Metaphor Quotes - Page 32

• The drive toward the formation of metaphors is the fundamental human drive, which one cannot for a single instant dispense with in thought , for one would thereby dispense with man himself.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Men, Instant, Humans

  Friedrich Nietzsche “Delphi Complete Works of Friedrich Nietzsche (Illustrated): Friedrich Nietzsche”, Delphi Classics

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• We didn't build our bridges simply to avoid walking on water. Nothing so obvious. A bridge is a meeting place. A neutral place. A casual place. Enemies will choose to meet on a bridge and end their quarrel in that void... For lovers, a bridge is a possibility, a metaphor of their chances. And for the traffic in whispered goods, where else but a bridge in the night?

  Jeanette Winterson

  Night, Bridges, Water

  Jeanette Winterson (2007). “The Passion”, p.57, Grove/Atlantic, Inc.

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• Metaphor has traditionally been regarded as the matrix and pattern of the figures of speech.

  Marshall McLuhan

  Speech, Patterns, Figures

  "Laws of Media: The New Science". p. 231. Book by Marshall McLuhan and Eric McLuhan, 1988.

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• Let the snake wait under his weed and the writing be of words, slow and quick, sharp to strike, quiet to wait, sleepless. - through metaphor to reconcile the people and the stones. Compose. (No ideas but in things) Invent! Saxifrage is my flower that splits the rocks.

  William Carlos Williams

  Weed, Flower, Writing

  William Carlos Williams (1991). “The Collected Poems of Williams Carlos Williams: 1939-1962”, p.455, New Directions Publishing

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• through metaphor to reconcile the people and the stones.

  William Carlos Williams

  People, Stones, Reconcile

  1944 The Wedge, 'A Sort of Song'.

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• The world that is a book is devoured bya reader who is a letter in the world's text; thus a circular metaphor is created for the endlessness of reading; We are what we read.

  Alberto Manguel

  Book, Reading, World

  1996 A History of Reading.

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• We are a people captivated by the power and romance of metaphor, forever seeking the invisible through the image of the visible.

  Lewis H. Lapham

  People, Romance, Forever

  "Waiting For The Barbarians" by Lewis H. Lapham, (p. 88), 1997.

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• It is one thing, then, to say, "The Bible contains the religion revealed by God ," and quite another to say, "Whatever is contained in the Bible is religion, and was revealed by God." If the latter be accepted, metaphor and allegory become literal statements and the errors and absurdities of bibliolatry follow.

  Lionel Trilling

  Errors, Accepted, Latter

  Lionel Trilling (1939). “Matthew Arnold”

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• What on earth is modern exegesis up to? Oh, little lazy one! Some red wine and up! Off you go, brandishing your fork, stripped of Ophelia's useless ornaments, fire in your large nostrils, out to rake the muck of metaphors.

  Louis Aragon

  Wine, Fire, Lazy

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• It seems clear that the Bible belongs to an area of language in which metaphor is functional, and were we have to surrender precision for flexibility.

  Northrop Frye

  Language, Surrender, Precision

  "The Great Code: The Bible and Literature". Book by Northrop Frye, 1981.

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• Literally, the Bible is a gigantic myth, a narrative extending over the whole of time from creation to apocalypse, unified by a body of recurring imagery that "freezes" into a single metaphor cluster, the metaphors all being identified with the body of the Messiah, the man who is all men, the totality logoi who is one Logos, the grain of sand that is the world.

  Northrop Frye

  Men, World, Body

  "The Great Code: The Bible and Literature". Book by Northrop Frye, 1981.

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• Metaphors of unity and integration take us only so far, because they are derived from the finiteness of the human mind.

  Northrop Frye

  Unity, Mind, Integration

  Northrop Frye, Alvin A. Lee (2006). “The Great Code: The Bible and Literature”, p.189, University of Toronto Press

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• This is the highest honour of the Church, that, until He is united to us, the Son of God reckons himself in some measure imperfect. What consolation is it for us to learn, that, not until we are along with him, does he possess all his parts, or wish to be regarded as complete! Hence, in the First Epistle to the Corinthians, when the apostle discusses largely the metaphor of a human body, he includes under the single name of Christ the whole Church.

  John Calvin

  Son, Names, Church

  "Commentaries on the Epistles of Paul to the Galatians and Ephesians" by Jean Calvin, William Pringle, Edinburgh, (p. 218), 1854.

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• This is what metaphor is. It is not saying that an ant is an elephant. Perhaps; both are alive. No. Metaphor is saying the ant is an elephant. Now, logically speaking, I know there is a difference. If you put elephants and ants before me, I believe that every time I will correctly identify the elephant and the ant. So metaphor must come from a very different place than that of the logical, intelligent mind. It comes from a place that is very courageous, willing to step out of our preconceived ways of seeing things and open so large that it can see the oneness in an ant and in an elephant.

  Natalie Goldberg

  Believe, Intelligent, Elephants

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• The number one metaphor I have in my mind for writing a screenplay is that...you're trying to climb a mountain blindfolded. And the funny thing about that is, you think, 'Okay, that's hard because you're climbing up a rock face, and you don't know where you're going, and you don't know where the top is, you can't see what's below you...' But actually the hardest part about climbing a mountain blindfolded is just finding the mountain.

  Michael Arndt

  Writing, Thinking, Numbers

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• On several occasions, we are informed that the professional ideal 'took steps', 'organised assaults', and 'selected social problems'. But this is anthropomorphic metaphor implausibly masquerading as historical explanation.

  David Cannadine

  Book, Historical, Steps

  David Cannadine (1998). “History in Our Time”, Penguin Group USA

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• Ownership by delegation is a contradiction in terms. When men say, for instance (by a false metaphor), that each member of the public should feel himself an owner of public property-such as a Town Park-and should therefore respect it as his own, they are saying something which all our experience proves to be completely false. No man feels of public property that it is his own; no man will treat it with the care of the affection of a thing which is his own.

  Hilaire Belloc

  Men, Care, Politics

  Hilaire Belloc (2002). “An Essay on the Restoration of Property”, p.25, IHS Press

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• Jerusalem has been - and for many, still is - a metaphor for destruction and the vengeance of an offended God. She is the city where believers have killed unbelievers to give life to faith.

  Amos Elon

  Cities, Giving, Atheism

  Amos Elon (1995). “Jerusalem, Battlegrounds of Memory”, Kodansha Globe

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• A creed is an ossified metaphor.

  Elbert Hubbard

  Atheism, Creeds, Positive Atheism

  Elbert Hubbard (1911). “A Thousand & One Epigrams: Selected from the Writings of Elbert Hubbard”

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• It was easier than explaining DiMaggio's use as a metaphor.

  Paul Simon

  Baseball, Use, Easier

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• Catastrophe Theory is-quite likely-the first coherent attempt (since Aristotelian logic) to give a theory on analogy. When narrow-minded scientists object to Catastrophe Theory that it gives no more than analogies, or metaphors, they do not realise that they are stating the proper aim of Catastrophe Theory, which is to classify all possible types of analogous situations.

  Rene Thom

  Science, Giving, Analogies

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• I'm interested in machines that make you aware of the process of seeing and aware of what you do when you construct the world by looking. This is interesting in itself, but more as a broad-based metaphor for how we understand the world.

  William Kentridge

  Interesting, Machines, World

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• They see me as a symbol, and not a human being. That way they can kill me, say it’s not murder it’s a metaphor.

  Ani DiFranco

  Way, Murder, Kill Me

  Song: Crime For Crime, Album: Not a Pretty Girl, 1995

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• A black boxer's career is the perfect metaphor for the career of a black male. Every day is like being in the gym, sparring with impersonal opponents as one faces the rudeness and hostility that a black male must confront in the United States, where he is the object of both fear and fascination.

  Ishmael Reed

  Careers, Perfect, Black

  Ishmael Reed (1988). “Writin' is fightin': thirty-seven years of boxing on paper”, Scribner

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• The system metaphor is a story that everyone--customers, programmers, and managers--can tell about how the system works.

  Kent Beck

  Stories, Programmers, Customers

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