Like a cock's wattles
Like a cock's wattles
In Brief
Figure of speech. When the narrative of Aeolus
says of Myles Crawford that "The loose flesh of his neck shook
like a cock's wattles," it is employing the poetic and
rhetorical figure called simile, a comparison of two
unlike things made explicit by the words "like" or "as." This
comparison is repeated twice, in Circe, as a metaphor.
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Simile (SIM-uh-lee) is the neuter form of the Latin adjective
similis = like. An equivalent Latin term was similitudo
= likeness. This is one of the few concepts in the rhetorical
tradition that did not adopt Greek vocabulary. Aristotle
treats the trope as simply a metaphor that has been weakened
by a prothesis (placing before) of words such as
"like" or "as." In book 3 of the Rhetoric (1406b) he
writes, "A simile is also a metaphor; for there is little
difference: when the poet says, 'He rushed as a lion,' it is a
simile, but 'The lion rushed' [with lion referring to a man]
would be metaphor"; similes, Aristotle says, "are
metaphors, differing in the form of expression" (trans. George
Kennedy). The Latin writers evidently were not content to
treat simile as just a form of metaphor, and in the centuries
since much ink has been spilled on the differences. But
whatever those may be, it can hardly be denied that the two
tropes are engaged in essentially the same activity. Simile
could be called a spelled-out metaphor, and metaphor an
implied simile.
Some people have speculated that similes must have arisen
earlier in human expression, since metaphors are more
compressed, bolder, more surprising. Instead of saying that
two things are alike, they simply present something (e.g., a
lion) in such a way as to suggest that it is something
else (Achilles), leaving it up to the hearer to discover in a
flash of insight that the similarity exists. In Joyce's
sentence, the simile establishes its tenor
("The loose flesh of his neck") before introducing the
vehicle that will carry it ("a cock's wattles").
Presented as a metaphor, there might be no more than a bare
vehicle: "His wattles shook." The comparison takes this form
in Circe, in stage directions for both Myles Crawford
("His cock's wattles wagging") and Lipoti Virag
("He gobbles gluttonously with turkey wattles").
Memorable similes abound in oratory and literature: "That
creature, who like a snail silently hides and keeps himself in
his shell, is carried off, he and his house, to be swallowed
whole" (Ad Herennium); "My love is like a red, red rose
/ That's newly sprung in June, / My love is like a melody /
That's sweet sung in tune" (Robert Burns); "Our last
impression of her as she turned the corner was that smile,
flung backward like a handful of flowers" (Wallace Stegner).
No one has employed the figure more brilliantly than Joyce did
in "The Boarding House." Learning that Mr. Mooney was ugly
when he drank and "One night he went for his wife with the
cleaver" prepares the reader for the implacable ferocity with
which Mrs. Mooney snares Bob Doran: "She dealt with moral
problems as a cleaver deals with meat: and in this case she
had made up her mind."
