When attempting to persuade the King to meet with Helen, Lafew employs hyperbole, allusion, and idiom to describe Helen’s remarkable medical abilities. He states:
I have seen a medicine
That’s able to breathe life into a stone
Quicken a rock, and make you dance canary
With sprightly fire and motion, whose simple touch
Is powerful to araise King Pippen, nay,
To give great Charlemagne a pen in ’s hand
And write to her a love line
Lafew utilizes hyperbole to exaggerate the potency of Helen's medical prowess, claiming she can bring inanimate objects like stones and rocks to life, and even make them dance. If Helen can make rocks “quicken,” Lafew implies, she can certainly help the king feel better.
Shakespeare also employs allusion here, as Lafew mentions the long-dead historical figures King Pippen and Charlemagne, suggesting that Helen’s medicine could revive them. This further emphasizes the hyperbolic nature of Lafew’s claims and reflects his admiration for Helen's skills. The reference to “dance canary” Shakespeare makes here is also an allusion. "Canary" refers to a lively court dance of the time, which involved a great deal of leaping and prancing and some precise, measured steps. Being able to "dance canary" implied a great range of possible movement. If the King of France could "dance canary," it would be an excellent indication of his path to recovery.
In Act 3, Scene 1, the Duke of Florence speaks of his astonishment that France has chosen not to get involved in the ongoing conflict, using a combination of an idiom and a metaphor referring to an embrace. Shakespeare also employs personification, as this important figure declares:
Therefore we marvel much our cousin France
Would in so just a business shut his bosom
Against our borrowing prayers.
In this paragraph, the Duke refers to France as "our cousin." This was an idiom used by royalty during the Early Modern period. Rulers referred to each other by the names of their countries, and used the names of relatives like "cousins" or "uncles" to emphasize both familiarity and alliance. This idiom reflects the interconnectedness of European nobility.
Adding to this idea that France is a “cousin” of Florence’s, Shakespeare personifies the country as if it had the capacity to close off its heart to the pleas of others. By giving the country human qualities, Shakespeare tells the audience that the Duke of Florence is hurt and offended by their refusal to answer his “borrowing prayers,” as if the country itself had treated him coldly.
The word “bosom” refers to the chest area, which is closely associated with the heart. By using this metaphor, the Duke is saying that France has literally hardened its heart, and is indifferent to the pleas for assistance. This metaphor communicates the Duke’s frustration and disappointment at the lack of support from a country or "cousin" he thought was an ally.
Parolles contemplates the lies he will need to fabricate for Bertram and the Lords in order to maintain his façade of bravery. In this scene, Shakespeare combines idiom, personification, and a classical allusion to display Parolles's internal conflict:
[...] [T]hey begin to smoke me; and disgraces have of late knocked too often at my door. I find my tongue is too foolhardy; but my heart hath the fear of Mars before it and of his creatures, not daring the reports of my tongue.
The phrase "they begin to smoke me" (as it’s used here) is an idiom. When Parolles says this, it means that he fears that Bertram and his companions are beginning to suspect his true nature. It’s a reference to “smoking” a hiding place in order to drive someone out by making the air unbreathable. Parolles is backed into a corner by his own lies, and fears being forced to admit them.
Shakespeare further captures Parolles’ state of anxiety by personifying both the “disgraces” that plague him, and his own tongue. This approach makes inanimate concepts like “disgrace” and “tongue” seem like living things with their own will and motivation. When Parolles says "disgraces have of late knocked too often at my door," he's saying that he’s been getting into trouble frequently in the recent past. He also talks about his “tongue being too foolhardy,” which means he can’t control what he says. Both of these moments place the blame for Parolles’s dire situation away from the man himself. His tongue and his “disgraces,” in his opinion, act in ways he can’t control.
When Parolles mentions his “heart” having “the fear of Mars before it,” Shakespeare is making a reference to Mars, the Roman god of war. Parolles is a military man and he’s been misrepresenting himself to his fellow soldiers. By invoking Mars, he expresses just how scared he is of his comrades finding out about his lies and cowardice.
When the Fool encounters Parolles delivering a letter in Act 5, Shakespeare makes his distaste for Parolles’s stench apparent through the use of the sensory language of smell, personification, and idiom:
Truly, Fortune’s displeasure is but sluttish if it smell so strongly as thou speak’st of. I will henceforth eat no fish of Fortune’s butt’ring. Prithee, allow the wind.
The Fool employs smell imagery here to liken Parolles’s current unfortunate situation to a repugnant smell. He doesn’t just smell bad: the aroma is akin to bad fish. This vivid imagery is instrumental in painting a picture of the distasteful condition Parolles finds himself in. It highlights his decline from his previous position of respect to one of ridicule. Through the smell imagery, Shakespeare imparts to the audience a tangible sense of Parolles’s disgrace.
Moreover, the Fool utilizes personification by giving human characteristics to “Fortune.” The Fool refers to Fortune’s “displeasure," implying that it’s Parolles’s new state of being that stinks so horribly. The Fool's comparison of Fortune's “displeasure” to a cook saucing fish also appeals to the audience’s sense of smell. Fortune’s “sauce” smells so bad that the Fool has to ask Parolles to “allow the wind” (air himself out).
The word "sluttish" is used in an idiomatic manner here. It doesn’t mean “sexually promiscuous” in this context. Rather, it takes on its older meaning: “sluttish” here means “messy” in a way that was typically used to criticize women.
