Figurative+language,+or+Imagery

Figurative language, or figures of speech, includes such devices as **metaphor**. In a metaphor, a quality is ascribed to a character by tagging the character with a descriptor. For example, when Helmer uses the metaphor of “little squirrel” for Nora, he is suggesting that she is busy—almost frantically so—but not thoughtful or intentional in her actions. When Nora describes herself as a doll-child or a doll-wife, she is saying that she is viewed as a toy, valued for her beauty but not recognized as having any intellectual capacity.

Another figure of speech is the **simile**, in which a comparison is introduced by the words “like”, “as,” or “as if.” Ibsen is using a simile when he has Helmer say, “He, with his sufferings and his loneliness, was like a cloudy background to our sunlit happiness.”

Figurative language is sometimes called **imagery** because it uses language to project an image. While many plays, especially those by Shakespeare, rely heavily on imagery, Ibsen uses very little imagery in //A Doll’s House// because it is a realistic play.