An expanded metaphor or How to hit the "living arrow" in the reader's heart

Without metaphors, it would be difficult to imagine fiction (both classical and modern). It is metaphors that can be attributed to the central trails used in the composition. Such rhetorical constructions make it possible to make any narrative realistic, to convey a certain emotional gamut to the reader.

Multiple psychological studies have confirmed that it is the metaphorical images that are most strongly imprinted in the human memory. It is with the help of such an associative array that the reader can recreate in his mind the picture of what he has read.

A real "queen of the ball" is a detailed metaphor. It gives the opportunity to transmit simultaneously a whole set of images, and through them - some idea or idea. An expanded metaphor is consistently performed throughout a large fragment of the text. Quite often, writers use this technique for word games, for example, using the metaphorical meaning of a word or expression in the neighborhood of a direct one to obtain a comic effect.

Unlike other paths that make it possible to make literary speech more expressive, a metaphor can exist as a separate phenomenon when it becomes an aesthetic end in itself for the author. At this moment, the essence of the statement loses its decisive importance, the unexpected meaning, the new meaning, which it acquires through the use of the metaphorical image, comes to the fore.

The very meaning of the word "metaphor" goes back to the times of Ancient Greece. Translated this word as "portable meaning", which explains the very essence of the path. By the way, ancient literature was more rich in epithets, rather than metaphors. Nevertheless, in the works of Pindar, Aeschylus, Homer and many other outstanding figures of the world of literature of the time, these techniques are used very actively. It is noteworthy that some works (in particular, we are talking about the mythology of the ancient Greeks) can be safely called the personification of how a detailed metaphor can look. After all, absolutely every image, regardless of whether it was about any of the deities or their actions, carried a certain subtext, an analogy with the life of ordinary mortals.

No other method can so vividly convey to the reader a picture that appeared to the eyes or imagination of the author, as a detailed metaphor. Examples of its use can be found both in classical antique literature and in later literature. Do not miss this reception and our compatriots. For example, the expanded metaphor became one of the main distinguishing features of Sergei Esenin's creativity ("The day will fade away, flashed with the fifth gold ...", "At the fence overgrown nettles were dressed with bright mother-of-pearl ...", etc.). The true master of metaphors was the well-known Oscar Wilde.

True masters of words often combine in their creations a detailed and individually authored metaphor. It is this that can give any work, poetic or prose, a unique color and atmosphere.