STRATEGY ELEVEN
Metaphor as Design Device

A Definition and Some Background

A metaphor is a figure of comparison that implies some likeness in two disparate realms thus making a verbal equation: “All the world's a stage and all the men and women merely players” (Shakespeare). That statement claims, in effect: Life = a play. This metaphor reflects one of our core concepts as heard in such expressions as “My role as teacher,”and “She was upstaged by her sister.” It served as the basis for the 2000 hit, “Same Script, Different Cast.”

Thinking metaphorically draws upon the right brain's ability to visualize, note similarities, and synthesize, thus using a thought process natural to the right-brain intuitive/feeling type, the NF.

Simile: A Tentative Metaphor

A simile is the most common subtype of metaphor. It makes a direct comparison using the words like, as or than. I've dubbed a simile a tentative metaphor because it lacks the metaphor's assertiveness. For example, compare the relative power of the statement “All the world's a stage” to “All the world is like a stage,” or “I Am a Rock” to “I Am Like a Rock.” The essential meaning is the same, but the “like” considerably lessens its impact.

Since similes are by nature metaphoric, all the upcoming theory, exercises and guidelines on the successful use of metaphor pertain equally to the use of simile.

The Verbal Equation

It's been observed that it's virtually impossible for anyone to talk for more than three consecutive minutes without recourse to a metaphor. That's because we envision so many basic aspects of life, quite unconsciously, in terms of something else. As a consequence, when we use certain phrases we're often unaware that we're not being literal. For example, the following phrases may not immediately strike you as metaphoric. Yet each embodies a verbal equation:

This Metaphoric Phrase	Implies	This Verbal Equation
“You won that round”		arguments = prizefights
“Jumpstart the economy”		economy = engine
“That's hard to swallow”		ideas = substances
“Cool it!”		feelings = temperatures

A metaphoric expression states, in essence, “A equals B.” Thus, to reflect truth, each attribute given must reflect “B-ness.” Shakespeare expanded his concept that the world (A) is a stage (B) by noting further likenesses to the stage—his semantic field—the area of comparison: Players have “their exits and their entrances and one man in his time plays many parts.” Every attribute is an aspect of B-ness (the stage) and thus reflects truth. The clarity, consistency and coherence of the metaphor result from a unified semantic field—in this case, the stage.

Identify and Unify Your Semantic Field

The fresh, inventive or stunning metaphor is a rarity. The majority of metaphors that we read, hear, speak, and write are uninspired, banal–and often muddled. The muddle results from the thinker's feeling state that has blurred or overlapped two or more semantic fields; for example, this student lyric phrase: “I think I'm going under/Trapped in all the games surrounding me.” Going under? In what, water? Or quicksand? How is one trapped in games? What kind of games surround? Card games? Board games? The singer's emotion is obvious–distress. But what is the semantic field? The essence of metaphor is to understand one thing in terms of another–thus enriching meaning. There is no clear “other” here and thus no enriched meaning–only distressed feeling. Making coherent metaphoric statements requires first being conscious of your initial semantic field of comparison–your B (“other”)–and then, keeping it consistent.

The Mixed Metaphor

A metaphoric statement that begins by saying A equals B and then adds characteristics unrelated to B results in the infamous “mixed metaphor.” Here, for example, is a metaphoric statement that hopes to offer a formula for success: “If you play your cards right, you'll hit the bull's-eye.” Attaining success (A) starts out being compared to a card game (B). But the thinker lost sight of his original semantic field, and wandered into a second semantic field: a target range (C). The result, a “mixing” of two fields of comparison (B + C) instead of augmenting one (B + B). There's a simple trick to writing coherent metaphors: See what you feel.

Unmixing the Metaphor

Let's unmix that mixed metaphor. Visualize on your mind's mental screen an image of a card game and keep it there until you complete the metaphor for success. What does a card game look like? What do you do during a card game? Now, keeping that image in your mind, come up with a new phrase that adds card-game-like attributes (“B-ness”) to the introductory statement. Think for a minute. Have an idea yet? Here's one treatment: “If you play your cards right, you'll hold the winning hand.” Any variant on that would work fine.

Now, let's do it again, only start from the second half of the statement. Picture a target. What, literally, do you have to do to hit the bull's-eye? Think of an opening phrase to introduce target. Okay, what's your phrase? It might be something like, “If you shoot enough arrows, you'll hit the bull's-eye.” Or, “If you aim your darts carefully, you'll hit the bull's-eye.” Remember the guideline: See what you feel. With a little practice, it becomes automatic.

Keep a Series of Ideas Consistent

When writing a series of related ideas, be sure to keep the series either consistently figurative or consistently literal. For example, William Faulkner once observed, “Hollywood is the only place I know where you can get stabbed in the back while you're climbing a ladder.” Faulkner's remark is funny and insightful and the images–stabbed/back/ladder–consistently figurative. Now, here's a blooper that begins with a literal statement that's immediately followed by a figurative one: “While they were out walking the dog (literal), she let the cat out of the bag” (figurative). The mental image is so incongruous, it's funny. But humor was not the writer's goal. The statement can be corrected one of two ways: by making it all literal or all figurative: Literal: “While they were out walking the dog, he unintentionally revealed the surprise.” Figurative and intentionally humorous: “When they were horsing around, he let the cat out of the bag.”

Oops: A “Malaphor”

It's strange, but seems to be true: A recorded lyric is the only published writing that doesn't pass through an editorial process; that is, it lacks a review by a professional editor to check for proper syntax and semantic accuracy. Perhaps that's why a printed lyric, when exposed to the glare of the bare page, often reveals metaphoric blunders, specifically of the kind that contradict reality in some way. A metaphor suggests a potential reality. A metaphor that falsifies reality, I've termed a “malaphor.” Here are some recorded malaphors I've noted:

• A female singer wants to open her lover's locked heart and says, “I hold the lock and you hold the key.” Nope—if he had locked his heart, he'd hold the lock as well as the key.

• A male singer compared himself to a rock—“charging from the gate … carrying the weight.” Nope—rocks are incapable of either activity.

• A male singer said he was (metaphorically) “sliding on ice” while “caught in a vice.” Nope—if you're in a vice, you're immobilized; a case of seduction by rhyme.

• A lyric alluded to “the stepping-stones of life … along the road.” Nope—stepping-stones are those stones in water that allow to you cross from one shore to the other.

• A lyric in which the singer vowed to go metaphorically on strike had her packing and never coming back. Nope—on strike means “a temporary cessation of activities.”

To avoid such malaphors, make sure—before the demo session—that your left-brain editor gives a reality check to your right-brain images.

The Overstated Malaphor

There's a particular kind of malaphor that results from a lyricist mistaking metaphoric overstatement for “dramatic” writing. The result: A falsehood. For example, in a “goodbye song” with a winter setting, a singer claimed, “my heart is frozen in the snow.” No, it isn't. That line flunks the reality check. Luckily there's a simple remedy for this type of malaphor. Modify the false metaphor to a true simile: “My heart feels frozen like the snow.” Now it passes the reality check.

The Murky Metaphor

Besides the mixed metaphor and the malaphor, another major cause of flawed figurative lyrics stems from the writer's unconscious linking of unrelated metaphoric expressions that muddy the intended meaning. For example, a student's chorus contained this (con)fusion of ideas: “Where there's smoke there's fire/When we met you started a spark/Now there's a fire in my heart.” Started a spark and fire in my heart accord in meaning because they both reflect the basic metaphoric concept: passionate emotions = fires. But the adage “Where there's smoke there's fire” uses fire in a wholly different context. The metaphoric colloquialism suggests a result/cause (smoke/fire) relationship by implying that some concrete evidence (smoke) points to an incriminating cause (fire). The lyricist unwittingly subverted her chorus' intended positive statement by introducing it with an unrelated negative implication.

Learning to Discriminate

As just noted, all figurative uses of a single word, such as fire, do not necessarily embody the same meaning and thus, if linked, may convey incoherence. Metaphoric competence requires the ability to discriminate–to make fine distinctions. And as the improvement in students' writing makes clear, it's a learnable skill–and one that's essential to writing coherent lyrics. A lyric's coherence or lack of it depends on a series of good judgments. Good judgments–whether thinking or feeling judgments–require the ability to discriminate between literal and figurative, between identical and similar, between false and true. Here's an exercise to activate your ability to analyze.

Identify These Implied Verbal Equations
Take a few minutes now to identify the metaphoric equation implicit in these common expressions. I'll give you the first one for starters:
That delay cost me an hour	______time______		=	______money____
Their affair is on the rocks	_______________		=	_______________
She turns me on	_______________		=	_______________
He leaves me cold	_______________		=	_______________
Her image has frayed	_______________		=	_______________
(Answers on Comment.)

The Metaphor Strategy

The objective now is to write a lyric whose central design rests on a metaphor that unites two different fields. Challenge yourself to select one semantic field and keep it consistent. Many famous songs draw upon society's most basic metaphoric concepts. Let's look at four:

Titles That Embody Four Basic Metaphoric Concepts
Rain = trouble/hard times	Stormy Weather
	I Made It Through the Rain
	Raindrops Keep Fallin' on My Head
	Rainy Day Woman
	Let a Smile Be Your Umbrella
Sun = happiness/good times	You Are My Sunshine
	Sunny Side of the Street
	When the Sun Comes Out
	You Are the Sunshine of My Life
Music = romantic feelings	With a Song in My Heart
	The Song Is You
	How Do You Keep the Music Playing
	The Song Is Ended, But the Melody Lingers On
Life = a road journey	Somewhere Down the Road
	Two for the Road
	Merrily We Roll Along
	Boulevard of Broken Dreams

Those metaphors represent the staples of songdom because they reflect truth. So they're worth emulating–of course with a fresh slant. But the song that really grabs us is the one that makes a comparison that we've never heard before, like these:

Titles That Reflect Fresh Metaphor/Simile Concepts
You Ain't Nothin' But a Hound Dog
(Like a) Bridge Over Troubled Water
Everything's Coming Up Roses
Running on Empty
If You Don't Want My Peaches, You'd Better Stop Shaking My Tree
You Can't Be a Beacon If Your Light Don't Shine
I Don't Mind the Thorns When You're the Rose
You Are the Wind Beneath My Wings

Prewriting Suggestion

Any of the foregoing metaphors may suggest a fresh approach, or you might consider some other mainstream concepts:

Love is magic	Silence is a wall
Feelings are temperatures	Troubles are burdens
Relationships are a gamble	Infidelity is a crime

After you pick one, or come up with an original one, then comes the free associating process. Whatever your favorite mode–paper or PC–let spontaneous phrases tumble out. If, for example, you picked “relationships are a gamble,” start out with that phrase, suspend your left-brain's critical judgments and let your right's randomness come out to play. Freely jot down any related words or phrases that spring to mind–roulette wheel, game of chance, place my bet, stakes are high. Stay in that “flow” mode for a while letting random thoughts connect, rhymes spill out–wheel/deal/steal/appeal/conceal…. The longer you sustain the flow, the richer will be the source material from which you begin to write. So keep going and going and going. Suddenly, a phrase may come out that makes you say, “Hey, that's it–a title.” Now you've experienced the activating/associating phase.

Then you move into phase two–incubate. You muse about the title, walk around with it, ask yourself who's saying it to whom, and why. Maybe even sleep on it. As you begin to sift and sort and shape all that rich randomness into the suitable song form, you'll have moved over to the left hemisphere. As you separate, you eliminate inappropriate ideas that no longer fit your title.

When you've got a first draft finished, then comes the editing process–discriminate. Be sure your title (logically) sums up your main thought. Ask yourself if you've kept to a single semantic field. Does every metaphoric statement have “B-ness”? Does every metaphoric statement pass the reality test? (No hearts frozen in the snow.) Here now is a student lyric that was activated by the strategy and went through every phase in the four-part creative process.

Metaphor. Example No. 1 (Verse/Chorus/Bridge)
OCEANS OF LOVE

If you wanna sail to heaven,
Leave it all and put to sea,
Take a fantasy cruise forever,
Well, you can book your passage with me.

I wanna give you
OCEANS OF LOVE
Waves of pleasure,
Waves of pleasure,
OCEANS OF LOVE.
You gotta feel the rhythm,
The motion,
The oceans and oceans
The rhythm,
The motion,
And the OCEANS OF LOVE.

Or if you are a seasoned sailor,
And the seas hold no surprises for you,
I can take you on a voyage
That will thrill you through and through.

(repeat chorus)

Deeper than the great Pacific,
Wider than the seven seas,
My love is endless as the blue horizon,
And it's only there to please you.

(repeat chorus)

If you wanna sail to heaven
Float away to paradise
Let me navigate the waters
So you can rise and fall with the tides.

(repeat chorus)
© 1990 Regine Urbach. Used with permission.

Comment

Not only did the writer incorporate consistently appropriate nautical allusions to support her premise that sexual pleasure = an ocean trip–sail, cruise, book passage, seasoned sailor, seas, voyage, navigate the waters–she punned on oceans and waves, playing off the two meanings implicit in each word. In the chorus, by manipulating her rhythm, she also managed to make her love boat “rock.” I want to point out the instance of trailing rhyme in seas/please you. Had you given any thought to the writer's type?

Well, she's as right-brain dominant as one can be–an ENFP with all four preferences in the right hemisphere. So it's no wonder we get the sexual/loving subject matter, the metaphoric language, and an attitude characteristic of the intuitive/feeling type–aiming to please.

Here's another metaphoric example. Though the subject is love again, you'll hear quite a change in the attitude. Remember, the right-dominant (NF) is not the only type who can think metaphorically.

Metaphor: Example No. 2 (Verse/Chorus/Bridge)
STRANGE, STRANGE POISON

I still don't know how you get in–
How you get underneath my skin.
Must be somethin' in the lovin'
You've been givin' me.
Must be somethin' in your lips–
Some kind of deadly kiss.
I've been hurt before by this.
Still I go down easy.

Hey, ain't love a
STRANGE, STRANGE POISON?
Sometimes sickly sweet,
Sometimes powerful and pure.
Hey, ain't love a
STRANGE, STRANGE POISON?
And though it makes me weak,
I know your poison is a cure–
A STRANGE, STRANGE POISON
That's for sure.

There's really nothin' I can do,
No, not when it comes to you.
It's jus' somethin' I go through
When you're lovin' me.
I feel you running through my veins
Like the river floods in monsoon rains.
You really muddy up my brain;
Still I go down easy.

(repeat chorus)

Gotta keep this lovin' feelin' goin'
Even though it's changin' me.
So I let you pry me open
Knowin' your love is rearrangin' me.

(repeat chorus)
© 1990 Kevin Dowling. Used with permission.

Comment

A central design metaphor, yes, and a fresh one, yet totally unlike the ENFP's playful, romantic tone and style. Here we get the questioning, analytical, paradoxical viewpoint so characteristic of the intuitive/thinker. The writer, an ENTP, uses metaphor in service to his ironic view of life. I'm sure you noticed the fresh metaphoric concept “pry me open” implying the singer is a sealed container.

WrapUp

Each lyric example reflects an aspect of its writer's essential view of life. It is perhaps this very integrity—integrated whole-brainedness—that contributes to the clarity and effectiveness of both lyrics.

Writing coherent metaphoric lyrics requires mastering two skills: 1) Becoming conscious of your initial semantic field; and 2) Learning to see what you feel. Till then, first drafts may require some metaphoric revisions. Of course all initial lyric outpourings need a cool, objective look from your left-brain critic whose gift is to detect discrepancies. But quite naturally, it is the feeling types who may especially need to develop that critical ability—in both senses of the word. (Ts of course do it automatically because thinking is a dominant function.) But without a conscious effort to access the left-brain editor, a feeling type may read over a first draft more in appreciation of its wordplay than in appraisal of possible flaws. But by purposefully accessing the left brain's analytical skills, every type can acquire the ability to produce coherent metaphors. One last editorial guideline: Beware of your favorite lines; they're usually the ones that require the sharpest blue pencil. Now to a special metaphoric subtype: The Compound Metaphor.

Answers to the Exercise on Learning to Discriminate
Their affair is on the rocks:	relationships = a sea voyage
She turns me on:	people = machines
He leaves me cold:	emotions = temperatures
Her image has frayed:	reputations = fabrics