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Irony
Definition of Metaphor
A metaphor is a figure of speech that compares two different things by saying that one thing is the other. The comparison in a metaphor can be stated explicitly, as... read full definition
A metaphor is a figure of speech that compares two different things by saying that one thing is the other. The comparison in a metaphor... read full definition
A metaphor is a figure of speech that compares two different things by saying that one thing is the other... read full definition
Day Two: Afternoon
Explanation and Analysis—Ladders and Wheels:
In Day Two: Afternoon, Stevens continues to reflect on what makes a good butler and, relatedly, what makes a "distinguished household," the kind of place a butler should aspire to work in. He uses two metaphors to compare the viewpoints of older generations of butlers and his generation, who he says had different criteria for their ideal employers.
Butlers of my father’s generation, I would say, tended to see the world in terms of a ladder – the houses of royalty, dukes and the lords from the oldest families placed at the top, those of ‘new money’ lower down and so on, until one reached a point below which the hierarchy was determined simply by wealth – or the lack of it. […] For our generation, I believe it is accurate to say, viewed the world not as a ladder, but more as a wheel.
He first says older butlers, like his father, saw the world as a metaphorical ladder: there simply was a hierarchy of employers, and this hierarchy aligned with the time period's common beliefs about class and nobility. Birth was a large determining factor in this paradigm, but money also played a role when distinguishing between employers who were not in the aristocracy. But when butlers of his time determined the best families to work for, Stevens claims they saw the world not as a ladder, but as a wheel:
What occurs under the public gaze with so much pomp and ceremony is often the conclusion, or mere ratification, of what has taken place over weeks or months within the walls of such houses. To us, then, the world was a wheel, revolving with these great houses at the hub, their mighty decisions emanating out to all else, rich and poor, who revolved around them. It was the aspiration of all those of us with professional ambition to work our way as close to this hub as we were each of us capable.
He claims all the important decisions of the world—for Darlington mainly politics, but this might also be true for religion or business—are decided in private before they are offered up to the public's eye. The privacy in which great men make decisions is often a house like Darlington Hall in which a butler like Stevens works, and so Stevens compares the "great houses" to the hubs of wheels, powering all of the rotation of the rest of the wheel, even the rims furthest away. Stevens says his generation (or at least some of them—he walks back this generalization later) aimed to be near the decision-makers who wielded all the power. In the words of the wheel metaphor, they hoped to be near the hub.
Related Themes:
Day Three: Evening
Explanation and Analysis—Bold Steps:
In Day Three: Evening, Stevens reminisces about a 1935 conversation he and Lord Darlington had about politics. In it, Darlington alludes to a few of the powerful governments of the 1930s:
Ordinary, decent working people are suffering terribly. Germany and Italy have set their houses in order by acting. And so have the wretched Bolsheviks in their own way, one supposes. Even President Roosevelt, look at him, he’s not afraid to take a few bold steps on behalf of his people. But look at us here, Stevens. Year after year goes by, and nothing gets better. All we do is argue and debate and procrastinate.
This flashback, like most of the memories Stevens writes about, takes place during the interwar period. World War II was yet to begin, but the fascist regimes that eventually fought the Allied Forces were already burgeoning. When Darlington references Germany and Italy, which he sees as having solved their problems "by acting," he refers to Hitler's Germany and Mussolini's Italy, two fascist dictatorships. While Darlington clearly doesn't care for the Bolsheviks, who ran Russia during this time period, he likewise appreciates their staunch and anti-democratic control over their country. Likewise, Franklin D. Roosevelt was a U.S. president who, despite largely being considered one of the best presidents in American history, has also been criticized for growing presidential power and staying in office for longer than was the norm. In all of these examples, what Darlington appreciates is the movement from a more democratic (and, he says, cautious) government toward one that vests more power in a single person or ideological system to the detriment of other beliefs. Darlington metaphorically says Germany and Italy "have set their houses in order," and Roosevelt has taken "a few bold steps," both euphemistic ways of describing these shifts in governing norms.
Darlington goes on to use a metaphor to illustrate his point against democracy:
If your house is on fire, you don’t call the household into the drawing room and debate the various options for escape for an hour, do you?
Metaphorically, Darlington compares England's situation to a house on fire. Although the wise thing would be to act quickly, in his view, democracy has forced England to pause at this crisis point and "debate the various options" to the point of paralysis. Although he doesn't make it clear, Darlington's "house on fire" is likely the Great Recession, an economic collapse that began in the United States but quickly spread to Europe.
Related Themes:
Day Four: Afternoon
Explanation and Analysis—Deep Waters:
Stevens recalls an uncomfortable conversation he had with the younger Mr. Cardinal, who was Darlington's godson but disagreed strongly with his political decisions. While Darlington facilitates a meeting between the German ambassador and English heads of state in the other room, Cardinal describes how he sees Darlington's situation with a metaphor.
His lordship is in deep waters. I’ve watched him swimming further and further out and let me tell you, I’m getting very anxious. He’s out of his depth, you see, Stevens.
"Out of his depth" is a common English-language idiom used to mean someone cannot handle the situation they're in. Here, however, Cardinal expands it into a metaphor. With his association with and promotion of the Germans, Darlington is "swimming further and further out," possibly much further than he can survive. It's not clear what Cardinal thinks will happen to Darlington if he gets lost in these "deep waters," but it won't be good. Although Stevens says he trusts Darlington's judgement, Cardinal tries again to convince him of the danger:
I remember this American chap, even drunker than I am now, he got up at the dinner table in front of the whole company. And he pointed at his lordship and called him an amateur. Called him a bungling amateur and said he was out of his depth. Well, I have to say, Stevens, that American chap was quite right.
Here Cardinal references Mr. Lewis, the American who tried to conspire against Darlington during the "unofficial conference" held at Darlington Hall to discuss an upcoming meeting about lessening the burden of the Treaty of Versailles. In Stevens's telling, Mr. Lewis was duplicitous, but Cardinal seems to think Lewis was correct—politics shouldn't be Darlington's realm, because he's a "bungling amateur" who does not have the skill level necessary to handle the sensitive situations he's in, just as a poor swimmer could fail to have the skill to return from the water they swam into.
Related Themes:
Day Six: Evening
Explanation and Analysis—What Remains:
In the final chapter of the novel, Stevens speaks to an old man at the pier. Stevens worries about the life he's led and whether he ought to have acted differently, and the old man reassures him using a metaphor:
The evening’s the best part of the day. You’ve done your day’s work. Now you can put your feet up and enjoy it. That’s how I look at it. Ask anybody, they’ll all tell you. The evening’s the best part of the day.
When he says "the evening's the best part of the day," the stranger means that the end of a person's life can be the most enjoyable. It offers, he says, a chance to relax after a life of work, and, as a result, a lot to be proud of. Stevens takes this advice to heart and says this shortly after:
Perhaps, then, there is something to his advice that I should cease looking back so much, that I should adopt a more positive outlook and try to make the best of what remains of my day.
Stevens has spent the entire novel reflecting on his past, and those reflections seem to have brought up serious regrets. He cannot be unambiguously proud of his time serving Lord Darlington, because now Darlington is known as a Nazi supporter and an unintentional pawn of Germany during World War II. His relationship with his father ended up strained, and he could not be fully present for his father's death. Nor did he ever allow himself to form a closer, perhaps romantic, relationship with Miss Kenton. Darlington Hall has been sold, and Stevens's sacrifices have all been toward the service of a man whose politics he can't entirely justify.
But the stranger's metaphor seems to have rung true, and he reflects that he ought to "make the best of what remains of my day"—which is both an extension of the stranger's early evening metaphor and a reference to the title of the book.
Related Themes:
