Guest Blogger: Carol Hamblen -- The Role of Metaphor

In a recent Community Writing Workshops class this past week, I led a presentation called “The Role of Metaphor in Creative Nonfiction.” (Class members can find the handouts in the Resources page.) One point I shared was the difference between metaphor and simile according to my understanding of what French philosopher Paul Ricoeur writes in his book The Rule of Metaphor.

Since class, I have been continuing to ponder these findings, and I would like to share my most recent thoughts and hear your thoughts on the subject, as well. 

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Consider the following example: “My neighbor is a metronome.” According to Ricoeur, this sentence would permit a literal interpretation of all the words in the sentence except the last one (metronome). As a reader, you know I am not saying my neighbor is the dictionary definition of a metronome.  (I am not saying my neighbor is “an instrument for marking exact time by a regularly repeated tick.”)  Not being able to make sense of the word “metronome” in this sentence, you seek out meaning beyond the dictionary meaning of the word. A mental floodgate is lifted and a torrent of new associations takes place. You stretch your imagination for another interpretation. You might, for example, imagine that my neighbor is a person so continuously and persistently “on a mission” that he is oblivious to—and intolerant of—those around him. Rigid. Inflexible. Perhaps, tiresome. Paradoxically, all characteristics that a metronome itself (as an inanimate object) does not have.

A metaphorical interpretation of a sentence is required when the sentence contains a word that cannot be understood literally. In the example above, the metaphorical process is the process through which the reader twists the dictionary meaning of the word “metronome” in response to the literary nonsense or playfulness of the sentence.

With a simile, on the other hand, all words in the sentence are used literally (e.g.  My neighbor is like a metronome).

Paul Ricoeur argued that the resemblance between two things as expressed through a metaphorical sentence (my neighbor is a metronome) is more powerful, more moving, if you will, than the resemblance expressed in a literal sentence (my neighbor is like a metronome). The uniqueness of resemblance in metaphor is in the tension that is created between difference and identity. With original or new metaphors, or living metaphors as Paul Ricoeur called them (which is what we are talking about and which we strive for in our essays), the difference and identity do not merge together.  Rather they confront each other and remain opposed. The use of the predicate (is a metronome) despite its incompatibility is what provides for the instruction, the extended meaning, the deepened understanding, that the metaphor provides.

Moreover, if we are able to successfully substitute a nonmetaphorical word for the metaphorical word in our sentence—if , for example, if we can substitute “dedicated person” for “metronome,”—then “metronome” would have been simply decorative or ornamental and its use would not have provided richness nor complexity nor the new information about my neighbor. 

During our class discussion, Jason stated that metaphor and simile are, for all practical purposes, synonymous in his thinking.  Paul Ricoeur, on the other hand, argues for the supremacy of metaphor over simile.  Jason provided a simile that challenged Paul Ricoeur’s distinction between metaphor and simile. I will look at Jason’s simile below.  But first here’s a recap of Paul Ricoeur’s description of metaphor and simile:

• SIMILE: When it is written that A is like B, the writer is pointing out and focusing on a single similarity between the two subjects. The dissimilarity between A and B does not play a role in the assertion.

• METAPHOR: When it is written that A is B, the writer is not referring to a characteristic that B actually has. In fact, A is B does not make literal sense and the reader must come up with a nonliteral (metaphorical) interpretation of the sentence. The reader does that by going beyond the literal meaning (the dictionary definition) of the word B, beyond the actual characteristics that B possesses, to a metaphorical meaning, to characteristics that nonetheless reflect a connection between A and B. The modified meaning of B is “new, but fitting” and “strange but evident,” and perhaps also “surprising but satisfying.”  After this stretching of the imagination, the sentence contains a tension; at the same time that the literal reading of the sentence underlines the difference between A and B, the metaphorical reading proclaims a similarity in spite of the difference.
  

Before looking at the simile Jason provided, I want to ask two questions for us to consider, as follows:

1. Do similes typically compare one characteristic of a thing with the same characteristic of another thing.
2. Do similes typically announce or state the characteristic that the two things share.

Consider the following examples:

           “I ran from the sound of the river into the woods, dark as the inside of a box.”   

                      ―Anne Michaels, Fugitive Pieces

            “My story is not important but odd like horses lying down.”

                      ―C .D. Wright, Cooling Time

Now consider Jason's example, which came from the Darrell Spencer story “The 12-Inch Dog”: 

            “Teeth like Judgment Day.”

The single characteristic we expect to find in a simile is not evident, and I assume the context doesn’t provide it either. If that is the case, I would agree that a metaphorical response is required on the part of the reader to understand the connection being made here.

With the similes above we do imagine a dark box and horses lying down. But in Jason’s simile, we can’t just imagine Judgement Day and how that reflects the physical quality of one’s teeth. We have to stretch our imagination and come up with a nonliteral interpretation; we have to consider the words “Judgment Day” as we would a metaphor. Since the characteristic(s) shared are not told, and are not obvious, in spite of the use of the word “like,” we do have to twist the dictionary definition of “Judgment Day.” 

So I would say that when similes are formed as in the examples above (boxes and horses)—when the single common characteristic is somehow obvious—similes differ from Paul Ricoeur’s use of the word metaphor. Perhaps when they are formed as above (“teeth like Judgement Day”), metaphorical interpretation is called for and they at least approach metaphor as Paul Ricoeur defines it. 

Here, then, are some thoughts, possibilities, questions: 

(Please note: It’s also possible that I didn’t fully understand the crux of Paul Ricoeur’s argument, in which case my presentation would not have successfully presented his distinction between metaphor and simile.)

• Is a simile like the one used in Jason’s example more infrequent and, perhaps, used more often in contemporary writing than in canonical work? Perhaps it was not something Paul Ricoeur would have encountered.
  

• Perhaps it’s not a matter of form at all—whether or not the words “like” or “as” are used—that distinguishes between simile and metaphor.  If you see a distinction between 1) simple imagining (mentally picturing the inside of a box) and 2) stretching the imagination (interpreting a sentence that contains the words “Judgment Day”), then perhaps you could say it is the response required of the reader that distinguishes between simile and metaphor.
  

What do we think? I’ll be interested in hearing your ideas.  I know I will be looking closely at similes and metaphors in my future reading and see just how they are used and what is required of me as reader.