How to Create Figures of Speech or Metaphors.

“Life is like a box of chocolates.”(Because you don’t know what the next moment will bring.)

This is an analogy –comparing life to reaching within a box of chocolate?

Analogy = making comparisons and finding similarities between two things.  For example:     Compare a zebra to a newspaper and find what is similar between them:

   They both are black and white.  

  Congratulations! You just made an analogy or comparison of a zebra and a newspaper.   

Analogies are similes & metaphors

• When you use an analogy in literature or poetry it is often called ‘a simile’ or ‘a metaphor’.

• For example: If you are a good tackler in the football game a reporter may write in the newspaper tomorrow that you are a beast.

“Number 63 is like a beast on the football field.”

Similes made easy: find what is similar between two things.

How are two things that seem unrelated be alike?!  For instance, How is a dishwasher like a tree?-the tree and dishwasher both need water and they clean things.  In what ways is a hot dog like a shoe?  -The hot dog and the shoe are both made from animals, and go with another object (a shoe with a foot and a hot dog with a bun).

Congratulations you made two more analogies or metaphors.

What are the two things being compared? & what is similar between them?

McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.

The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.

The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.

A Dream Lost or Deferred

Indentify what is being compared and what are the metaphors:

Dreams  - by Langston Hughes Hold fast to dreams For if dreams dieLife is a broken-winged birdThat cannot fly.

Hold fast to dreamsFor when dreams goLife is a barren or empty fieldFrozen with snow.  

Practice

Dr. Lincoln Brower has studied the monarchs in their wintering sanctuaries for 20 years. Whenever he describes the monarchs' winter habitat, he uses this analogy or metaphor: "The forest serves as an umbrella and a blanket for the monarchs."  Work individually or in pairs to think about the analogies or metaphors he uses and explain in writing what these reveal about how the forest helps monarchs survive.

(**Be aware, however, that when analogies or metaphors are stretched too far, they can lead to misconceptions!)

 With a partner :

Write a few sentences for each question:

1. What are metaphors and how are they used in literature?

2. What makes a metaphor effective? or

Create at least two metaphors. Have fun with it!

Bibliography

• Forest Gump by jasmined• Tackle by Huskies Outsider• A dream – Editor B.