Реклама. ООО «ЛитРес», ИНН: 7719571260.
Contents
Preface
Chapter One. Sources & Uses of Comparisons
Chapter Two. The Use of Animals to Describe Humans
Chapter Three. The Use of Nature to Describe Abstractions
Chapter Four. The Use of Nature to Describe Inner States
Chapter Five. The Use of Nature to Describe Language
Chapter Six. Human Biology
Chapter Seven. Extreme People & States
Chapter Eight. Occupations & Institutions
Chapter Nine. Circumstances
Chapter Ten. The Classical World & Other Sources of Story
Chapter Eleven. Architecture & Other Man-Made Things
Chapter Twelve. Personification
Chapter Thirteen. The Construction of Similes
Chapter Fourteen. The Construction of Metaphors
For Annie and Sam
Despite the greater emphasis on ideas rather than words, this can be considered another book about rhetoric – that is, about the use of language to persuade or otherwise affect an audience. This book and its predecessor draw on the prose of similar times and places, and both were inspired in part by texts on rhetoric that were written for students of the subject in ancient Greece and Rome. Rhetoric now has a bad name; to many people it has come to mean bombast. I wish to help with the rehabilitation of the word, however, and to encourage its use in the honorable way that was common until recently – the sense of “rhetoric” that made it something for Lincoln to study and for Churchill to write about, and that caused it to be considered one of the liberal arts.
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5. The theory of this book has been stated but the execution of it is loose. Sometimes examples appear where consideration of them seems most convenient even if they are outside the strict topic of the chapter or heading; they may then be introduced with a “cf.” – meaning “compare (this related example).” This will give no trouble to the reader who understands the organization as just a means to an end: seeing and understanding the range of wonders that rhetorical artists have worked with comparisons. It is an unruly subject that calls for a flexible approach. Maybe a more fitting simile than a museum is a safari in which we will veer from the path as needed to get good views. Any order will do, or almost any: as noted earlier, the book really is not written to be read from front to back; it is meant to invite dedicated but arbitrary perusal (though the first chapter does provide some orientation for the rest). More important than the sequence is the pace, which is best kept leisurely. A well-conceived metaphor usually takes more time to appreciate than a literal sentence, and is worth it.
For comments, suggestions, examples, and good counsel, I wish to thank Kamela Bridges, Daniel Dickson-LaPrade, Bryan Garner, David Godine, David Greenwald, Andrew Kull, Richard Lanham, Michael Lusi, Susan Morse, Brian Perez-Daple, Christopher Ricks, Wayne Schiess, Thomas Stumpf, Jeffrey Walker, and the many rhetoric students, research assistants, and librarians over the years who have contributed to the book in one way or another. Carl W. Scarbrough created the jacket and designed the text with his usual and consummate skill.
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