Allison Krug
Prof. Irving
1 May 2017 Figures of Speech in To a Wasp and The Writer
Figures of speech are a commonly used type of literary device. They bring a story to life and give it that extra "spark" to enhance its meaning, opening new layers. Another use is to help the reader to better clarify the material and give emphasis on what they have read. The poems To a Wasp and The Writer, provide vivid and powerful examples of similes and metaphors, which literally “build” the poems. This paper will focus on the analysis of the figures of speech used in these two poems and the meaning that they add to them. Richard Wilbur’s The Writer is built heavily on similes and metaphors. In the second stanza, the sound of the typewriter that the author’s daughter is using is compared “like a chain hauled over a gunwale” (648). In combination with the word “commotion”, this simile creates the image of the struggle the daughter is having while trying to write or in this case it is possible she might have writer’s block. She is confused and maybe disturbed, and every keystroke sounds loud. The third stanza contains a metaphor that “the stuff of her life is a great cargo” (648). This metaphor is developed by the author who wishes his daughter “a lucky passage”. The author reveals in the …show more content…
Tracy Caldwell believes that these are metaphors used by the author that allow him in a relatively short poem to capture “not only the essence of feelings parents harbor over their children’s activities, but also the difficulty of expressing oneself via language…” ( ).
In Janice Moore’s To a Wasp,
Works Cited
Caldwell, Tracy M. "Richard Wilbur's "The Writer.." Literary Contexts in Poetry: Richard Wilbur's 'The Writer', Mar. 2006, pp. 1-6. EBSCOhost,
Prof. Irving
1 May 2017 Figures of Speech in To a Wasp and The Writer
Figures of speech are a commonly used type of literary device. They bring a story to life and give it that extra "spark" to enhance its meaning, opening new layers. Another use is to help the reader to better clarify the material and give emphasis on what they have read. The poems To a Wasp and The Writer, provide vivid and powerful examples of similes and metaphors, which literally “build” the poems. This paper will focus on the analysis of the figures of speech used in these two poems and the meaning that they add to them. Richard Wilbur’s The Writer is built heavily on similes and metaphors. In the second stanza, the sound of the typewriter that the author’s daughter is using is compared “like a chain hauled over a gunwale” (648). In combination with the word “commotion”, this simile creates the image of the struggle the daughter is having while trying to write or in this case it is possible she might have writer’s block. She is confused and maybe disturbed, and every keystroke sounds loud. The third stanza contains a metaphor that “the stuff of her life is a great cargo” (648). This metaphor is developed by the author who wishes his daughter “a lucky passage”. The author reveals in the …show more content…
Tracy Caldwell believes that these are metaphors used by the author that allow him in a relatively short poem to capture “not only the essence of feelings parents harbor over their children’s activities, but also the difficulty of expressing oneself via language…” ( ).
In Janice Moore’s To a Wasp,
Works Cited
Caldwell, Tracy M. "Richard Wilbur's "The Writer.." Literary Contexts in Poetry: Richard Wilbur's 'The Writer', Mar. 2006, pp. 1-6. EBSCOhost,