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1.3. Metaphor analysis implemented using the example of novels Jane Eyre and The Old Man and the Sea
The novel Jane Eyre contains several different moments which can be considered as metaphorical figures. They include such words and expressions that mean (or are intended to mean) other objects and are used to describe these metaphorical objects other than direct meaning of the word. To find that metaphorical meaning we should conduct the metaphor analysis. There are no approved and affirmed ways of carrying out that analysis, we even cannot practically find approved ways of identifying the metaphors in texts, but it is assumed that we can use our knowledge and approaches of different linguists to conduct such analysis. Several methods can be used in this case. They include “the table of meanings” and “the metaphorical chain”.
First, we can find some word or an expression in considered novel that give us the reasons to think it is a metaphor. For example, in the novel Jane Eyre we can see that “The Moon” is used in different contexts but it seems that it has some implication. In this case we can draw up table of meanings specified above, that should include different meanings of the word and circumstances of its use in the novel.
Metaphor analysis of the word “moon” used in the novel Jane Eyre
Meanings of theword “Moon” Times of use Conclusions
1. the direct meaning – the moon;
2. the satellite;
3. lunar month;
4. planet satellite.
5. Jane leaves Gateshead.
2. Jane meets Rochester.
3. Rochester proposes to Jane. Using the meaning of the word “moon” as a “planet satellite” , “a satellite” and the context when it is used in the novel, we can find out that “the moon” in the novel is used as a semantic metaphor for change. Time means “life satellite”, every time when something is changing in Jane’s life, we can see that “the moon” appears in the describing part of the novel. It is either described or looked at many times throughout the novel when Jane's life will take on a new direction.
After conducting the table above us can fully understand the sense of using the word “moon” in the novel Jane Eyre as a specified metaphor for change, taking a new direction. Then we should say that throughout the novel Jane Eyre of Charlotte Bronte we can find a lot of metaphorical describing or the relationship between human beings and nature. Several natural themes run through the novel, one of which is the image of a stormy sea. After Jane saves Rochester’s life, she gives us the following metaphor of their relationship: “Till morning dawned I was tossed on a buoyant but unquiet sea… I thought sometimes I saw beyond its wild waters a shore... now and then a freshening gale, wakened by hope, bore my spirit triumphantly towards the bourne: but . . . a counteracting breeze blew off land, and continually drove me back”.
The gale is all the forces that prevent Jane’s union with Rochester. Bronte implies that Jane’s feelings about the sea driving her back remind her of her heart felt emotions of a rocky relationship with Rochester and still being drawn back to him. We could also remember about birds and their meaning in the novel. Jane believes that birds are faithful to their mates. It is neither kind nor unkind, just nor unjust. Perhaps Bronte is telling us that this idea of escape is no more than a fantasy-one cannot escape when one must return for basic sustenance. The author brings the buoyant sea theme and the bird theme together in the passage describing the first painting of Jane’s that Rochester examines.
Besides, we can also see that the concept of nature in Jane Eyre is reminiscent of the majority’s view of the world: the instantiation of God, such general metaphor. John is filled with the same dispassionate caring that God’s nature provided Jane in the heath: he will provide, a little, but he doesn't really care for her. John is more human than God, and thus he and his sisters are able to help Jane.
Other semantic metaphors in the novel include “food”, that is used throughout the novel to represent want. One example of this is when Jane is at Lowood School. Here the food is scant, and elder girls often take it from Jane in the beginning. Examples such as the burnt porridge are given. However, the hunger Jane feels is not just a physical desire for food, but for personal growth as well. When she is accepted at the school and begins to accomplish things for herself in drawing class, she is no longer focuses on her hunger, as it has been fulfilled by her own achievements. She says:
“That night, on going to bed, I forgot to prepare in imagination the Barmecide supper, of hot roast potatoes, or white bread and new milk, with which I was wont to amuse my inward cravings. I feasted instead on the spectacle of ideal drawings, which I saw in the dark - all the work of my own hands.”
A similar case can be seen in Jane’s hunger before she is welcomed to Moor House. She has not eaten much, has had to beg for food, and is physically weak from hunger. She is not only hungry for food however, and when she arrives at the house and is welcomed there, Jane is more satisfied with the friendship she finds than the food she is offered. She had been hungry for companionship, and she finds it with Diana and Mary. So the analysis of the words “hunger”, “food” gives us a general idea that this objects are used in the novel to describe not only hunger of Jane for food, but hunger in general, for food, for occupation, for company.
One of the most important concepts used in the novel Jane Eyre is the concept of “Fire and Burning”. Now we can use the method of metaphor analysis so called “the metaphorical chain”:
When it first becomes truly obvious that Rochester has feelings for Jane, she has just saved him from the fire in his bed. →
When Rochester tries to keep Jane with him after this incident, she says: “strange energy was in his voice, strange fire in his look” →
When Rochester suggests that he and Jane remain together even though they cannot be married, Jane writes: “…a hand of fiery iron grasped my vitals. Terrible moment: full of struggle, blackness, burning! Not a human being that ever lived could wish to be loved better than I was loved” . Jane is tempted to succumb to her and Rochester’s passions, but she does not. →
So, we can see that passion, force, fire, struggle, burning – all this expressions are used throughout the novel to represent passion as an uncontrollable force.
Another interesting moment in the novel includes the expression of “Chestnut Tree”. This tree that had been struck by lightning during a storm is a symbol for the relationship between Jane and Rochester. When Jane is running in the rain toward Rochester, she sees the tree and writes that it had not been split in half, but that while there was a hole in it and it was separated much, the roots held it together. Jane says: “You did right to hold fast to each other.” At the end of the novel when Rochester compares himself to this ruined tree, Jane says that he is not ruined, but that plants will grow around him and take delight in him.