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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
Key Examples in Demon Copperhead
Chapter 16
Explanation and Analysis—The Funeral :
Demon uses poignant imagery when describing his mother’s funeral, following her fatal overdose on OxyContin, a highly addictive opioid prescribed to her by her doctor for pain relief:
I get to remember every single thing about the funeral. That day sits big and hard in my brain like this monster rock in the ocean, waiting to wreck me. I wish to God it would leave my brain. It stays. All of it. The itchy black socks borrowed from Mr. Peg because I’d outgrown all but my gym socks. The smell of sweat and shoe polish. The toothpaste green of the walls, a color Mom hated. The sound of the quavery organ, old ladies stinking of perfume. The wasps, this whole slew of them, buzzing and buzzing at the colored windows way up high.
Chapter 18
Explanation and Analysis—Sour Milk:
Demon uses a number of similes and metaphors related to food when describing his own feelings of worthlessness following the death of his mother. When the Peggots reluctantly invite Demon to join them in Knoxville over Christmas, he recounts:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Something was going on, to do with me. I realized I might not smell great due to barn cleaning the day before, and not getting my turn for the shower. I put my face to the window so nobody would see, if I tore up. Was this me now, for life? Taking up space where people wished I wasn’t? Once on a time I was something, and then I turned, like sour milk. The dead junkie’s kid. A rotten little piece of American pie that everybody wishes could just be, you know. Removed.
Related Themes:
Chapter 34
Explanation and Analysis—The Civil War :
Mr. Armstrong, history teacher and guidance counselor at Demon's school, uses logos and a simile in his argument that it makes "no sense" to fly an American flag alongside a Confederate flag, a symbol of the pro-slavery Confederacy in the American Civil War. When a pickup truck bearing both flags drives around the parking lot of the school, Mr. Armstrong presents his objections:
Unlock with LitCharts A+“People,” Mr. Armstrong finally kind of yelled, like he did whenever we were ignorant in class. “Are you following me here? A war. Opposite sides. Flying both those flags at once makes no sense. It’s like rooting for the Generals and the Abingdon Falcons in the same game.”
Whoah. We were all like, Crap. Because that’s unthinkable. Some guys started mumbling heritage and nothing personal [...] “Whose history are we talking about?” he asked. “Because Virginia voted to join the Confederacy, that’s true. To support the plantation owners. But the people here in this county were not represented in that vote.”
Related Themes:
Explanation and Analysis—School Priorities:
The novel uses simile and metaphor in a passage that satirizes the emphasis on sports, particularly football, in many American high schools. After Angus tries and fails to procure funding from the school administration for an "academic team" that could compete in state-level competitions, she and Demon discuss their school's priorities:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Defeat only made Angus more determined. I didn’t get it. I asked if she was jealous over me getting all my art attention, and she said art, was I kidding? If I wanted to discuss unfairness, let’s talk about football. Uniforms, equipment, buses to away games, state championships. The school board threw money at all that like water on a house fire. And I was like, Angus. It’s football. Take that out of high school, it’s church with no Jesus. Who would even go?
Chapter 37
Explanation and Analysis—Ghosts:
When recounting a trip he took with Angus to the home of Betsy Woodall, Demon uses similes, metaphor, and hyperbole:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Angus jumped out of the car with a big smile, walking all around with her hand clamped on her hat like she’s in shock, and it might fly off. Looking at things outside the house, inside the house, like this happy big-eyed fairy in a white T-shirt and leather vest, saying, Oh, I remember this! Which I’m sure she did, since nothing probably had changed in that house since God was a child. I hadn’t really thought before about the place being special to her, like seeing my dad’s grave was to me [...] A dead parent is a tricky kind of ghost.
Chapter 38
Explanation and Analysis—Homecoming Queen:
Demon uses multiple similes and a metaphor when recounting his first experience driving around with Fast Forward, who is something of a local celebrity in Lee County:
Unlock with LitCharts A+It was my first cruise from the vantage point of a vehicle, and we were the star attraction. Like the convertible in the parade with the homecoming queen in her fluffy dress, waving. In our case there was no waving, and really no “we,” it was all about Fast Forward. Hands resting loose on the wheel, head tilted back, eyes half closed, that smile. Ladies, come and get it if you dare. The girls came alive in a wave whenever that Lariat came into view. Up and down like fishing bobbers.
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Chapter 42
Explanation and Analysis—Like a Nurse:
Demon uses an ironic simile that compares Dori to a nurse when she injects fentanyl, an addictive synthetic opioid:
Unlock with LitCharts A+The next surprise won’t ever leave my brain. The kit she took out of her purse. The spoon she used first, to scrape the patch. The lighter she held underneath. The cotton ball, the syringe, pulling the cap off the needle and holding it in her mouth like a nurse giving booster shots. I don’t know what I said but she could tell I was scared, and she was sweet with me, the same voice she used with Jip. She’d been saving this, because the first time you do it with somebody, they say it’s the best you’ll ever feel in your life.
Related Themes:
Chapter 53
Explanation and Analysis—Atlanta:
When Demon learns that Emmy is living in Atlanta, Georgia, Aunt June insists that Demon accompany her there to recover Emmy, whom she fears is involved in drug abuse and sex work. Demon uses imagery, a metaphor, and a simile when describing the busy city of Atlanta:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Cloud-high buildings spiking up in the distance, pointy or square on top, the colors of steel and sky. So much like a movie, your eye couldn’t accept it was real [...] Hundreds of people passed by outside hugging their coats around them, looking at their feet, walking fast. I wondered what they were taking for the brain alarm bell that goes off in a place like this, where not one thing you see is alive, except more people. Everything else being dead: bricks, cement, engine-driven steel, no morning or evening songs but car horns and jackhammers. All the mountains of steel-beam construction.
Chapter 54
Explanation and Analysis—Like an Unborn Baby:
As Dori’s addiction worsens, leaving her listless and entirely dependent upon opioids, Demon uses a simile that compares her to an “unborn baby”:
Unlock with LitCharts A+I couldn’t get in bed with her. Even as tired and wrecked as I was, after such a day. She was curled up so small with her knees pulled against her chest and her fists on her face like an unborn baby herself. I tucked blankets around her, then came back downstairs and stripped the filthy mess of clothes and quilts off the couch and stuffed it all in the washer. I picked up the dishes and put them in the sink [...]. My only job and purpose now was to keep Dori alive, and I didn’t know how to do it.
Related Themes:
Chapter 58
Explanation and Analysis—Well-Oiled Machine:
In a climactic scene, Demon describes the dead body of Sterling Ford—referred to by most characters by the nickname Fast Forward—using both simile and metaphor. After Fast Forward falls from the top of the Devil’s Bathtub waterfall following a confrontation with Hammerhead Kelly, Demon observes that:
Unlock with LitCharts A+The other body didn’t move. The naked one. I made myself look, and it must have scarred my eyes because I can still see every goddamn line of it, the unnatural angle of arm, the smooth, hard quads, glutes like a pair of onions. The well-oiled machine he’d worked so hard to keep, a long time after it really mattered. What a waste, a dead body, with most of its parts still ready and eager to work. The final humiliation of a man, that last layoff.
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