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Setting
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
Part 2
Explanation and Analysis—Eliza Jane’s Arrival:
When Eliza Jane arrives at Mr. Ryder’s door, the narrator describes her appearance, using a simile and a metaphor in the process:
She looked like a bit of the old plantation life, summoned up from the past by the wave of a magician’s wand, as the poet’s fancy had called into being the gracious shapes of which Mr. Ryder had just been reading.
The simile here—in which the narrator describes how Eliza Jane “looked like a bit of the old plantation life”—immediately draws a connection between Eliza Jane and slavery. This is because she is old, has dark skin, and wears simple clothing (thereby suggesting a lower-class status). Though Mr. Ryder doesn’t yet realize that this is the formerly enslaved woman he married when he was a young apprentice on a plantation, the fact that he immediately sees her and thinks of the plantation suggests that, at least subconsciously, he knows who she is.
The metaphor here—in which the narrator metaphorically describes how Eliza Jane was “summoned up from the past by the wave of a magician’s wand”—further hints at how Mr. Ryder is, perhaps on an unconscious level, aware that this woman is someone he knew in the past. While he tried to create a new identity for himself in the North after the Civil War, he ultimately must face his past—and his history with Eliza Jane—before the end of the story.
Related Themes:
