By The Landlord
"Music is like a dream. One I cannot hear." – Ludvig Van Beethoven
"Music to me is like breathing. I don't get tired of breathing." – Ray Charles
"Songs are like tattoos." – Joni Mitchell
“Life is like … a simile.” – Terry Carr
“I went out on a date with Simile. I don't know what I metaphor.” – Tim Vine
“Thou hast the most unsavory similes, and art indeed the most comparative, rascaliest, sweet young prince.” – Falstaff, in Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 1
"Writing about music is like dancing about architecture." – Martin Mull, then variously Frank Zappa / Elvis Costello / Laurie Anderson …
It’s that common figure of speech in which two unlike things are explicitly compared, easily spotted because in this process, the words ‘like, or ‘as’ are employed. This is different to saying or implying ‘is’ – where imaginatively saying something ‘is’, is, by contrast, a metaphor. As F. L. Lucas puts it: "The simile sets two ideas side by side; in the metaphor they become superimposed." So is that clear as crystal, or clear as mud?
We all do it, often employing similes as cliches. “Love is like a red, red rose," said Robert Burns, creating one, there and then. He was busy as a bee. His images could be as white as snow. He made life more interesting, when it was often tediously boring, like watching paint dry. ““The wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile.” said Charles Dickens in A Christmas Carol, when explaining why old Jacob Marley was as dead as a doornail. But George Orwell warned against overused figures of speech: "By using stale metaphors, similes and idioms, you save much mental effort, at the cost of leaving your meaning vague, not only for your reader but for yourself.”
So this week we’re looking for similes in song lyrics, and ideally ones that aren’t nailed-on cliches, but original ones, or ones that at least refresh an old cliche into a new perspective. Many of them may be saying life is … or love is … and that’s fine, but there may well be many more incidentally, startlingly vivid images and lines in the meantime. And in this meantime, here are some similes from literature and more to help inspire.
We’ve already had a few visitors to the Bar remarking about or using similes about music, or indeed similes about similes. And there are many more crowding in right now. “People are like music, some speak the truth and others are just noise,” says Bill Murray, trying to order a drink through the melee. But first up, there’s a whole gang wanting to talk about similes themselves, trying to outdo comedian Tim Vine and Terry Carr.
“Yeah. A metaphor is like a simile,” says Steven Wright, mischievously stirring the pot. “Hmm. Yes. And a day without sunshine is like, you know, night.” says Steve Martin.
"Similes prove nothing, but yet greatly lighten and relieve the tedium of argument." says Robert South. In half agreement Franz Kafka says: “In argument similes are like songs in love; they describe much, but prove nothing."
But who likes a simile? “Well,” says George McWhirter, the Northern Irish-Canadian writer, “A simile is like a pair of eyeglasses, one side sees this, one side sees that, the device brings them together.” Also rather nicely turning a simile into a simile, is James Geary: "A simile is just a metaphor with the scaffolding still up.”
“A room without books is like a body without a soul!” shouts Marcus Tullius Cicero, pouring from his wine flagon in the corner. “Cliché!” shout all the other writers in the room, especially George Orwell, conveniently forgetting that it’s only a cliché because he probably said it first, many years before them, being a maker of trendsetting similes.
But what makes a good simile? Ideally one that creates a fresh, visually arresting image in the mind, presents an idea that is clear, sparky and immediate, doesn’t overly mix ideas, is entertaining.
Anton Chekhov is also here, enjoying our vodka, and advising that: “ When describing nature, a writer should seize upon small details, arranging them so that the reader will see an image in his mind after he closes his eyes. For instance: you will capture the truth of a moonlit night if you'll write that a gleam like starlight shone from the pieces of a broken bottle, and then the dark, plump shadow of a dog or wolf appeared. You will bring life to nature only if you don't shrink from similes that liken its activities to those of humankind.”
So here for you is a selection of other similes variously well-known or otherwise, from writers and other famous figures, on a variety of subjects, from life in general to love, nature, emotions, the environment, law, society and sex:
Frank Zappa. His mind, and indeed hair, is like …
“A mind is like a parachute. It doesn't work if it is not open.” – Frank Zappa
"Love set you going like a fat gold watch" – Sylvia Plath, Morning Song
“The sun rose like a stripper, keeping its glory well covered by cloud till it seemed there'd be no show at all.” – Clive Barker, Cabal
“In the eastern sky there was a yellow patch like a rug laid for the feet of the coming sun . . .” – Stephen Crane, The Red Badge of Courage
“. . . and snow lay here and there in patches in the hollow of the banks, like a lady’s gloves forgotten.” — R. D. Blackmore, Lorna Doone
Albert Einstein. Not at all like a fish on a …
“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance, you must keep moving.” – Albert Einstein
“The man is as useless as nipples on a breastplate.” – George R.R. Martin, A Feast for Crows
“Destroying rainforest for economic gain is like burning a Renaissance painting to cook a meal.” – E.O. Wilson
“Worrying is like paying a debt you don't owe.” – Mark Twain
Nobody is quite like Sophia Loren. Country will grow …
“A woman's dress should be like a barbed-wire fence: serving its purpose without obstructing the view.” – Sophia Loren
“Laws are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through. – Jonathan Swift
We’ve recently seen the sad loss of two of the wittiest writers and employer of similes, Clive James and Jonathan Miller, and in the latter also a brilliant theatre and TV director, medical doctor and actor. It seems appropriate then to enjoy some of the latter’s work in turn inspired by one of the richest sources of similes, Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland, of which Miller made an incredibly original 1966 TV adaptation. “Oh, how I wish I could shut up like a telescope!” “Why is a raven like a writing-desk?” “`For it might end, you know in my going out altogether, like a candle.” "Up above the world you fly, Like a tea-tray in the sky.”
Talking of things in the sky, let us know look to where film and song are brought alongside each other, almost like a simile. In the fantastic 2014 French film, Girlhood (Bande de filles), four working-class black girls from a tough French housing estate briefly escape their world of violence, gangs and prejudice, to enjoy a night in a hotel, dancing to their favourite song. The lyrics, in this Rihanna number are a simile weirdly create a simile attached to a metaphor: “Her eyes sparkled like diamonds … you’re beautiful like diamonds in the sky … shine bright like a diamond.”
And to set us on our way, here are a few other song examples. This one, written by Hal David / Burt Bacharach, and sung by Dusty Springfield, was previously chosen for the topic, missing someone, and launches into a powerful simile in the chorus, like a summer rose needs the sun and rain. But perhaps there are other, equally good versions?
Also giving off an interesting aroma of simile, is this classic by The Sweet, previously chosen for the topic of gases.
There’s always more room for hip hop in the Marconium and our playlists, and here’s one by the ever articulate, self-describing rather nicely the music it employs and enjoyment it inspires:
This rhythm really fits like a snug glove
Like a box of positives is a plus, love
As the Tribe flies high like a dove.
And finally, let’s end with a brand new song, by the former frontman of the The Beta Band, Steve Mason, with the extended simile, Like A Ripple. But is anything like a ripple? Or is each one unique, like a snowflake? Complex. And yet simple. Enjoy:
So then it’s time to turn your over to our specialist of the simile, this week’s playlist guru, the perfectly poised ParaMhor. Send your simile songs to the comments box below before deadline on Monday 11pm UK time, for playlists published on Wednesday. There may be nothing quite like it …
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