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Idioms
Definition of Imagery
Imagery, in any sort of writing, refers to descriptive language that engages the human senses. For instance, the following lines from Robert Frost's poem "After Apple-Picking" contain imagery that engages... read full definition
Imagery, in any sort of writing, refers to descriptive language that engages the human senses. For instance, the following lines from Robert Frost's poem "After... read full definition
Imagery, in any sort of writing, refers to descriptive language that engages the human senses. For instance, the following lines... read full definition
Chapter 3: Havermeyer
Explanation and Analysis—Billowing Pendants:
In Chapter 3, Heller constructs a quite unusual sex scene, using a series of similes and imagery. This scene, first described here, will come back up throughout the novel:
Each time she landed with the heel of her shoe, Orr giggled louder, infuriating her still further so that she flew up still higher into the air for another shot at his noodle, her wondrously full breasts soaring all over the place like billowing pennants in a strong wind and her buttocks and strong thighs shim-sham-shimmying this way and that like some horrifying bonanza.
Chapter 12: Bologna
Explanation and Analysis—Clear and Warm:
Just before the military leadership finds that Yossarian had altered the maps to show that Bologna had been "taken," in Chapter 12, Heller creates some evocative imagery of Captain Black:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Captain Black tugged himself erect and began scratching his scrawny long thighs methodically. In a little while he dressed and emerged from his tent, squinting, cross, and unshaven. The sky was clear and warm. He peered without emotion at the map. Sure enough, they had captured Bologna. Inside the intelligence tent, Corporal Kolodny was already removing the maps of Bologna from the navigation kits.
Related Themes:
Chapter 15: Piltchard & Wren
Explanation and Analysis—Boom-Boom-Boom:
Yossarian, in Chapter 15, flying his plane over Bologna and trying to drop his bomb, is taking heavy bullet fire. This is the first instance in the book of sustained armed conflict. But there is not a wide description of the battle at large. Instead, Heller's third-person narrator shows readers the action though Yossarian's reactions to the situation, or stream of consciousness, with vivid imagery of his perceptions and reactions:
Unlock with LitCharts A+He had been lulled, lured, and trapped, and there was nothing to do but sit there like an idiot and watch the ugly black puffs smashing up to kill him. [...] He was trembling steadily as the plane crept ahead. He could hear the hollow boom-boom-boom-boom of the flak pounding all around him in overlapping measures of four, the sharp, piercing crack! of a single shell exploding suddenly close by. His head was bursting with a thousand dissonant impulses as he prayed for the bombs to drop. He wanted to sob.
Chapter 22: Milo the Mayor
Explanation and Analysis—Pomaded Pup Tent:
Heller describes Orr's face in rich visual imagery in Chapter 22:
Unlock with LitCharts A+He had a raw bulgy face, with hazel eyes squeezing from their sockets like matching brown halves of marbles and thick, wavy particolored hair sloping up to a peak on the top of his head like a pomaded pup tent.
Chapter 41: Snowden
Explanation and Analysis—Ether Too:
As Yossarian lies in bed, nearly dying, in Chapter 41, Heller depicts his strange situation using rich, complex, multi-sensory imagery:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Yossarian played dead with his eyes shut while the clerk admitted him by shuffling some papers, and then he was rolled away slowly into a stuffy, dark room with searing spotlights overhead in which the cloying smell of formaldehyde and sweet alcohol was even stronger. The pleasant, permeating stink was intoxicating. He smelled ether too and heard glass tinkling. He listened with secret, egotistical mirth to the husky breathing of the two doctors. It delighted him that they thought he was unconscious and did not know he was listening.
Related Themes:
