All 6 Uses of
simile
in
The Iliad by Homer - (translated by: Pope)
- If we observe his descriptions, images, and similes, we shall find the invention still predominant.†
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- As a metaphor is a short simile, one of these epithets is a short description.†
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- It is owing to the same vast invention, that his similes have been thought too exuberant and full of circumstances.†
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- His similes are like pictures, where the principal figure has not only its proportion given agreeable to the original, but is also set off with occasional ornaments and prospects.†
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- As it also breaks out in every particular image, description, and simile, whoever lessens or too much softens those, takes off from this chief character.†
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- He sometimes omits whole similes and sentences; and is now and then guilty of mistakes, into which no writer of his learning could have fallen, but through carelessness.†
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Definition:
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(simile) a phrase that highlights similarity between things of different kinds -- usually formed with "like" or "as"
as in "It's like looking for a needle in a haystack," or "She is as quiet as a mouse."editor's notes: While metaphors and similes are both techniques of figurative language. The distinction is that a simile explicitly shows that a comparison is being made, by using words such as "like" or "as". A metaphor simply substitutes words assuming the reader will understand the meaning should not be take literally. "She is like a diamond in the rough" is a simile; while "She is a diamond in the rough" is a metaphor.