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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
Similes
Explanation and Analysis—The Body Politic:
The aristocratic characters of "The Winter's Tale" often use an extended metaphor, applying political language to members of the family unit. As monarchs, Leontes and Polixenes must preserve their families in order to ensure that they produce heirs who will rule their respective kingdoms in the future. Therefore, their use of this metaphor highlights the way in which their social position makes domestic and political matters inextricable from each other.
Related Themes:
Act 1, Scene 1
Explanation and Analysis—Lambs in the Sun:
When Hermione asks Polixenes in Act 1, Scene 2 about his childhood friendship with Leontes, Polixenes responds with a wistful description:
Unlock with LitCharts A+We were twinned lambs that did frisk i’ th’ sun
And bleat the one at th’ other. What we changed
Was innocence for innocence.
Related Themes:
Act 1, Scene 2
Explanation and Analysis—Lambs in the Sun:
When Hermione asks Polixenes in Act 1, Scene 2 about his childhood friendship with Leontes, Polixenes responds with a wistful description:
Unlock with LitCharts A+We were twinned lambs that did frisk i’ th’ sun
And bleat the one at th’ other. What we changed
Was innocence for innocence.
Related Themes:
Explanation and Analysis—Simile:
As Leontes interrogates his son Mamillius in Act 1, Scene 2, in search of evidence that Hermione has been unfaithful, Leontes's use of similes provides insight into his distrust of women:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Women say so,
That will say anything.
But were they false
As o’erdyed blacks, as wind, as waters, false
As dice are to be wished by one that fixes
No bourn ’twixt his and mine, yet were it true
To say this boy were like me.
Related Themes:
