In Chapter 5 of Literary Theory, Culler mentions that metaphor, as one of the basic uses in language, it is also treated as respectable. He said that metaphor is commonly used to provide a vivid visual image to reader through instance of example, by connecting the knowledge which readers have already known or experience they have gone through, readers can more easier to understand the situation or put themselves into the plot or image(72). For example, in the poem “The sea is history” written by Derek Walcott, the author implies that time locks the history up, but there is no physical barrier which stop people from found it, the author is actually means that all the container of memory, culture, history, are buried under the sea and have been forgotten, as time goes by, these records have become a part of the sea, and the sea have become their container forever until someone discover them and dig them out.
In my view, metaphor is an important way to express the author’s purpose in the article. Metaphor leads reader to imagine and consider what meaning is behind the article from different aspects. It might also encourage people to think creatively and persuade reader to act as well.
This entry is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International license.
Wow, good point. I also agree that metaphor can arouse readers’ imagination and dig out the meaning behind literary works.
I found your explanation on the metaphor very interesting, particularly how we can connect the words used as metaphor to our knowledge and experience to better understand poems.
Good job!
I like the way you have addressed this post. You have explained it in a very concise and precise way. I like the idea, and I agree when you said, “Metaphor leads the reader to imagine and consider what meaning is behind the article from different aspects. “As culler said, Metaphor is treated as basic to language an imagination.” It allows us to describe things by comparing them to others and interpreter them through our imagination.