The Stimulation of Similes

I love a good simile. Who doesn’t? They shoot off fireworks in the mind—stimulating. And a good simile is a point of connection between an author and a reader. Similes and metaphors say: Look! I’ve noticed a connection between these two things. Do you? Similes add another layer of enjoyment when we read.

So, what’s a simile?

Both metaphors and similes make comparative connections. But let’s stick to similes for the moment. A simile is a comparison between two things that are seemingly unrelated and usually uses a helping word such as like, or as. For example, here’s one by Barnett Cocks. “A committee is a cul-de-sac down which ideas are lured and then quietly strangled.” A cul-de sac and a committee are two very different things. Yet, often, when something bad happens it happens on lonely dead-end roads. It’s an apt comparison.

Similes can be subtle and thoughtful, or a bit outlandish such as is this one from M. T. Anderson’s book The Game of Sunken Places. “Bravo, boy. About time you struck out on your own. Instead of sticking to your friend like a tapeworm in a dowager’s belly.” If used anywhere other than Anderson’s middle grade, humorous book this simile would stick out like a sore thumb. (That last sentence is an overused simile—but it makes the point.)

How to use similes

For similes to work well they need to be laced into your writing in a way that contributes to the piece without standing out so much that they yank the reader out of the world of the story. That is, they need to do the work of creating a picture in the reader’s mind that clarifies the comparison and deepens understanding. This happens a lot in poetry. Especially when we see the poet’s mind in motion. When the poem wanders a bit, and questions are being raised or disparate images come one after the other, it’s because the poet’s mind has picked up a connection between the images or happenings he/she is writing about.

In such cases the comparison can slip in with an implied like or as, since much of poetry is truncated. For example, these opening lines of Billy Collins’ poem “The Afterlife” do not use the words like or as, but function as a simile. “While you are preparing for sleep, brushing your teeth, / or riffling through a magazine in bed, / the dead of the day are setting out on their journey.” So, what’s implied is that just like the dead preparing for their journeys, you prepare for bed. It works well. A little startling, but it’s a comparison that clarifies the rest of the poem—and, though he doesn’t state it directly—it lets us know that this business of dying is as everyday as brushing your teeth and getting ready for bed.

In haiku we often come across implied similes due to the use of juxtaposing images (In the study of Japanese poetry this is called toriawase. Literally: taking and putting together.). When images are set side by side in a haiku the words like or as may not be present, but the reader is being asked to make that comparison. Such as in this classic poem by master Matsuo Bashō (1644-1694).

In the twilight rain
these brilliant-hued hibiscus—
a lovely sunset.

(Note: Don’t confuse an implied simile with metaphor just because the connecting words are not present. In a metaphor one object stands in for or symbolizes another. “America is a melting pot.” “He’s a bulldog holding on to that new idea of his.”)

What good similes do:

A good simile compares two quite different things. Were you to write “The United States is like Great Britain,” you’d have to go further and tell us more about the ways they are similar. This is comparison through exposition, not a simile. It compares two things that are already very much alike.

A simile highlights a specific, somewhat hidden way that dissimilar objects/abstractions are alike.  “A first love is as exciting as a rollercoaster.” Or, “Mr. Bigg’s speech touched off a response in the audience like the Hindenburg.” (Destroying everything.)

And, as in the Anderson example above, if it’s a zany/alarming/hilarious connection between two different things, it still needs to slip comfortably into the context of the work like a bespoke bit of clothing. Your writing should wear it well.

To sum up

• Similes use “like” or “as,” or some other connective word/phrase to make a comparison. (In some cases, especially in poetry, the connecting words may simply be implied.)
• Similes make comparisons between the less obvious aspects of at least two quite different things/abstractions/etc.
• Similes should fit naturally within the voice/context/dialog of the written piece. They should never be so startling that it takes the reader out of the world the writer has created.

A few favorite similies

As I said at the beginning of this post, I like similes. When I read, I will often jot down in a journal any interesting ones I find. Here are a few for you to enjoy.

• From Everything Sad is Untrue by Danial Nayeri. (About the houses where “the Committee” people lived in Iran.) “The houses were unmarked and sat in rows of tense neighborhoods like uncracked knuckles.”
• From The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros. (About dancing with her Uncle Nacho. “My feet swell big and heavy like plungers.”
• From poem #372 by Emily Dickinson. “After great pain, a formal feeling comes –/ The Nerves sit ceremonious, like Tombs –“
• From Nine Coaches Waiting by Mary Stewart. “He was driving like a careful insult.”
• From The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler. “I drove back to Hollywood feeling like a short length of chewed string.”
• From New York Times book reviewer Dwight Garner. (About a biography of Kay Thompson.) “Reading ‘Kay Thompson’ is like running a cheese grater across your central nervous system.”