Metaphorical language uses metaphors to transfer meaning from one word to another. It is often used in poetry, song lyrics, and novels to create a particular mood or for descriptive purposes. Ordinary people also use metaphorical language in speech to describe characteristics or initiate actions.
Metaphorical language is any form of language that makes use of metaphor. Metaphors are literary devices that say something is, in fact, something else entirely. William Shakespeare’s famous quote, “All the world is a stage, and all men and women are but actors” is a good example of metaphorical language. Shakespeare is not suggesting that the world is literally a stage, but he is instead using the word stage to represent to discuss something else that would be associated with stages.
The word “metaphor” comes from the Greek word metapherin, which literally means “to transfer.” The literary device of the metaphor transfers meaning from one word to another. The statement “The car has become an oven in the summer heat” doesn’t mean that the car is literally an oven, but that it takes on some of the qualities of an oven, such as being very hot, in the summer heat. Metaphors are like similes but they don’t use the words “like” or “like” in comparing two things. A metaphor states that one thing is another.
There are many uses for metaphorical language, but it is often used in poetry, song lyrics, or novels. For example, in “The Highwayman,” Alfred Noyes writes “The wind was a torrent of darkness through the gusty trees.” Using the metaphor of the wind as a “torrent of darkness,” he is able to evoke the feelings he wants to associate with both darkness and wind. Create a particular mood through the comparison of two unrelated things. Writers may also use metaphorical language for descriptive purposes, saying things like “The room was a cell,” which automatically evokes an image of a confined, unfurnished space.
Ordinary people also use metaphorical language quite heavily in speech. If someone said, “John is a pig when he eats,” he would not be saying that John turns into a pig when food is presented to him, but he would be saying that John has characteristics commonly associated with pigs when he eats. Essentially, the person would say that John is greedy and messy with food. Metaphorical language can be used in other ways as well, saying things like, “The conversation piqued my interest in philosophy.” The verb “sparkled” is used metaphorically to mean caused or initiated.
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