Description is a fundamental part of the art of writing. Characters, items, landscapes, sounds, smells, emotions, actions, they all need to be described for the reader to apprehend their existence. Each one has its own set of possible characteristics. Each instance has its own peculiarities. Sometimes a character is described physically, given a basic role, and sent on his way. Sometimes he has essentially no individual, unique physical presence, but his character-in-spirit is so thoroughly expressed as to make the reader forget this.  Sometimes a water barrel just needs those two words- ‘water barrel’- to fulfil its place in the narrative; sometimes it takes a full paragraph of description, becomes a ‘rotund thing, somehow bulging despite its emptiness, smaller to the eye on the inside, with rot creeping up one side and two dark knots on the other, the whole smelling of wine, sounding of forgetfulness’. In all this hard work, though, one persistent workhouse will come to abound: the metaphor (loosely defined).

Metaphors have been defined in many ways, loose, strict, and otherwise. For the purpose of this article and for practical application in writing, this definition will suffice: ‘A metaphor is a comparison (implicit, intuitive, or explicit) between the that which is being described and something partially dissimilar, generally one more familiar at least in theory to the reader, which comparison capitalizes on the partial similarity and partial dissimilarity between the two to elicit understanding of the thing described.’

This definition could do with some explanation.

Explicit metaphors are similes. They are statements that do not stop at implying a comparison but state it instead. In English, this means ‘like’ or ‘as’. Implicit metaphors include what grammarians call ‘metaphors’. These are comparisons not explicit but plain. It also includes extended metaphors and imagery which has a symbolic or metaphorical bent.¹ The implicit metaphor is the comparison plainly made but not plainly stated, hidden only in that it is not announced, operating quite comfortably on the conscious mind of the reader for its comparison

Intuitive metaphors are of a separate class. In fact, in calling these ‘metaphors’ I am exercising a significant amount of license. To borrow an example from a book on writing, consider a sentence from Virginia Woolf:² “The day waves yellow with all its crops.” The imagery here operates upon the intuition rather than reason; to ‘wave yellow’ would be to the purely logical approach a confounding notion, one requiring much though to understand. It’s not literally true. Indeed, as literal truth, it’s nonsense. As understood truth, though, as communication (for that is what all writing is, communication), it impresses itself upon the reader’s mind through an intuitive process, casting an undeniable shade of wheat-and-grass yellow (the gold of plants instead of the gold of the earth) across the day the sentence describes, a yellow filled with undefined associations and an emotional vivacity. We must not deny the skill present in this sentence.

All these comparisons work off of taking the traits of one concept and applying them to another. Explicit metaphors say, “The field waved like a golden ocean before him.” Implicit metaphors say, “The field was a yellow sea in the wind.” Intuitive metaphors say, “The day waves yellow….” All three borrow some element of one thing and ascribe it to another: the rise-and-fall of the ocean, the waves of water before wind, the emotional and literary connotations of ‘yellow’ connected to ‘waves’ connected to ‘day’.

In each comparison, then, we have two essential relations: similarity and dissimilarity. As I’ve stated in other places³, a symbol requires both (symbols are just repeated comparisons, the elongated brother of the metaphor). The relationship between the two (or more- we’ll get to that later) parts of the comparison, therefore, is defined in terms of ‘like’ and ‘not like’. It would be tempting to try to discard the ‘not like’ in favor of the ‘like’; the ‘like’, after all, is what conventionally conveys the intended information. To do so, though, would be to miss what makes the comparison useful. The ’not like’ of the metaphor’s chosen correspondents allows the reader to see the ‘like’ which both sides share into two different circumstances. Thus, by showing the ‘like’ from two angles, its true nature is more thoroughly revealed. Conversely, if we remove the ‘not-like’ from a metaphor, we get a tautology, the statement ‘fish is (like) fish’. The ability to see from two angles can allow comparison to carry meaning otherwise difficult to convey, imagery providing an intuitive path to understanding.

Do not be too hasty in delineating ‘not-like’ from ‘like’. In the sentence, “The salmon was pink and brown, the color of insulation trampled on the floor,” the metaphor may seem at first to be speaking only of the color of the fish. In context, though, it can easily have another, second meaning: it communicates to the audience the essentially unappetizing nature of the fish, that the perspective-holder would find chewing it a similar experience to chewing matted fiberglass. In other words, between the obvious ‘like’- color- and the obvious ‘not like’- the fish not actually being made out of fiberglass (one hopes), lies a gray zone where the metaphor can convey a sense of something else which is ‘like’- by likening it to insulation, the salmon is communicated to look tough, dry, and unfitted to the gustatory purpose of its presentation.

With all this ground work out of the way, let’s consider some sub-categories: clichés and mixed metaphors.

Cliched metaphors are metaphors where the ‘not-like’ has eroded away under the force of use, and the two sides of the comparison have become identical or at least close enough to identical to null the use of the comparison. “The juggler was brave as a lion,” really doesn’t convey any more information than “The juggler was brave” or “The juggler was really brave,” and it has about the same impact on the reader. The specific comparison here- to the bravery of a lion- is so played out as to be almost comical in its emptiness.⁴

Clichés can still be useful though- just not as the descriptions they ostensibly are. Calling somebody ‘fit as a fiddle’ doesn’t really convey more information than calling them ‘fit’ or ‘in good health’. It’s not a good comparison; the comparison adds no meaning to the statement. As a bit of dialogue, though, it can be a moment of characterization; as part of the prose, it can be a means of humor, a contrast to its surroundings- if put, for instance, at the center of a baroque or ornate passage, the mundanity can shock by contrast. In these roles, however, the comparison is not the strength of the cliché; the strength is rather in its cliché nature, in illumining the character’s mind or juxtaposing two radically different styles of word-smithing.

Mixed metaphors are more complicated. The mixed metaphor that we always deplore is the confusing or nonsensical mixed metaphor, saying, “The politician played his cards to the hilt⁵,” and thereby mixing up one metaphor- playing your cards- with another- driving the dagger in up to the hilt. The problem lies in dropping one metaphor half-way through and trying to patch it with the wrenched-off limb of another; it lies in the particular metaphors being designed to work independently, not together. This is not to say that mixing metaphors can’t work; you just have to be sure the metaphors combine into one, rather than being two parts held together with glue, duct tape, and willful ignorance. “He plucked defeat from the fires of victory” mixes up one metaphor- ‘plucking defeat from the jaws of victory’- with another- victory as fire. The metaphors, however, do not clash; indeed, the one helps the other, creating a sense that neither alone would produce. The first tells us that he had victory in his hand and either rejected it or failed to achieve it; the second tells us that victory is, in our or his eyes, an actually undesirable result, or at least a dangerous one. The key lies in mixing the metaphors chemically and not merely physically, in making them bind to each other coherently rather than just smashing them together and ignoring the seams.

Metaphor is a remarkably powerful tool. The ability to compare, to illumine new perspectives, to access the intuitive understanding of the reader, the vast stores of emotional connections which history, literature, and culture may have built up around what you’re using as a comparison, this is an ability worth fostering. We must take care, therefore, to use metaphor well, to understand where its power comes from- seeing ‘like’ in terms of ‘not-like’ in order to see the first ‘like’ better- and where it can go wrong- erosion of texture and incoherent construction. With such an understanding, our writing can become much more vivid, more attuned to communicate the life of man, the darkness of sin, and the glory of God in His work.

God bless.

Footnotes

1 – Whether metaphors are a type of imagery or imagery is a loose form of metaphor really depends on your definition. In mechanical terms I prefer the second; it seems to have more application and teaching value. In grammatical terms, of course, the first is much truer.

2 – I’ve never read Virginia Woolf’s work; quite possibly I never will. From what I understand, she was a woman of repulsive morals and wrote books I have not much interest in from the perspective of a reader. She was nevertheless, by all accounts and examples I have seen, a skilled writer.

3 – Specifically, this article about the meaning of baptism, published here for its relationship to the concept of symbolism.

4 – Descriptions such as “Her eyes were like sapphires,” and the like, if not always clichés, can in certain contexts fall into the same traps. Authors can also form personal clichés- in a world populated by cyborgs, if every cyborg gets the same metaphor, that metaphor will lose its power all too quickly, possibly as soon as the third use, depending on frequency and reader attentiveness.

5 – I freely admit to having borrowed the idea of this example from the first result on DuckDuckGo. I couldn’t think of a mixed metaphor. This is actually an ongoing problem; thinking of examples of literary phenomenon usually only works easily when I’m several hours away from writing the article.