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Personification in literature gives human qualities to non-human entities, often used in poetry, prose, and everyday speech. It is a form of metaphor used to describe something by comparing it to something more familiar. Ancient cultures used personification to view natural forces, reflected in myths and legends. Modern writers continue to use personification in literature in unusual ways, such as giving human personality and desires to inanimate objects or personifying abstract human experiences.
The function of personification in literature is to give a concept or object human characteristics, usually to describe its qualities or to make a statement about human behavior. Personification is the term for assigning human qualities to non-human entities, also sometimes called anthropomorphism. It is often used in poetry, prose and song lyrics, as well as in everyday speech. Personification in literature is often a form of metaphor, a method of describing something by comparing it to something more familiar. Emotions, abstract concepts, and natural forces have all been endowed with human characteristics in myth and literature.
The use of personification in literature includes some of the earliest surviving literary works. Aesop’s fables, dating back to at least 400 BC, were famous for giving motivations and human shortcomings to animals and natural forces such as the wind and the sun. Ancient cultures often viewed natural forces in a similar way, and this has been reflected, for example, in the myths and legends of the Greek gods. The Greek writer Homer turned this belief into a literary device, employing the personification in his epic poems The Iliad and The Odyssey. The latter poem opens with a prayer to the Muses; these Greek goddesses were the personifications of art forms such as poetry and dance.
Writers sometimes use personification in literature to express an idea. In his 19th-century poem “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” John Keats briefly compares the title urn to a human historian. He does not retain this metaphor elsewhere in the poem; it’s just a way to convey how the urn brings the knowledge and art of antiquity into modern times. In other verses, Keats likens the urn to a child and a virgin bride. He uses these descriptions because readers of his day would associate them with innocence and pristine beauty, qualities he wishes to assign to the Greek vase.
The 20th century poem “Rhapsody on a Winter Night” by TS Eliot is perhaps one of the best known examples of personification in literature. Eliot assigns human qualities to a lamppost, which he then narrates the rest of the poem. The lamp depicts the moon above as an old woman, alone in the night with a faded memory of her and some precious possessions. In the 1920s, composer Andrew Lloyd Webber adapted the poem into the hit song “Memory” from his musical Cats, introducing a new generation to Eliot’s words.
Modern writers continue to use personification in literature, sometimes in unusual ways. In his 1990 novel Skinny Legs and All, Tom Robbins gives human personality and desires to a group of inanimate objects, including a spoon and a can of beans. In addition to being a classic example of Robbins’ eccentric style, the trick allows Robbins to comment on human activity from the perspective of non-human objects. In the same decade, Neil Gaiman’s comic The Sandman personified abstract human experiences, such as desire and madness, into central characters. The title character was the personification of the human dream.
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