures of speech in:
(1) What a piece of work is man? How noble in reason! How infinite in faculties!
(2) O Time! the corrector where our judgments err.
(3) They wear a garment like the Scythians, but speak a language peculiar to themselves.
(4) The vision of Mirza.
(5) Prosperity gains friends; adversity tries them.
(6) True freedom is obtained by the limitation of desire.
(7) The parables in the Bible.
(8) I saw their chief tall as a rock of ice.
(9) Wisdom will die with you.
(10) The wish is father to the thought.
(11) They smote the city.
(12) He is become my salvation.
(13) The country was devastated by the sword.
(14) I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers.
(15) Who steals my purse steals trash.
(16) I can swim like a duck. (
17) She had seen sixteen summers.
(18) I came, I saw, I conquerd.
(19) When boys are boys, teachers should be teachers.
(20) Fools who came to scoff, remained to pray.
(21) Hasten slowly.
(22) You are a pretty fellow.
(23) Many are called, but few are chosen.
(24) The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.
(25) O what a fall was there, my countrymen!
26. Errors, like straws, upon the surface flow; He who would search for pearls must dive below.
27. Here thou, great Anna! whom three realms obey, Dost sometimes counsel take and some-times tea.