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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
Chapter 7
Explanation and Analysis—Flowering and Budding:
Eliot frames Silas's developing Christian morals and his concurrent softening of personality through the metaphor of flowers and buds opening. In Chapter 7, Eliot implies that Silas's environment in Raveloe is nourishing him like rich soil, whether or not he knows it:
This strangely novel situation of opening his trouble to his Raveloe neighbours, of sitting in the warmth of a hearth not his own, and feeling the presence of faces and voices which were his nearest promise of help, had doubtless its influence on Marner, in spite of his passionate preoccupation with his loss. Our consciousness rarely registers the beginning of a growth within us any more than without us: there have been many circulations of the sap before we detect the smallest sign of the bud.
Related Themes:
Chapter 9
Explanation and Analysis—Reaping and Sowing:
In Chapter 9, Eliot uses the metaphor of planting the "seed" of an evil or misguided decision to explain why such decisions inevitably hurt the doer. When describing Godfrey's trust in "the throw of Fortune's dice" to solve his relationship problems, she writes:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Let him forsake a decent craft that he may pursue the gentilities of a profession to which nature never called him, and his religion will infallibly be the worship of blessed Chance, which he will believe in as the mighty creator of success. The evil principle deprecated in that religion, is the orderly sequence by which the seed brings forth a crop after its kind.
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Chapter 10
Explanation and Analysis—Tiny Rivers:
Silas Marner is as miserly and dry as sand before his real good nature is "unblocked" through his relationship with his adopted daughter. Eliot uses the metaphor of a rivulet (a tiny stream) to describe the flow of goodness working its way through his "soul" in Chapter 10:
Unlock with LitCharts A+The fountains of human love and of faith in a divine love had not yet been unlocked, and his soul was still the shrunken rivulet, with only this difference, that its little groove of sand was blocked up, and it wandered confusedly against dark obstruction.
Related Themes:
Chapter 15
Explanation and Analysis—Flowering and Budding:
Eliot frames Silas's developing Christian morals and his concurrent softening of personality through the metaphor of flowers and buds opening. In Chapter 7, Eliot implies that Silas's environment in Raveloe is nourishing him like rich soil, whether or not he knows it:
Unlock with LitCharts A+This strangely novel situation of opening his trouble to his Raveloe neighbours, of sitting in the warmth of a hearth not his own, and feeling the presence of faces and voices which were his nearest promise of help, had doubtless its influence on Marner, in spite of his passionate preoccupation with his loss. Our consciousness rarely registers the beginning of a growth within us any more than without us: there have been many circulations of the sap before we detect the smallest sign of the bud.
Related Themes:
Chapter 19
Explanation and Analysis—Pregnant Words:
In Chapter 19, when Godfrey Cass and Nancy offer Eppie a home and reveal that Godfrey is her true father, Silas is horrified at the prospect of having another Cass steal his "gold" from him. This time, though, it's because he has become a father in every way that matters to Eppie, and Eliot uses a metaphor to underline how seriously he takes that relationship:
Unlock with LitCharts A+‘Just the same?’ said Marner, more bitterly than ever. ‘How’ll she feel just the same for me as she does now, when we eat o’ the same bit, and drink o’ the same cup, and think o’ the same things from one day’s end to another? Just the same? that’s idle talk. You’d cut us i’ two.’ Godfrey, unqualified by experience to discern the pregnancy of Marner’s simple words, felt rather angry again.
Related Themes:
