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Definition of Simile
A simile is a figure of speech that directly compares two unlike things. To make the comparison, similes most often use the connecting words "like" or "as," but can also... read full definition
A simile is a figure of speech that directly compares two unlike things. To make the comparison, similes most often use the connecting words "like... read full definition
A simile is a figure of speech that directly compares two unlike things. To make the comparison, similes most often... read full definition
Book 1, Chapter 10
Explanation and Analysis—Mephistopheles:
The Veneerings’ matchmaking arrangement raises red flags even before the marriage. Just prior to the Lammles’ wedding ceremony, Dickens introduces a troubling simile and allusion that previews some of the marital troubles to come:
But, hark! A carriage at the gate, and Mortimer’s man arrives, looking rather like a spurious Mephistopheles and an unacknowledged member of that gentleman’s family.
Mortimer’s “spurious Mephistopheles” is a reference to Goethe’s Faust, a play in which its titular protagonist sells his soul to Mephistopheles (the devil) in hopes of rekindling his interest in the world. Aided by his infernal partner, he wins over his lover but must pay the price in the end. While Goethe’s two-part work manages to redeem its fallen protagonist, it highlights the dangers of temptation and disillusionment.
Comparing Mr. Lammle to Mephistopheles makes for telling prophecy. Under the spell of this allusion, the Mrs. Lammle-to-be walks straight into a “Devil’s bargain.” At the end of Book 1, Chapter 10, she strikes a deal with her fraudulent husband to keep up appearances and “to work together in furtherance of our own schemes.” The couple cooks up nefarious plots.
The crucial difference between Mrs. Lammle and Faust is that Dickens’s bride is far less successful. Faust at least seduces his lover under Mephistopheles’s wing, but the novel’s “spurious” devil fails miserably. The Lammles win neither the Podsnaps nor the Boffins. Rather, they get ensnared by yet another Mephistopheles, Fledgeby, who fleeces them of even their furniture and forces them to leave the country. Our Mutual Friend pulls back the curtain on an entire food chain of devils and demons.
Related Themes:
Book 2, Chapter 8
Explanation and Analysis—Cheesy Money:
Dickens’s simile in Book 2, Chapter 8 offers fresh perspective for his appraisal of the Boffins’ wealth. Our Mutual Friend opens the scene with a glimpse at the newly minted millionaires:
The minion of fortune and the worm of the hour, or in less cutting language, Nicodemus Boffin, Esquire, the Golden Dustman, had become as much at home in his eminently aristocratic family mansion as he was likely ever to be. He could not but feel that, like an eminently aristocratic family cheese, it was much too large for his wants, and bred an infinite amount of parasites; but he was content to regard this drawback on his property as a sort of perpetual Legacy Duty.
In a comic simile, Dickens likens the Golden Dustman’s sprawling estate to a “family cheese”—hole-ridden, far too large, and home for an “infinite amount of parasites.” By placing wealth and food in humorously close proximity, this comparison strengthens the force of Dickens’s satire. The novel takes down the pretensions of wealth through an unlikely equivalence with pungent cheese.
Similes of this kind were a standard tactic of Victorian humor, which often involved merging the highbrow and lofty with the ordinary. Dickens’s simile relies on a juxtaposition of sorts—difference only sharpens the sense of similarity. He joins aristocratic outlays to subjects as disparate and humble as cheese, teasing out comedy from their sharp contrasts and unexpected resemblances.
Related Themes:
