Metaphor

A metaphor is "a figure of speech that, for literary effect, refers to one thing by mentioning another," and it "invites the audience to make a comparison between two normally unrelated entities or ideas." The word comes from the Greek metaphorá, "transference (of ownership)", and the article observes that "the word metaphor itself is a metaphor." Its example is Shakespeare's "All the world's a stage, / And all the men and women merely players," with the world as the tenor and the stage the vehicle. The near neighbor differs by one grammatical step: a metaphor's comparison is implied or assumed, while the extra wording of a simile makes the comparison more obvious or explicit.

For novelists metaphor is compression: one transferred image carries information and attitude at once, and a fresh one marks voice faster than any adverb. Two cautions: a worn metaphor does no work, and a stack of ornate ones tips into purple prose, the same earn-your-ornament test as show, don't tell. In a serial, an established metaphor quietly becomes canon that readers reread later chapters against.