Juxtaposition: Analogy, Metaphor & Similes

In this lesson we learn about analogy, metaphor and similes. Here I will define the three terms for a better understandings.

Analogy

Analogy is to use something familiar to explain a complex matter. It is a mixed between metaphor and similes. Analogy is 'reasoning or explaining from parallel cases'. Put another way, an analogy is a comparison between two different things in order to highlight some point of similarity.

Examples of analogy:

1. Glove is to hand as paint is to wall
2. Citizens are to president as solar system is to galaxy
3. Horses are to past societies as computers are to future societies

Metaphor

A figure of speech that implies comparison between two different things that actually share something in common. Using one thing to describe another thing

Metaphors are comparisons that show how two things that are not alike in most ways are similar in one important way. Metaphors are a way to describe something. Authors use them to make their writing more interesting or entertaining.

Unlike similes that use the words “as” or “like” to make a comparison, metaphors state that something is something else.

One thing conceived as representing another; a symbol: “Hollywood has always been an irresistible, prefabricated metaphor for the crass, the materialistic, the shallow, and the craven” (Neal Gabler)

Examples of metaphor:

1. A lifetime is a day, death is sleep; a lifetime is a year, death is winter
2. Life is a struggle, dying is losing a contest against an adversary
3. Life is a precious possession, death is a loss
4. Time is a thief

Simile

A figure of speech in which two fundamentally unlike things are explicitly compared. Simile is when you compare two nouns (persons, places or things) that are unlike, using the term 'as' or 'like'.

Examples of simile:

1. As flat as a pancake
2. Like a volcano
3. As light as a feather
4. The water is like the sun
5. The rain falls like the sun,rising upon the mountains

"The water is like the sun."

"The water is like the sun" is an example of simile because water and the sun have little in common, and yet they're being compared to one another. The "is" is also part of what makes this stanza an example of simile.

"The rain falls like the sun,
rising upon the mountains."

Here is another example, comparing falling rain to the rising of the sun. Good similes compare two very different nouns.

SENSES

Sadness is as happy as laughter.
You might cry because it hurts.
You might laugh because it hurts.
But I know one thing,
laughter is laughter and sadness
is sadness.
They can show the
same things like
hurting and gladness.

	It's been a hard day's night, and I've been working like a dog
	The Beatles