اللغة الإنجليزية
Similes: Comparisons That Say Like Out Loud
A simile compares two unlike things using like or as. Three examples unpacked into what each actually claims, plus the line that separates simile from metaphor.
Simile
A simile is a comparison between two unlike things, made openly with the word like or as, in order to give one of them a quality of the other.
- أين يقابله الطلاب
- Grade 3 English, in poetry and descriptive writing, and again in every reading paper that asks what effect a writer's choice of language has.
الإجابة باختصار
A simile compares two unlike things using the word like or as, so that one lends a quality to the other: as quiet as a mouse, or ran like the wind. The comparison is stated openly, and that is what separates a simile from a metaphor, where one thing is simply called the other.
مثال
The lake was as still as glass.
Ask what the comparison actually claims and the sentence opens up. Glass is flat, unbroken and reflective, and those are the qualities being handed to the lake. Glass is also hard, cold and breakable, and none of those are being claimed at all. A reader takes only the qualities that fit, and knowing which ones those are is the whole skill being tested when a paper asks why the writer used this image.
Three similes, and what each one is really saying
A simile is not decoration. It makes a claim, and the claim can be stated in ordinary words — which is the test of whether a reader has understood it rather than merely spotted it.
Notice how much difference a single word makes in the third example. Like a deer on its own suggests grace and delicacy. Startled turns the whole image towards panic, and the running becomes clumsy rather than elegant.
- As quiet as a mouse — claims silence, and only silence. Not smallness or timidity, though those follow the mouse into the sentence. It is also a cliché: so worn that the reader stops picturing a mouse at all
- Her voice was like honey — claims smooth, slow and sweet. Note that it describes a sound using taste and texture, and that crossing between the senses is exactly why it works
- He ran like a startled deer — claims sudden, fast and frightened, all at once
The one line that separates simile from metaphor
A simile says a thing is like another thing. A metaphor says it is the other thing. He fights like a lion is a simile; he is a lion in a fight is a metaphor, and nothing else about the two sentences has changed.
A metaphor is the bolder of the two because it refuses to admit that the comparison is a comparison. A simile keeps a small distance — the word like is a reminder that this is a resemblance and not a fact — which can make it gentler, more precise, and easier to extend over several lines without becoming absurd.
When like is not a simile at all
The word like is not a switch that turns any sentence into a simile. She looks like her mother compares two people, which are things of the same kind, so nothing figurative has happened; it is a plain literal statement. A simile needs a gap between the two things, and the wider the gap, the more work the comparison does.
Two more uses to rule out. Like as a filler in speech — it was, like, freezing — is not a comparison of anything. And like meaning for example, as in fruits like mangoes and guavas, is giving instances rather than drawing a resemblance. Check what the word is doing in the sentence before naming the device. That check takes a second and it prevents the commonest error in a language paper, which is naming a device that is not actually there.
أسئلة شائعة
What is the difference between a simile and a metaphor?
A simile says something is like something else, using like or as. A metaphor says it is the other thing. The sea was like a sheet of steel is a simile; the sea was a sheet of steel is a metaphor. Both compare, but only one of them admits it.
Does a simile have to use like or as?
In school work, that is the test to apply. A few comparisons use than, as in colder than charity, or as though and as if, and a teacher will accept these if you explain the comparison being made. But if you are naming devices in an exam, the safest similes to point at are the ones with like or as in them.
Is a simile the same as an idiom?
No, although some phrases are both. An idiom is an expression whose meaning cannot be worked out from the words, such as raining cats and dogs. A simile can always be worked out from the words, because it names the two things being compared. As cool as a cucumber happens to be a simile and an idiom at once.
How do I write a good simile?
Avoid the ones you have already heard. As white as snow and as fast as lightning pass through a reader without leaving a picture, because they have been used too often. Choose something the reader has genuinely seen but has not connected to the thing you are describing, and only claim the qualities you actually mean.
آخر تحديث
معرفة الكلمة ليست كاستخدامها
يستطيع المعلّم أن يرى الطالب وهو يستعمله في سؤال، فيتبيّن أين يتوقف الفهم بالضبط. الحصة الأولى مجانية.