Metaphor, Allegory, and Chess

Previously a metaphor was just thought of being a simile that doesn't use "like" or "as". In today's lesson it was further discussed the definition of it and determined that it can be broken down into two things; the tenor and the vehicle. The tenor is the idea that is being communicated and the vehicle is the person/object/action that represents that idea. The example we used in class was Romeo's famous line "What light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun." Juliet is the metaphor is the tenor and the light, east, and sun are the vehicles that further describes her.

After determining the parts of a metaphor, the class was introduced to the term allegory, a network of metaphors. The first example of allegory that was used was the original X-Men. The comic was an allegory to what was happening in the 1960's, from Montgomery to the race riots. It used characters like Professor X and Magneto to represent famous figures of this time like Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. It also used relationships and actions of these characters to critique what was happening on the outside world.

Another allegory example that was shown was the chess scene from The Wire. The scene showed three characters around a chess board, with one teaching the other two how to play by describing each piece as someone from the drug cartel. For instance, the king is the kingpin who can go wherever he wants and is the most protected. The pawns are soldiers who are easily killed but can rank up if the last long enough. And the queen is the muscle, the "go get s*** done piece". It was brought up that while the audience in the show was being taught how to play chess, the audience watching was being taught how the drug trade works.

Allegories and metaphors are great ways to not only describe something/someone in a book/film, but are great ways to help people understand what is happening is the real world. Ray Bradbury, in describing how to write great science fiction, wrote "Science fiction pretends to look into the future but it's really looking at a reflection of what is already in front of us". Fiction is a device used to open people's eyes of the non-fiction, whether by scaring us with a dystopian future or a bizarre mutated present reality.

Metaphors are the queen piece of fiction, they are the piece that makes us go and get s*** done.