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Anonymous Posted 15 years ago
Grammar
Metaphors
Can the word "than" be part of the construct of a metaphor? For example, "He was meaner than a junkyard dog." or "The inside was warmer than the mid-day sun."
Top answer
No, those aren't metaphors. In a metaphor you literally say that something IS something else. For example "The moon is a ghostly galleon".
- No, those aren't metaphors.
- In a metaphor you literally say that something IS something else.
- For example "The moon is a ghostly galleon".
- If you say something IS LIKE something else, that's a simile.
- But in "He was meaner than a junkyard dog", you're just saying that he was MEAN ( pronoun was adjective ), and that his amount of meanness was greater than the meanness of a junkyard dog.
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1 Answers
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No, those aren't metaphors. In a metaphor you literally say that something IS something else. For example "The moon is a ghostly galleon". If you say something IS LIKE something else, that's a simile. But in "He was meaner than a junkyard dog", you're just saying that he was MEAN (pronoun was adjective), and that his amount of meanness was greater than the meanness of a junkyard dog.
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