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Setting
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
Prologue
Explanation and Analysis—Brideshead Mentioned:
In the Prologue, an aged Charles learns that he and his soldiers have been stationed at Brideshead, now vacated by the Flyte family. In his moment of recognition, Charles experiences a flashback, recalling his time spent with Sebastian and Julia:
“What’s this place called?”
He told me and, on the instant, it was as though someone had switched off the wireless, and a voice that had been bawling in my ears, incessantly, fatuously, for days beyond number, had been suddenly cut short; [...] for he had spoken a name that was so familiar to me, a conjuror’s name of such ancient power, that, at its mere sound, the phantoms of those haunted late years began to take flight.
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Part 1, Chapter 2
Explanation and Analysis—The Eldest Brideshead:
As Anthony Blanche talks Charles's ear off in Part 1, Chapter 2, he gradually assesses each member of the Flyte family, laying bare their respective characters. He uses several oxymorons to describe Brideshead, the eldest child and son of the Flyte clan:
Unlock with LitCharts A+“There’s Brideshead who’s something archaic, out of a cave that’s been sealed for centuries. He has the face as though an Aztec sculptor had attempted a portrait of Sebastian; he’s a learned bigot, a ceremonious barbarian, a snow-bound lama…."
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Explanation and Analysis—Fermentation:
In a curious example of simile from Part 1, Chapter 2, Charles analyzes the character of his and Sebastian's "wickedness" during their first year at Oxford:
Unlock with LitCharts A+I could match my cousin Jasper’s game-cock maturity with a sturdier fowl. I could tell him that all the wickedness of that time was like the spirit they mix with the pure grape of the Douro, heady stuff full of dark ingredients; it at once enriched and retarded the whole process of adolescence as the spirit checks the fermentation of the wine, renders it undrinkable, so that it must lie in the dark, year in, year out, until it is brought up at last fit for the table.
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Part 1, Chapter 3
Explanation and Analysis—Fear:
In the following example of simile from Part 1, Chapter 3, Charles narrates his panic upon receiving a letter from Sebastian, informing him that the Flyte boy is in grave danger:
Unlock with LitCharts A+[F]ear worked like yeast in my thoughts, and the fermentation brought to the surface, in great gobs of scum, the images of disaster; a loaded gun held carelessly at a stile, a horse rearing and rolling over, a shaded pool with a submerged stake, an elm bough falling suddenly on a still morning, a car at a blind corner; all the catalogue of threats to civilized life rose and haunted me [...].
Related Themes:
Part 1, Chapter 4
Explanation and Analysis—Sebastian and Religion:
In Part 1, Chapter 4, Charles slowly begins to unearth certain truths about Sebastian's nature through exposure to Brideshead and the entire Flyte family. Notably, Charles uses the following simile to describe Sebastian's relationship with Catholicism:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Often, almost daily, since I had known Sebastian, some chance word in his conversation had reminded me that he was a Catholic, but I took it as a foible, like his teddy-bear.
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Part 2, Chapter 2
Explanation and Analysis—Julia:
At the beginning of Part 2, Chapter 2, Charles begins his narration with foreshadowing, alluding to the fact that Julia will play a far greater role in the events of Brideshead Revisited than she has thus far:
Unlock with LitCharts A+It is time to speak of Julia, who till now has played an intermittent and somewhat enigmatic part in Sebastian’s drama. It was thus she appeared to me at the time, and I to her. [....] She told me later that she had made a kind of note of me in her mind, as, scanning the shelf for a particular book, one will sometimes have one’s attention caught by another, take it down, glance at the title page and, saying “I must read that, too, when I’ve the time,” replace it, and continue the search.
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