Wednesday 14 December 2011

How to Build Effective Metaphors

Metaphors are a double-edged sword. If it works, it can lend your piece an extra-special color; if it slips, it can destroy leave your meaning confusing and muddled.

You’ve probably experienced it yourself. Some of the world’s most memorable speeches, after all, use metaphors that conjure a very vivid image in the audience’s mind. In the same way, even a well-written piece, duly worked on by an advanced writing software, can leave you bewildered when an off-base metaphor suddenly finds itself thrust in the middle of your reading.

Metaphors are also important is creating quality contents. This can make your writing good while you stick to the rules on how to use them. Moreover, your content can basically express a lot of meaning as you use metaphors to discuss your topic further.

What’s good about it? Simple, it draws your readers closer to your writing while they actually have their own interpretations while understanding the concept of your topic.

Excess use of metaphors is not really good but knowing how to use them well can help you a lot. It is because it gives your content a colorful glow which makes it clearer and interesting in the eyes of your readers.

Besides, it also helps to maintain every emotion that is express in your writing. It allows your readers to think behind what their eyes can see, thus, it makes them think further and imagine the picture in your writing.

What makes you a good writer? It is by knowing how you will create your content and to use the right words to describe the topic well. If you don’t have any ideas how metaphors play an important role in your content, then don’t worry about that.

Every problem has its own solutions and if you having a hard time in writing metaphors, there are ways that will help you out.

Whatever is your purpose in writing and where you will publish you work, metaphors are always allowed to boost your skills and creativity as you face your writing tasks. Just avoid bad metaphors so that you won’t mess up with your content later.

Most often, bad metaphors are the result of one of two things:

• Poorly-chosen comparisons. Some metaphors just aren’t the eight choices. Either they don’t improve clarity, they don’t match the subject of comparison or they bring absolutely no color to the discussion. The latter is especially common with beginning writers who are prone to using obvious and common comparisons.

• Mixed metaphors. The “mixed” part refers to conflicting halves of the comparison – the first part just doesn’t match the second, leading to writing that sounds awkward and forced. As a result, any impact the metaphor is supposed to achieve just ends up falling short.

When building effective metaphors, look towards the following guidelines to help you avoid the previous problems:

• Ensure consistency, making sure the entire statement relays a unified message.
• Make it easy to visualize, using words that paint a clear picture.
• Make it accessible, using familiar images that people can identify.

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