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Irony
Definition of Metaphor
A metaphor is a figure of speech that compares two different things by saying that one thing is the other. The comparison in a metaphor can be stated explicitly, as... read full definition
A metaphor is a figure of speech that compares two different things by saying that one thing is the other. The comparison in a metaphor... read full definition
A metaphor is a figure of speech that compares two different things by saying that one thing is the other... read full definition
Ligeia
Explanation and Analysis—As a Shadow:
While describing his beloved Ligeia near the beginning of the short story of the same name, the narrator waxes poetic about his time spent interacting with her prior to her death. In doing so, he uses a simile comparing her to a shadow and metaphorically suggests that she is made of "marble":
I would in vain attempt to portray the majesty, the quiet ease, of her demeanor, or the incomprehensible lightness and elasticity of her footfall. She came and departed as a shadow. I was never made aware of her entrance into my closed study save by the dear music of her low sweet voice, as she placed her marble hand upon my shoulder. [...] It was the radiance of an opium dream—an airy and spirit-lifting vision more wildly divine than the phantasies which hovered about the slumbering souls of the daughters of Delos.
Related Themes:
The Murders in the Rue-Morgue
Explanation and Analysis—To Look at a Star:
In “The Murders in the Rue-Morgue,” Dupin uses the metaphor of a person looking at a star with peripheral vision to elucidate the problem with police detective work that focuses too much on the small details, thereby missing the overarching picture:
Unlock with LitCharts A+The modes and sources of this kind of error are well typified in the contemplation of the heavenly bodies. To look at a star by glances — to view it in a side-long way, by turning toward it the exterior portions of the retina (more susceptible of feeble impressions of light than the interior), is to behold the star distinctly — is to have the best appreciation of its lustre — a lustre which grows dim just in proportion as we turn our vision fully upon it.
Related Themes:
The Black Cat
Explanation and Analysis—Walling Up the Monster:
At the end of “The Black Cat,” the narrator concludes his account with a final, exclamatory lament that his hubris ended up resulting in his own downfall. In doing so, he uses a metaphor to express just how large a mistake he made:
Unlock with LitCharts A+[...] a dozen stout arms were toiling at the wall. It fell bodily. The corpse, already greatly decayed and clotted with gore, stood erect before the eyes of the spectators. Upon its head, with red extended mouth and solitary eye of fire, sat the hideous beast whose craft had seduced me into murder, and whose informing voice had consigned me to the hangman. I had walled the monster up within the tomb!
Related Themes:
The Purloined Letter
Explanation and Analysis—A Game of Puzzles:
Dupin uses metaphors to explain his logical thought processes in “The Purloined Letter”:
Unlock with LitCharts A+"There is a game of puzzles,” he resumed, “which is played upon a map. One party playing requires another to find a given word—the name of town, river, state or empire—any word, in short, upon the motley and perplexed surface of the chart. A novice in the game generally seeks to embarrass his opponents by giving them the most minutely lettered names; but the adept selects such words as stretch, in large characters, from one end of the chart to the other.
Related Themes:
