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How Does Steinbeck Use Metaphors In The Chrysanthemums

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What is a metaphor? A metaphor is a figure of speech where a comparison is made between two things based on similarity. Metaphors are widely used in literature today and are very important. They can create powerful and lasting images and ideas. Metaphors make the images described by the author more creative and interesting. The best writers use metaphors in their writing. The short story “The Chrysanthemums” by John Steinbeck is a great story pervaded with metaphors. The story opens in the Salinas Valley at Henry Allen’s ranch in the foothills during December. As Steinbeck describes “The high grey-flannel fog of winter closed off the Salinas Valley from the sky and from the rest of the world. On every side it sat like a lid on the mountains and made the great valley a closed pot”(438). This description of the valley portrays that it is enclosed. Steinbeck is using the imagery of the grey-flannel fog surrounding the valley as an indicator of their isolated world. …show more content…

Elisa is unhappy with her life, feels trapped, and unappreciated. The only way out for her frustration is her flower garden where she grows beautiful chrysanthemums. The chrysanthemums symbolize Elisa and the limited scope of her life. Her husband is always too busy on the farm with the cattle so she never has enough attention or any kind of affection. Her husband also does not find any interest in her chrysanthemums. Her husbands remark “I wish you’d work out in the orchard and raise some apples that big” (439) shows how little interest he has in her chrysanthemums and even

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In John Steinbacks “The Chrysanthemums,” the shift of the setting from the ranch to the road plays an important role in the development of the main character, Elisa. Therefore, in the first setting, Elisa is in her garden attending to her the chrysanthemums, which she loves and cares for. Immediately, we’re placed in a rural setting, where women happen to live in isolation and man is manly. Elisa sneaks quick glances towards the men by the tractor shed, who is talking to her husband, waiting for them to leave, so she can throw aside her gloves and work her fingers into the soil of the garden. However, Elisa shows her fearless side by quickly digging in the garden, with her eagerness to grow her chrysanthemums, right after the men leave.

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Another example of metaphors in

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Martin Luther King, Jr. uses metaphors to make his argument in “The Letter To Birmingham Jail” by saying things such as “I guess it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging darts of segregation to say wait.” He refers this quote to when the people were being perilously brutalized by police officers. They were kicked, cursed at, and treated awfully, however. I believe one reason Martin Luther King uses metaphors in his writing to show you more detail and give you a visual of what he is saying in his pious mind. Martin Luther King, for example, uses metaphors to show detail when he talks about little girls not being able to go and play on the playground with other white children.

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John Steinbeck’s short story, “Chrysanthemums”, was written in 1938. The story tells of a woman’s struggle to find self respect and worth from her male counterpart within a very patriarchal society. Throughout the story symbols are constantly used and Steinbeck specifically chooses symbolism in order to express the inequality of women during that time. The use of chrysanthemums in Steinbeck’s story is to symbolize Elisa and her self worth.

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Further supporting Henry’s expectations, the way Elisa dresses while she gardens, downplays her femininity. As Elisa is busy working in the fields, her hair gets in her way and she moves it to the side. In the process she “left a smudge of earth on her cheek” (1). Having dirt on her face did not concern her, and so she did not take time to remove it. In Elisa’s mind, tending her garden allows her to find inner happiness amongst her chrysanthemums.

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The Chrysanthemums Literary Analysis One of the themes of “The Chrysanthemums” by John Steinbeck is gender inequality. In this short story, the main character Elisa Allen was a strong, smart woman who was stuck being a common housewife. Elisa wishes she could go out and be like the tinker, sleeping under the stars and adventuring every day of her life. Elisa’s husband owns a ranch of some sorts, and when he tells Elisa of the business deal he’d just made he gave her an unspecific explanation, or a dumbed down one so he doesn’t “confuse her”.

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In Elliot, A Soldier’s Fugue by Quiara Alegria Hudes, Ginny, mother to Elliot, suffers from PTSD, and maintains a garden as a means of possessing a sense of stability. In 4/Prelude, she recalls her purpose for bringing the garden to life, and the memories it brings back when she spends time there. Through elements of style such as diction, figurative language, and imagery, Hudes establishes Ginny’s garden as a symbol of healing. In this scene, Hudes establishes Ginny’s garden as a symbol of healing, as she utilizes diction to reference Ginny’s specific reasons for constructing the garden, and memories of Vietnam.

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Poets use metaphors in poems to describe the difference between the two things that you are comparing. Metaphors help the reader to understand the poem more clearly. Poets sometimes use metaphors to compare characters within the poem. In Cathy Song’s poem “The Youngest Daughter,” the poet uses metaphors to help the reader understand the relationship between the mother and the daughter. The poet distinguishes the differences of the mother and daughter.

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As the short story progresses, we see a recurring imagery of sunshine that seems to highlight Elisa mentally and physically. In the article, Timmerman states, “Organizational and Gendered Imagery in John Steinbeck's ‘The Chrysanthemums.’”, the author explains how organizational imagery occurs in two different moments of the story, as he writes, “The color yellow used throughout the paragraph accentuates the illusion of sunshine… It remains an illusionary world wrapped in fog” (Timmerman, 32). This line reveals that the sunshine that we as readers see at times of the short story, is just an illusion and the reality is the fog that sets the mood of the story and reflects Elisa. The imagery of the bright direction, shows that in this world there

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Metaphors are an influential piece to the literary world due to, “the process of using symbols to know reality occurs”, stated by rhetoric Sonja Foss in Metaphoric Criticism. The significance of this, implies metaphors are “central to thought and to our knowledge and expectation of reality” (Foss 188). Although others may see metaphors as a difficult expression. Metaphors provide the ability to view a specific content and relate to connect with involvement, a physical connection to view the context with clarity. As so used in Alice Walker’s literary piece, In Search Of Our Mothers’ Gardens.

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I mainly use metaphors to help someone better understand a concept. For example, one could say that another is a walking dictionary. This helps us to infer something about another person. We assume that she knows a lot of words and definitions. Right now, I mainly see a lot of repetition and metaphors in music.

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Of Mice And Men John Steinbeck’s novella ‘Of Mice and Men’ published in the 1930’s employs carefully considered narrative techniques that effectively inject sympathy within the reader. The chain of events are foreshadowed through speech, Death and Lennie Small. Curlys Wife soon becomes the instrument who destroys the dream. Steinbeck demonstrates this through various techniques including of foreshadowing, realism, symbolism, circular structure, significance of the title and setting.

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In her short story “Marigolds”, Eugenia Collier, tells the story of a young woman named Lizabeth growing up in rural Maryland during the Depression. Lizabeth is on the verge of becoming an adult, but one moment suddenly makes her feel more woman than child and has an impact on the rest of her life. Through her use of diction, point of view, and symbolism, Eugenia Collier develops the theme that people can create beauty in their lives even in the poorest of situations. Through her use of the stylistic device diction, Eugenia Collier is able to describe to the reader the beauty of the marigolds compared to the drab and dusty town the story is set in.

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In addition, metaphors can be utilised as an evaluation instrument as a part of foundations whereby, an instructor requests that the understudies frame a section out of a specific metaphor to uncover their comprehension of that specific metaphor. Moreover, a metaphor is humorous and has comparability between the ideas in the meantime and that makes metaphors exceptionally helpful in composing of writing. Metaphors are additionally used to make talking and listening all the more intriguing, they convey bigly with only an expression or few words. At long last, metaphors can get readers and audience members to think about the connection they are hearing or perusing about since they infer, rather straightforwardly expressing the connections, it

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Alice Walker uses imagery and diction throughout her short story to tell the reader the meaning of “The Flowers”. The meaning of innocence lost and people growing up being changed by the harshness of reality. The author is able to use the imagery to show the difference between innocence and the loss of it. The setting is also used to show this as well.

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