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Definition of Simile
A simile is a figure of speech that directly compares two unlike things. To make the comparison, similes most often use the connecting words "like" or "as," but can also... read full definition
A simile is a figure of speech that directly compares two unlike things. To make the comparison, similes most often use the connecting words "like... read full definition
A simile is a figure of speech that directly compares two unlike things. To make the comparison, similes most often... read full definition
Similes
Explanation and Analysis—The Ghostly Servant:
Just before the story reaches its climax, Egaeus finds himself sitting in the library with no memory of the hours between Berenice’s sunset burial and the current midnight hour. As he ponders over a growing sense of terrible certainty that he has “done a deed”—a certainty all the more horrible for the fact that his memories are vague—his musings are abruptly interrupted by the arrival of a servant:
There came a light tap at the library door—and, pale as the tenant of a tomb, a menial entered upon tiptoe.
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Explanation and Analysis—A Simoon Upon her Frame:
As Poe introduces Berenice to the reader, he uses a simile to illustrate the dire effects of the physical illness that wrecks her body:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Disease—a fatal disease, fell like the simoon upon her frame; and, even while I gazed upon her, the spirit of change swept over her, pervading her mind, her habits, and her character, and, in a manner the most subtle and terrible, disturbing even the identity of her person!
Related Themes:
