Tropes.

1. What a trope is.

2. The group of METAPHOR:

1. types of metaphor proper;

2. personification;

3. periphrasis;

4. allegory and symbol

3. SIMILE.

4. The group of METONYMY:

1. Metonymy proper;

2. Synecdoche;

3. Antonomasia.

5. IRONY.

6. HYPERBOLE, LITOTES, UNDERSTATEMENT.

7. EPITHET.

8. PUN AND ZEUGMA.

9. OXYMORON.

10. UNEXPECTED COLLOCATIONS.

One of the reasons why figurative interpretation is not completely random is that language contains rules of transference, or particular mechanisms for deriving one meaning of a word from another. A general formula which fits all rules of transference is this: F=L

'The figurative sense F may replace the literal sense L if F is related to L in such-and-such a way.'

A simple example is the rule which allows one to use a word denoting such-and-such a place in the sense 'the people in such-and-such a place'; the following sentences illustrate this rule:

Ex: The whole village rejoiced. (= All the people in the village rejoiced.)

The relation between figurative and literal senses can be represented by the formula F= 'the people in L'.

Another rule of transference might be called the 'Quotation Rule'; it is the one we encountered in interpreting the paradox'" That truth is a lie'. In that case, we made sense of an apparent absurdity by reading it as if part were enclosed in quotation marks.

'The work(s) for the author' is a further standard example of transference of meaning: for example, when we say 'I love Bach' referring to the music, not the man; or 'I've been reading Dickens'. We apply these rules automatically in our daily speech, and are scarcely aware of their existence.

In literature they are used more daringly, just as the rules of word-formation are applied beyond the usual restrictions.

metaphor is so central to our notion of poetic creation that it is often treated as a phenomenon in its own right, without reference to other kinds of transferred meaning. In fact, metaphor is associated with a particular rule of transference, which we may simply call the 'Metaphoric Rule', and which we may formulate: F= 'like L'. That is, the figurative meaning F is derived from the literal meaning L in having the sense 'like L', or perhaps 'it is as if L'.

Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,

And then is heard no more: it is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing. [Macbeth, V.v]

The main features of poetic metaphor, according to R. Walleck, are

· analogy

· Double vision

· sensuous image

· reference to human feelings.

All components are combined in different proportions. Analogy should not be understood too literally, since metaphor simultaneously prompts not only analogy but also difference between two objects.

tenor of the metaphor - that which is actually under discussion. The purported definition is its vehicle - that is, the image or analogue in terms of which the tenor is represented. Metaphor, in these terms, may be seen as a pretence - making believe that tenor and vehicle are identical.. This brings us to the third notional element of metaphor: the ground of the comparison. Every metaphor is implicitly of the form 'X is like Y in respect of Z', where X is the tenor, Y the vehicle, and Z the ground.

In the text the central image on which the metaphor is built can be mentioned or not. When the central point of reference is omitted we speak about contributory metaphors.

Ex..… amazed by the old liar with honey on his forked tongue? (Tolkien)

It would be futile to attempt a full typology of metaphors according to the relation of meaning between literal and figurative senses. Nevertheless, certain types of semantic connection have been traditionally recognized a more important than others. They include:

[a] The Concretive.Metaphor, which attributes concreteness or physical existence to an abstraction

[b] The Animistic Metaphor, which attributes animate characteristics to the inanimate

[c] The Humanizing (Anthropomorphic') Metaphor, which attributes characteristics of humanity to what is not human

[d] The Synaesthetic Metaphor, which transfers meaning from one domain of sensory perception to another

Categories [a],[b] and [c] overlap, because humanity entails animacy, and animacy entails concreteness. These categories (notional classes) reflect the tendency of metaphors to explain the more undifferentiated areas of human experience in terms of the more immediate. We make abstractions tangible by perceiving them in terms of the concrete, physical world.

The familiar poetic device of personification, whereby an abstraction is figuratively represented as human actually combines all three categories.

PERSONIFICATION - a trope, a variant of the metaphor which likens the characteristics of a person to abstract notions and inanimate objects. It reveals itself in valences, characteristic of nouns, personal names. This means that the word so used can

· be substituted by pronouns he, she

· be used in the form of the possessive case

· match with verbs of speech, thinking, desire

· other actions and conditions, characteristic of people

· be sometimes marked by the capital letter.

Ex. The cold was cursing the warmth for which it hungered (Tolkien)

The dehumanizing metaphors, which ascribe animal or inanimate properties to a human being, frequently have a ring of contempt.

Ex. You blocks, you stones, you worse than senseless things! (Sh. Julius Caesar)

Developed, sustained, prolonged, extended metaphor consists of several metaphorically used words, creating a single image, i.e. it consists of several simple metaphors which are interconnected and support each other. They intensify the implied image by the joining of two plans and their parallel operation.

Ex. Dombey’s cup of satisfaction was so full at that moment, however, that he felt he could afford a drop or two of its contents, even to sprinkle on the dust of the by-path of his little daughter (Dickns)

Expressions that we condemn as mixed metaphors, on the other hand, occur when dead metaphors, which have lost their imaginative force, are brought incongruously together so that a conflict in their literal meanings, which normally go unnoticed, is forced upon our attention.

Ex. The hand that rocked the cradle has kicked the bucket.

Once found metaphoric image can move over to the category of commonly used, become a lexical metaphor. We speak about trite, hackneyed usage when an interaction of two plans is completely lost and a fresh metaphor changes into a cliched image. This refers to simple metaphors in the first place. But the keen ear of the author to the language even a cliched metaphor may return something of its double vision and freshness of the image.

Ex. No sooner had Cleman’s eye fell upon the object of his former love as it broke and fell to pieces. (Dickens)

SYMBOL. There might be a situation (with proverbs in the first place) when literate interpretation is acceptable, but figurative interpretation is universally preferred.

Ex. The rolling stone gathers no moss.

Stop playing, poet! May a brother speak? (Browning)

This optional extension of the meaning from literal to figurative is what we associate with symbolism. symbols in common use, such as ' lamp' = 'learning', 'star' = 'constancy', ' flame'='passion', are assigned their underlying meaning by custom and familiarity. There need not, therefore, be any linguistic indication of what the tenor is, or of why the term cannot be taken at its face value. Most conventional symbols are metonymic : coffin, scull as symbols of death.

allegory stands in the same relation to an individual symbol as extended metaphor does to simple metaphor: in fact, an allegory might be described as a ' multiple symbol', in which a number of different symbols, with their individual interpretations, join together to make a total interpretation. A naive reader may take the allegory at its face value. To hint to the underlying sense, the tenor, the authors introduce speaking names: Dowel, Dobet and Dobest (Peter Plowman), Mr Greatheart, Vanity Fair (J.Bunyan, Pilgrim’s Progress), The House of Holiness, the Tower of Bliss (E. Spnser,The Faerie Queen). As example of allegories fables and fairy tales can serve.

PERIPHRASIS - a trope, presented by changing a subject name by a description, a collocation with naming its essential, distinctive features. Periphrasis can be

· logical,

· eupthemic

· figurative (metaphoric or metonymic)

The principle of economy of expression discourages the use of periphrasis in most communicative situations. It is difficult to find a general explanation of its popularity in poetry, but no doubt part of the matter is the purely technical value of periphrasis as a routine licence in any lengthy poem. Particularly in epic poetry, it is a convenience for the poet to have various ways of referring to the same thing, especially if that thing is of key significance in the poem. According to the requirements of metre, the Anglo-Saxon poet often makes use of longer, periphrastic expressions, such as gomen-wudu ('game-wood') for 'harp'; hilde-setl ('battle-seat') for 'saddle'. Especially characteristic of early Germanic poetry are kennings, or periphrastic compounds which incorporate metaphors.

An interesting parallel in later literature (dramatic, not epic) is the variety of periphrases for 'crown' in Shakespeare's history plays. Such designations, whether in Beowulf or Shakespeare, must be attributed not merely to metrical convenience and 'elegant variation' for the avoidance of monotony, but to the poet's desire to elaborate a thematically important concept, by throwing the emphasis now on one, now on another of its facets, thus deepening its symbolic and emotive significance.

The reverse side of this linguistic propriety shows itself outside poetic language in euphemism - an alternative, often roundabout mode of expression used in preference to a blunter, less delicate one. Euphemistic periphrases abound in areas of social taboo. More to the taste of the present age is an anti-euphemistic vein which shows itself when a taboo subject is described by means of a jokingly indelicate periphrasis, often a figurative one.

SIMILE – an explicitly expressed similarity or likening one subject or phenomena to another. SIMILE can be either short, or developed. Most often simile is introduced by words as if, as though, like, as when, but can be introduced as well lexically, by words seem, look…

Simile is an overt, and metaphor a covert comparison. This means that for each metaphor, we can devise a roughly corresponding simile, by writing out tenor and vehicle side by side, and indicating (by like or some other formal indicator) the similarity between them. However, this equivalence, this translatability between metaphor and simile, should not obscure important differences between the two:

[a] A metaphor, as we noted earlier of metonymy, is generally more concise and immediate than the corresponding literal version, because of the superimposition, in the same piece of language, of tenor and vehicle.

[b] A simile, conversely, is generally more explicit than metaphor: in translating into simile, we have to make up our minds what object concretely is intended. The very circumstantiality of simile is a limitation, for the ability of metaphor to allude to an indefinite bundle of things which cannot be adequately summarized gives it its extraordinary power to 'open new paths' of expression.

[c] Simile can specify the ground of the comparison. Also a simile can specify the manner of comparison, which may, for example, be a relationship of inequality, as well as equality. It is more flexible, in this respect, than metaphor.

[d] Metaphor, on the other hand, is inexplicit with regard to both the ground of comparison, and the things compared. This is not only a matter of indefiniteness, as noted in [b] above, but of ambiguity.

Simile and metaphor have complementary virtues. Poets quite often take advantage of both by producing a hybrid comparison, in which simile and metaphor are combined.

METONYMY is a trope based on associations of adjacency and contiguity. There is a constant external link between the object that is meant and the object that is mentioned. This relationship can be: