Simile


 * Simile** A figure of speech in which a comparison is expressed by the specific use of a word or phrase such as: //like, as, than, seems// or Frost's favorite //"as if"//.

“He said it for himself. I see him there Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top In each hand, **//like an old-stone savage armed.”//**
 * Example 1** (From Robert Frost’s “Mending Wall”)

Here, the speaker is comparing his neighbor to a caveman. By doing so, he creates the almost comical image of a man lifting heavy rocks for a rather unnecessary purpose. The neighbor’s movements are probably rough and heavy, and the speaker seems to be mildly mocking the neighbor for working so hard when he really does not need to. This simile may also serve to emphasize the stubbornness of the neighbor. Like a caveman, who is a primitive and uneducated being, the neighbor does not question why he is building a wall in the first place: “He will not go behind his father's saying/ And he likes having thought of it so well. He says again, "Good fences make good neighbors” (45).

“The counterfeit presentment of two brothers, See what a grace was seated on this brow: Hyperion's curls, the front of Jove himself, A station like the herald Mercury** New lighted on a heaven-kissing hill.”
 * Example 2 (from Shakespeare’s //Hamlet//) (Act 3 scene 4)**
 * An eye like Mars, to threaten and command,

Here, Hamlet compares his father to the Roman gods, suggesting that Old Hamlet was as majestic and omnipotent as these deities. Thus, this simile underlines the high regard Hamlet holds for his father, even after Old Hamlet’s death. Yet, in employing such similes, Hamlet also reveals his refusal to accept his father’s mortality; in short, by comparing his father to immortal figures, Hamlet shows that he cannot accept the fact that his father has left the physical world.