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Pathos
Definition of Personification
Personification is a type of figurative language in which non-human things are described as having human attributes, as in the sentence, "The rain poured down on the wedding guests, indifferent... read full definition
Personification is a type of figurative language in which non-human things are described as having human attributes, as in the sentence, "The rain poured down... read full definition
Personification is a type of figurative language in which non-human things are described as having human attributes, as in the... read full definition
Act 1, Scene 2
Explanation and Analysis—The Weary Sun:
Describing the harsh punishment that awaits Aegeon, the First Merchant personifies the sun that looks down upon Ephesus as “weary,” suggesting that nature itself is tired, both with the ongoing and senseless fighting between Syracuse and Ephesus and with the injustice of executing an innocent man:
This very day a Syracusian merchant
Is apprehended for arrival here
And, not being able to buy out his life,
According to the statute of the town
Dies ere the weary sun set in the west.
Act 2, Scene 1
Explanation and Analysis—Master Time:
While Adriana anxiously awaits her husband’s return to their home, Luciana attempts to calm her sister down, personifying time as a boss or “master” who dictates how men live their lives.
Unlock with LitCharts A+LUCIANA
Good sister, let us dine, and never fret.
A man is master of his liberty;
Time is their master, and when they see time
They’ll go or come. If so, be patient, sister.
Related Themes:
Act 2, Scene 2
Explanation and Analysis—Time:
In early modern poetry and drama, the abstract concept of time is often personified as a godlike figure, such as “Father Time.” In Act 2, Scene 2, Antipholus and Dromio of Syracuse personify time as a god who grants different favors to different living things.
Unlock with LitCharts A+ANTIPHOLUS OF SYRACUSE
Why is Time such a niggard of hair, being, as it is, so plentiful an excrement?DROMIO OF SYRACUSE
Because it is a blessing that he
bestows on beasts, and what he hath scanted men
in hair, he hath given them in wit
Act 3, Scene 1
Explanation and Analysis—Slander:
In counseling Antipholus of Ephesus against making a scene by arguing with his wife in view of the public, the merchant Balthasar personifies slander or gossip as an intruder who invades its subject’s life and home:
Unlock with LitCharts A+A vulgar comment will be made of it;
And that supposèd by the common rout
Against your yet ungallèd estimation
That may with foul intrusion enter in
And dwell upon your grave when you are dead;
For slander lives upon succession,
Forever housèd where it gets possession.
