Once again I’ll be piggybacking on Copyblogger for this week’s Weekly Grammaticalness.
I find it important, because we all use analogies, metaphors and similes every day. Most of them are small, and we likely don’t even think about them when we use them. However, they can be a very useful tool when trying to explain something to a reader, client or customer.
Copyblogger does an excellent job of explaining the differences between analogies, metaphors and similes. Check out the post.
A similar device Copyblogger left out was the allegory. Allegorical tales are less popular and not used very often. However, they are used in comedy quite frequently.
An allegory is a one-to-one comparison or substitution of something figuritve for something literal. While this is extremely similar to a metaphor, allegories are usually more subtle and a lot more involved, taking up entire books and pieces of art.
Perhaps the most famous allegorical tales are in literature, Sir Walter Raleigh’s Faerie Queen and Orwell’s Animal Farm are two famous examples I can think of.
