metaphor
A metaphor names one thing as if it were another, carrying a likeness across without the words like or as.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)Definitions
- A figure of speech that describes one thing in terms of another, implying a likeness between them without words such as “like” or “as”.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - Something regarded as standing for or representing something else, usually more abstract.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
Examples
- Calling the city a jungle is a metaphor for its noise and competition.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - For many readers the long voyage is a metaphor for growing up.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
Usage
Metaphor is a technical term in literary criticism and linguistics, but in journalism and everyday speech it covers any figurative expression, and sometimes any symbol. Reviewers call a metaphor fresh, dead or mixed, and the last of these is a criticism rather than a description. In general writing the word often points to the underlying image of a whole passage rather than to one phrase.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)The noun is usually followed by for: a metaphor for growth, a metaphor for the state of the industry. Two other fixed patterns are common, a metaphor of plus a noun and the verb mix in mixed metaphor, which names the fault of joining two incompatible images in one sentence. Metaphor is countable, so an extended metaphor and a central metaphor both take an article.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)Metaphor is regularly confused with simile, which makes the comparison explicit with like or as. A sentence that says one thing is another is a metaphor, while one that says it is like another is a simile, and the line between them is grammatical as well as stylistic. A second error is to treat metaphor as decoration that could be removed without loss, when in many arguments the metaphor is doing the reasoning.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)Word forms
Regular forms according to English morphology (editorial description).
word forms
| przypadek | forma |
|---|---|
| singular | metaphor |
| plural | metaphors |
Word forms: Editorial team
Collocations
- a mixed metaphor
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - an extended metaphor
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address) - a metaphor for
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)
Synonyms · Antonyms
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)Etymology
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W. W. Skeat, An Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, 4th ed., Oxford 1910, open sourceRelated words
- metaphoric , adjective
- metaphorical , adjective
- metaphorically , adverb
Related entries
Questions and answers
What does metaphor mean?
A metaphor is a figure of speech that speaks of one thing as if it were another, on the strength of a likeness between them, without using like or as. The word also covers a thing that stands for something else, usually something more abstract, as when a journey in a novel stands for growing up.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)How does a metaphor differ from a simile?
A simile states the comparison openly with like or as, while a metaphor leaves the comparison implicit by naming one thing as another. Her eyes were stars is a metaphor; her eyes were like stars is a simile. The metaphor makes a stronger claim, which is why it can sound more forceful and also more risky.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)What is a mixed metaphor?
A mixed metaphor joins two images that do not belong together, as in burning one’s bridges at the grassroots. Each image works on its own, but together they pull the sentence in two directions and the reader stumbles. The fault is common in drafts written quickly, and it is fixed by keeping one image and cutting the other.
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Editorial team (in-house source, no external address)Where does the word metaphor come from?
The Greek noun metaphora meant a carrying across, the transfer of a word from its proper sense to another, and came from metapherein, to transfer. In compounds meta often carries the sense of change, and pherein means to bear or carry, a root shared with English bear. Latin and Middle French passed the word to English.