Utilizing Language in Literature

Instructor: Ms. Becky Villarreal

Click here for an Introduction to Language (Video Requires Real Player)

Diction

Diction in writing is essentially how the author "talks." Flannery O'Connor and William Faulkner both use a lot of southern dialogue in their writing. Both are fairly descriptive and colorful in their language. O'Connor uses more humor; Faulkner is more formal, "poetic," and even somewhat long-winded.

An author's use of language is often as distinguishable as handwriting. Many things go into shaping an author's individual style, but some elements to look for are:

• length of sentences, diction, dialogue
• use of humor, understatement, exaggeration, irony
• use of symbolism, imagery, and description

Hemingway is known for his short sentences and simple dialogue:

He was an old man who fished alone in a skiff in the Gulf Stream and he had been gone eighty-four days now without taking a fish.

from The Old Man and the Sea

Metaphor

A metaphor is a comparison which imaginatively identifies one thing with another dissimilar thing, and transfers or ascribes to the first thing (the tenor or idea) some of the qualities of the second (the vehicle or image). Unlike a simile or analogy, metaphor asserts that one thing is another thing, not just that one is like another.

• Then Jesus declared, "I am the bread of life."

  John 6:35

• Thus a mind that is free from passion is a very citadel; man has no stronger fortress in which to seek shelter and defy every assault. Failure to perceive this is ignorance; but to perceive it, and still not to seek its refuge, is misfortune indeed.

  Marcus Aurelius

• The mind is but a barren soil; a soil which is soon exhausted and will produce no crop, or only one, unless it be continually fertilized and enriched with foreign matter.

  Joshua Reynolds

Like simile and analogy, metaphor is a profoundly important and useful device. Aristotle says in his Rhetoric, "It is metaphor above all else that gives clearness, charm, and distinction to the style."

Metaphor not only explains by making the abstract concrete and familiar, it also enlivens by touching the reader's imagination. Further, it affirms an interconnection in the unity of all things by showing a relationship between things seemingly alien.

Personification

Personification is the metaphorical representation of an animal or inanimate object as having human attributes.

• The ship began to creak and protest as it struggled against the rising sea.
• We bought this house instead of the one on Maple because it is more friendly.
• This coffee is strong enough to get up and walk away.

Ideas and abstractions can also be personified:

• Wisdom cries aloud in the streets; in the markets she raises her voice. Prov. 1:20
• Men say they love Virtue, but they leave her standing in the rain. Juvenal

While personification functions primarily as a device of art, it can often serve to make an abstraction clearer and more real to the reader by defining or explaining the concept in terms of everyday human action. As a writer, try always to be fresh and avoid the clichés. "Winking stars" is worn out, but "winking dewdrops" may be all right.

Van Gogh's "Starry Night"

Irony

Irony is a mode of expression, through words (verbal irony) or events (irony of situation), conveying a reality different from and usually opposite to appearance or expectation. A writer may say the opposite of what he means, create a reversal between expectation and its fulfillment, or give the audience knowledge that a character lacks. In verbal irony, the writer's meaning or even his attitude may be different from what he says. An example of situational irony would occur if a professional pickpocket had his own pocket picked just as he was in the act of picking someone else's pocket.

An example of dramatic irony would be when King Oedipus, who has unknowingly killed his father, says that he will banish his father's killer when he finds him.

The ability to detect irony is sometimes heralded as a test of intelligence and sophistication. When a text intended to be ironic is not seen as such, the effect can be disastrous. Some students have taken Swift's "Modest Proposal" literally. To be an effective piece of sustained irony, there must be some sort of audience tip-off, through style, tone, or other device.

Edith Wharton's "Roman Fever" is a masterpiece inundated with dramatic and situational ironies.

Simile

A simile is a direct, expressed comparison between two things essentially unlike each other, but resembling each other in at least one way. In formal prose, the simile is a device both of art and explanation, comparing the unfamiliar thing (to be explained) to some familiar thing (an object, event, process, etc.).

When a noun is compared to a noun, the simile is usually introduced by "like":

I see men, but they look like trees, walking. --Mark 8:24

When a verb or phrase is compared to a verb or phrase, "as" is used:

They remained constantly attentive to their goal, as a sunflower always turns and stays focused on the sun.

Here is your pencil and paper. I want you to compete as the greatest hero would in the race of his life.

Often the image (the simile itself or vehicle) precedes the thing likened to it. In such cases, "so" usually shows the comparison:

The grass bends with every wind, so does Harvey.

Other ways to create similes include the use of comparison:

His temper reminds me of a volcano; his heart, of a rock; his personality, of sandpaper.

Symbolism

A symbol is has its own identity, yet also represents something else, like an idea. For example, a sword may be a sword and also symbolize justice. A symbol may be said to embody an idea. There are two general types of symbols: universal symbols that embody universally recognizable meanings wherever used, such as light to symbolize knowledge, a skull to symbolize death, etc., and invested symbols that are given symbolic meaning by the way an author uses them in a literary work, as the white whale becomes a symbol of evil in Moby Dick.

Think of the symbols used in the stories you've read this semester. For example, what does the iron symbolize in Olsen's story?

What does the rose symbolize in Faulkner's story?

Some of the information in these lectures came from the website of Tina Buck, ACC instructor.

Created by Becky Villarreal Austin Community College 2002