figure of speech in which one thing is liken to another, in such a way as to clarify and enhance an image. It is an explicit comparison recognizable by the use of the word like or as. ( A Dictionary of Literary Terms)
O, my love’s like a red, red rose,啊，我的爱人像一朵红红的玫瑰； That’s newly sprung in June:六月里迎风初开
O, my love’s like the melody啊，我的爱人像一曲甜蜜的歌； That’s sweetly played in tune.唱得合拍又柔和。 －Robert Burns
Kindness is the golden chain by which the world is bound.仁爱是联结世界的一条金链。
1. Origin: Latin, meaning like2. Comparative words: like, as3. Functions: describing shape, scenery; expressing emotions; explaining; vivid description, making easy to understand;creating interest. Structure of a Simile 1.Tenor + comparative word + vehicle.2. Subject + comparative word + reference. Example: 1.My love is like a red red rose. 2.Tom is as tall as his brother (not a simile). 3.Tom is as tall as a Maypole.(simile). Type One: like 1.Living without an aim is like sailing without a compass.2.Marriage is like a beleaguered fortress: those who are without want to get in, and those within want to get out Type Two: as 1.Men fear death, as children fear to go in the dark.2.Love goes towards love, as schoolboys from their books.3.But love from love, towards school with heavy books.(Love goes towards love, as schoolboys go from their books.But love goes from love, as schoolboys go towards school with heavy books.)
As firm as a rock.As mute as a fish.As strong as a horse.As brave as a lion As obstinate as a cow.As white as snow.As black as ink / pitch
As changeable as the weather.As wet as a drowned rat.As blind as a bat As fat as a pig.As proud as a peacock. Type Three: what Two Patterns:
A is to B what C is to D.What C is to D, A is to B.
Reading is to the mind what exercise is tothe body.The pen is to a writer what the gun is to a fighter.作家的笔犹如战士的枪。 Type Four: than 1.A home without love is no more than a body without a soul. 2.He had no more idea of money than a cow Type Five: and 1.Love and cough can not be hid.爱情像咳嗽一样是掩盖不了的。2.Truth and roses have thorns about them.3.Kings and bears often worry their keepers.4.A word and stone let go cannot be recalled.说出去的话就像抛出去的石子，是收不回的。 Type Six: others Who is to blame but her tyrant of a father.怪谁呢？只怪她那暴君般的父亲。
A doctor must have the heart of a lion andthe hand of a lady.当一个医生必须有狮子般的胆量
和仕女般的巧手。
二：Metaphor（暗喻）
1A figure of speech containing an implied comparison, in which a word or phrase ordinarily and primarily used of one thing is applied to another.
2.A figure of speech in which one thing is described in terms of another. The basic figure in poetry. A comparison is usually implicit; whereas in simile it is explicit
3.Metaphors are often easy to identify and take the form X is Y. Something or someone is being compared to something or someone else through a construction using the appropriate part of the verb to be (i.e. am, are, is, was, were, will be).
Example:1.Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of fire.2.Money is a bottomless sea, in which honor, conscience, and truth may be drowned.3.Marriage is a book of which the first chapter is written in poetry and remaining chapters in prose.
4.All the world’s a stage, And all men and women merely players;Theyhave their exits and entrances,And one man in his time plays many parts,His acts being seven ages… (Shakespeare, As you Likeit )5.The boy wolfed down the food the moment he grabbed it.6.Some books are to be tasted, others swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested. ( Of Studies, Bacon)7.She has a photographic memory for details.8.The mountainous waves swallowed up the ship.9.A policeman waved me out of the snake of traffic.
三：Metonymy (借代）
Definition: one thing for another; association
Metonymy is Greek for a change of name Function: brief, vivid, interesting Example:
1.What is learned in the cradle is carried to the grave.(from the cradle to the grave从生到死） 2.A thousand mustaches can live together but not four breasts.3.The pen is mightier than the sword.4.He keeps a good table.(待客周到,以丰盛的饮食招待客人)5.She has the eye for the fair and the beautiful.6.The wolf and the pig mingled together in his face.7.China won 4 golds and 5 silvers.8.We drove a Ford to Hyde Park.9.This is the struggle between the kimono and the miniskirt.10.It is a pity that there is more ignorance than knowledge in the country.11.She has retired from the stage to teach.
四：Parody 模拟
(Piece of ) writing intended to amuse by imitating the style of writing used by somebody else/ Literary or musical composition imitating the characteristic style of some other work or of a writer or composer, but treating a serious subject on a nonsensical manner, as in ridicule. Definition: imitation of well-known sayings Function: humorous, ironical, interesting Example:
I have no outlook, but an uplook. My place in society was at the bottom.我没有人生观，但我有“上爬观”，我的地位在社会的最底层A friend in need is a friend to be avoided.难中的朋友是要躲避的朋友。这句话明显是仿A friend in need is a friend indeed.而来的。
It is said Jane has fallen in love with Jack.Yes, but she says she had hesitated for a long.time before she finally walked into love.据说简与杰克坠入了情网。是的，不过她说她曾经犹豫了
很长一段时间最后才步入情网。
Reagan’s conduct in the Governor’s officedid at least demonstrate that his conservative bark often carried little bite when he tackledthe practical problems governing his state. 里根在州长任上的行为至少显示他在处理州里的实际问题时并不像他大叫大嚷的那些保守的调调厉害。 bark often carried little bite 是根据谚语His bark is worse than his bite.(心地不如嘴恶)仿拟出来的。
Twinkle, twinkle, little bat!“一闪，一闪，小蝙蝠！ How I wonder what you’re at!”我不知道你往哪里飞！”
“You know the song, perhaps?”“你也许知道这首歌吧？” “I’ve heard something like it,” said Alice.“我听过相似的歌，”艾丽斯说， “It goes on, you know.” the Hatter continued,“你知道下面还有呢。”帽匠继续道 “in this way—“是这样的——
Up above the world you fly.离开地面的你高高地飞翔 Like a tea tray in the sky.像个茶盘在天上 Twinkle, twinkle—”一闪一闪——” Original:
Where there is a will, there is a way. Imitation:
1.Where there is a will, there is a relative.Where there is a will, there is a lawsuit. 2.Beauty that’s more than skin deep. 并非肤浅的美。Beauty’s but skin deep. (美是肤浅的。)3.A bird in hand is worth two in the bush.bite off more than one can chew:attempt to do too much or something that is too demanding. 4.A stitch in time saves nine.
5.Be born with a silver spoon in one’s mouth:Having wealthy parents
6.To err is human; to forgive divine(人孰无过):It is human nature to sin and make mistakes and therefore one should be as forgiving as possible. 7.To be or not to be, that’s the problem.
五：Personification拟人
A figure of speech in which a thing, quality, or idea is represented as a person.
1.The rain to the wind said雨对风说：
“You push and I’ll pelt,”“你来狂吹，我来猛落。”
They so smote the garden bed他们俩就这样在花圃上施暴虐 That the flowers actually knelt于是花儿们便七歪八倒叶残瓣破
And lay lodged— though not dead最后终于倒下了——尽管还奄奄一息活着 I know how the flowers felt.我知道花儿们此时心中感受如何。
以上例子的拟人格很活泼，风和雨都成了人，变成了冷酷、残暴、以施虐为乐的人，风和雨狂吹猛落直把花儿摧残得奄奄一息。How soon hath Time, the subtle thief of
youth, stolen on his wing my three and twentieth year!时间，这个盗窃青春的狡猾的小偷，盗窃了我二十又三年飞去了。在十七、十八世纪的古典诗歌中，诗人们出于对神话和传统的尊重，常喜欢把自然现象人格化。诗人按照传统把Time比拟做人。
Love, free as air, at sight of human ties, spreads his light wings, and in a moment flies.爱情，自由得像空气，一见到人间的羁绊，伸展开他的翅膀立即飞开。„here let them lie
Till famine and ague eat them up.(Shakespeare: Macbeth)让他们去撒谎吧,直到饥荒与疟疾把
他们都吃掉。饥荒与疟疾都是可以置人于死地的，所以，用eat up 把这些灾祸拟人化，是很贴切的。A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.真理还来不及穿上鞋子，谎言已经走遍了半个世界。Slang is language that takes off its coat, spits on its hands, and goes to work.Laziness travels so slowly, that poverty soon overtakes him.Australia is so kind that, just tickle herwith a hoe, and she laughs with a harvest.
六：Onomatopoeia拟声词
Combination of sounds in a word that imitating what the word refers to, like ‘hiss’ or ‘boom’.
1.Thestream flows through the woods.The stream is murmuring through the woods. 2.Dais started laughing.Dais started giggling.
3.The door was pushed open.The door crashed open.
4.Heavy rain drops fell on the tent.Heavy rain drops began pitter-pattering on the tent. Definition: imitation of sound. Function: association, direct, vivid.
Example: The snake hissed.Giggle, clap, patter, mew, rumble
Apes gibber.Assesbray.Bees hum, buzz, drone.Bullsbellow.Cows low, moo .Cocks crow. Hens cackle, cluck.Chickencheep.Cats mew, purr.Dogs bow-wow.Dovescoo.Ducks quack.
Elephantstrumpet.Frogs croak.Geese gaggle.Horses neigh, snort.Magpieschatter.Mice squeak. Pigs squeal, grunt.Lionsroar.Tigers growl, roar.Snakes hiss.Wolves howl.Sound from nature:
Murmur, babble, swish, patter, rumble, roll, rustle, zip, toot, tick, tinkle, screech, bang,bubble, clang,crack, splash, grumble
七：Euphemism委婉说法
The use of pleasant, mild or indirect words or phrases in place of more accurate or direct ones.In old Greek, ‘eu’ means ‘well’ or ‘soundingwell’; ‘pheme’ means speech(说话). Definition: to talk about unpleasant things in a pleasant way.
Under the weather.Social disease.Hard of hearing.Join one’s ancestors. Wash one’s hands
Diseases :Look off colour/Under the weather/Not all there/Long illness/Social diseases. Disability.Disabled/Handicapped/Inconvenienced/Visually retarded.
Age :Advanced in age/Past one’s prime/Feel one’s age/Golden age/Senior citizen/The longer living.
Death:Go west/At rest/Asleep/Return to dus/Run one’s races.
Parts of body.In one’s birthday suit.Globes, apples, curves, charms(breast).Pass air, make a noise. Relieve oneself.Go get some fresh air.
八：Hyperbole/Overstatement(夸张)
An exaggerated or extravagant statementused as afigure of speech /Exaggeration for effect, not meant to be taken literally… /Extravagantexaggeration . Function: exaggerate the tone Compare:
He ran down the avenue, making a loud noise.
He ran down the avenue, making a noise like ten horses at a gallop.
1.One father is more than a hundred schoolmasters.2.It’s a crime to stay inside on such a beautiful day.3.The most effective water power in the world– women’s tears.
4.As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,So deep in luve am I,And I will luve thee still, my dear,
Till a’ the seas gang dry,Till a’ the sea gang dry, my dear,And the rocks melt wi’ the sun!And I will luve thee still, my dear,While the sands o’ life shall run.( It is quite obvious that all the seas will never become dry and the rocks will unlikely melt with the sun. However, we can notice that the speaker here is expressing a genuinely felt emotion. What he tries to say to his beloved is that he will forever love her. The hyperbolic expression here strongly emphasize the promise of undying love.)
5.For she was beautiful － her beauty made the bright world dim, and everything beside
seemed like the fleeting image of a shade. -----Shelly (The hyperbole her beauty made the bright world dim expresses the speaker’s great admiration for the female figure. What the poet intends to say, put in plain terms, is that she was extraordinarily beautiful.)
6:To be, or not to be: that is the question生存还是毁灭,这是一个值得考虑的问题； Whether’t is nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,默默忍受命运的暴虐的毒箭， Or to take arms against a sea of troubles或是挺身反抗人世的无涯的苦难， And by opposing end them?...在奋斗中结束一切？„„
A hyperbole is often metaphorical. The phrase a sea of troubles in line four is an exaggerated as well as metaphoric way of saying that it is a great quantity of troubles.
九：Understatement(低调陈述)
Statement that expressed an idea, etc, too weakly.（轻描淡写地来陈述一种想法） Function: control the tone of speaking
Overstatement: deliberately maximizing the importance; play up; high profile Understatement: deliberately minimize the importance; play down; low profile 1.This problem is not above us
2.He is a man not without ambition
3.Money is a kind of tight, but I can manage.
4.Well„ let’s go home and talk about it. We’ll figure out something. I can send you to the employment office I went to and －‘I can’t type. I got no college degree. I can’t do anything － and besides, I wanna be in the show!’ Neely started to sob violently again.‘Please, Neely,’ Anne begged. She knew Miss Steinberg and the girls were staring, but her worst fear materialized when Lyon Burke opened his door. She smiled at him weakly as he came over and stared at the shrieking Neely.‘This is Neely. She’s a little upset.’ ‘I’d say that was a classic understatement.’ －Susan, Valley of the Dolls( Without knowing anything more about the context, it is easy to see that Neely was a extremely upset. Therefore, Lyon Burke was witty to refer to Anne’s remark She’s a little upset as a classic understatement. In the novel, Anne was depicted as a little reserved－typical bearing of New Englanders. Her understatement here can be seen as a manifestation of this quality.)
十：Parallelism排比
The arrangement of a number of related ideas of the same importance in a number of parallel or balanced structures forms integrated whole, in order to intensifymotion and to emphasize the
author’s point.
Function: create rhythm, brief, compare and contrast
1Civilized men arrived in the Pacific, armed with alcohol, syphilis, trousers and the Bible.2An Englishman thinks seated; a Frenchman,standing; an American, pacing; an Irishman, afterward.3They could describe an entertainment with accuracy, relate an anecdote with humour, and laugh at their acquaintance with spirit.4It was the best of times, it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness; it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity; it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness; it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair; we had everything before us, we had nothing before us; we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way.－Charles Dickens A Tale of Two Cities.
十一：Contrast对照
Cowards die many times before their death; the valiant never taste of death but once… Let us never negotiate out of fear, but let us never fear to negotiate.
Men always want to be a woman’s first love; women have more subtle instinct; what they like is to be a man’s last romance.
A mother takes twenty years to make a man of her boy, and another woman makes a fool of him in twenty minutes.
十二：Antithesis(对偶)
Contrast of ideas marked by the choice and arrangement of words. Give me liberty, or give me death.不自由，毋宁死。 Feature: contrast in meaning, parallel in structure Knowledge make humble, ignorance make proud.
„the negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity.The life of the wolf is the death of the lamb.(对敌人的仁慈就是对人们的犯罪。) Short accounts make long friends
Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards.
Where there’s marriage without love, there will be love without marriage. －Benjamin Franklin If the economy stays down, can conservatives stay up?
十三：Oxymoron矛盾修饰法
The yoking together of two expressions which are incompatible, so that in combination they have no conceivable literal reference to reality. Features: contradictory in meaning The complexity of things
Example:A cheerful pessimist.Painfulpleasure.A thunderous silence. Adj. + N.creative destruction, living death,tearful joy, orderly chaos, etc. Adj.+ Adj. cold pleasant manner, sour-sweet days, poor rich guys, etc. Adv. +Adj. dully bright, mercifully fatal,falsely true, wisely stupid, etc.
V. + Adv.hasten slowly (=make hasteslowly), shine darkly, groan loudly, etc. N. + N.love-hate relationship, the sound of silence, etc.
1.It (New York) has the poorest millionaires, the littlest great men, the haughtiest beggars, the
plainest beauties, the lowest skyscrapers, the dolefulest pleasures of any town I ever saw. 2.An honourable murderer if you will;Fornought I did in hate, but all in honour.－William Shakespeare, Othello.
3.Juliet:…Beautiful tyrant! fiendangelical!Dove-feather’d raven! Wolfish-ravening lamb!...A damned saint, an honourable villain! 4.careful carelessness
十四：Pun双关
Pun: “also play on words—n. An amusing use of a word or phrase that has two meanings, or words with the same sound but different meanings: He made this pun: ‘Seven days without water make one weak’(=1 week)”.
1. The same sound, but different meanings
You earn your living and urn your dead.谋生即筑墓。(earn your living 谋生， urn your dead火化死者）
2.The same spelling, same sound but different meanings.
To England will I steal, and there I’ll steal. 我悄悄地溜到英国就在那儿偷。
We must hang together, or we shall all hang separately.我们必须紧密地团结在一起，否则我们将被一个个地绞死。
Make your every hello a real good-buy. (a Telephone Advertisement) Ben Battle was a soldier bold本•拜脱是一个大胆的士兵 And used to war’s alarms;习惯了战争的警报；
But a cannon ball shot off his legs,但是一颗炮弹打断了他的双腿，
So he laid down his arms.他只得放下他的武器。(诗中arms一语双关：手臂、武器。)
十五：Zeugma双轭修饰法
A figure of speech in which a single word, usually a verb or adjective, is syntactically related to two or more words, with only one of which it seems logically connected./A word is used to modify or govern two ormore words although its use is grammatically or logically correct with only one/Zeugma makes one word refer to two items when it properly refers to only one of items.
She opened the door and her heart to the homeless boy.她打开门热忱欢迎那个无家可归的孩子。(句中动词open(打开)先用于本义，后用于转义。)
She dropped a tear and her pocket handkerchief.她掉了一滴眼泪，掉了一条手帕。
She possessed two false teeth and a sympathetic heart. 她有两颗假牙，一颗富于同情的心。(以上两个句子里动词后接的是两个逻辑上明显并不能并列的、属于完全不同语义范畴的词作同等成分，一达到滑稽、可笑的效果)
At noon Mrs. Turpin would get out of bed and humor, put on kimono, airs, and the water to boil for coffee.
Miss Bolo rose from the table considerably agitated, and went straight home, in a flood of tears and sedan chair.
Side by side for seven years we had mined ranched, sold patent churns, herded sheep, took photographs and other things, built wire fences, and picked prunes.－O. Henry
Ten minutes later, the coffee and Commander Dana of Naval Intelligence arrived simultaneously. －J. P. Bachman(The coffee 与Commander Danna 都与arrived发生搭配关系，这种排列新奇、
别致，暗示“同时到达”。)
He halted in the district where by night are found the lightest street, hearts, vows, and librettos. V+N1 +N2…
Mrs. Packletid had already arranged in her mind thelunch she would give at her house in Curzon Street,inLoonaBimberton’s honor, with a tiger-skinoccupying most of the foreground, and all the conversation.帕克利泰德夫人早已在心中安排好了在她家中以露娜·比姆伯斯通的名义举办的午餐会，届时她将让一张虎皮覆盖大厅最显眼的位置与整的谈话。 Prep.+N1 +N2…
She was dressed in a maid’s cap, a pinafore, and a bright smile.她戴一顶少女戴的帽子，系一条围裙，带着灿烂的微笑。词组be dressed in 中介词in同cap与pinafore的搭配都属于规范搭配，而与smile 的搭配则属于非规范搭配。 Adj.+N1+N2…
It is much better to have a patched jacketthan to have a (patched) character.穿有补丁的衣服也比品德上打补丁好。
He lost his temper and health in India/The blouses appeal to eye as well as to the purse/never show the bottom of your purse or your mind/Yesterday he had a blue heart and coat/Down went her head and out came the truth and tears.
十六：Allusion引用典故
1.The heel of Achilles2.Open sesame3.Cinderella4.Fig leaf5.Tower of Babel6.Pound of flesh 1.small but weak or vulnerable point, eg. In sb’s character
2.magic words used, in one of the ArabianNights Stories, to cause a door to open 3.a girl or woman whose attraction, merits, etc.have not been recognized
4.(with reference to the story of Adam and Eve) conventional device for concealing genital organs in old drawings, statues, etc.5.tower built to reach heaven
6.Catch-22。7.To meet one’s Waterloo
8.Every man has himself a continent of undiscovered character. Happy is he who acts the Columbus to his own soul.
十七：Irony讽刺
A method of humorous or subtle sarcastic expression in which the intended meaning of the words used is the direct opposite of their usual sense. Feature: You say one thing, but mean quite the opposite.
Her capacity for family affection is extraordinary; when her third husband died, her hair turned quite gold from grief.
We send missionaries to China so the Chinese can get to heaven, but we don’t let them into our country.
„until we are marching backwards to the glorious age of the sixteenth century.(from Reader’s Digest, July, 1962)直到我们回复到光辉的十六世纪„„He was my friend, faithful and just to me:他是我的朋友，对我忠实而公正：But Brutus says he was ambitious;但是布鲁图斯说他有野心；And Brutus is an honourable man.而布鲁图斯却是一个正直的人。What a noble illustration of the tender laws of his favoured country!—— they let the paupers go to sleep!
他们竟允许穷人睡觉！——这是多么高尚的例证，说明他那行善的国家的法律是多么仁慈！
十八：Transferred Epithet(移就修饰、转移修饰)
Epithet:An adjective or descriptive phrase that refers to the character or most important quality of someone(表示某人性格或最主要特征的)修饰语或描述性短语移就这种修饰语不直接说明它所修饰对象的性质、形象或特色，而往往转个弯子去表示该对象给人的某种感觉。
a dizzy height: a. height that is dizzyb. a height that cause people to feel dizzy (令人眼晕的高度)a sleepless bed:a. a bed that is sleepless b. . a bed on which the sleeper has little sleep (寝不安枕)a sweet voice:一个甜嗓子a icy look:一副冷漠神色
I spoke to them in hesitant French/An awed hush fell upon the bystanders/There was a short, thoughtful silence/The big man crashed down on a protesting chair/After an unthinking moment, she put her pen into her mouth.
The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,The lowing herd winds slowly o’er the lea,The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,And leaves the world to darkness and to me.
parting day 使人联想到“日落西山、夜幕降临”的景象；weary way 又使人对ploughman产生形象性的联想。
十九：Climax(层进法)
A rhetorical series of ideas, images, etc. arranged progressively so that the mostforceful is last. 通过一系列观念、形象的修辞安排，逐步把意思往前推进，最有力量的放在最后、 I’m sorry, I am so very sorry, I am so extremely sorry (Chesterton)/
He who loses wealth loses much; he who loses a friend loses more; but he who loses courage loses all/I came, I saw, I conquered/Some read to think, these are rare; some to write, these are common; and some read to talk, and these form the great majority.
Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested. The audience smiled, chuckled, and finally howled.(微笑，窃窃而笑最后捧腹大笑)
二十：Anticlimax(渐降法)
A rhetorical series of ideas, images, etc. arranged progressively so that the mostforceful is in front.
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a fortune must be in want of a wife/For God, for America, and for Yale/A man snatches the first kiss, pleads for the second, demands the third, takes the fourth, accepts the fifth-and endures all the rest/The duties of a soldier are to protect his country and peel potatoes.
二十三：Alliteration(头韵)
Occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of two or more words in succession. Next to health, heart, home, happiness for mobile Americans depends upon the automobile. Money makes the mare go.
A fair face may hide a foul heart. Pride and prejudice The winds of war
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