Figurative Language In Los Angeles Notebook

This shows that meteorological conditions are able to affect a character’s thoughts and alter their feelings. As has been noted, Shelley accentuates the description of spring to express the hope and renewal bestowed upon the creature by the exemplifications of the weather.

Didion personifies the wind as almost an unknown epidemic. Similar to when an unknown disease goes viral, all walks of life are affected. Didion clearly states how teachers, students, doctors, to physicists, to generally everyone becomes unhappy and uncomfortable during the winds. She does not write of how the wind caused fire to ravage the shrublands, but she writes of the symptoms it inflicts on the people. Didion mentions all the after effects of the wind and the harm it can do like inflict paranoia. She mentions how the fear-stricken victims of southern California are paranoid like her neighbor that refuses to leave the house and her husband who roams with a machete. Didion’s personification of the wind focuses on a fearful and distant light.

>>>>Coelho gave a touch of life to the Sun and wind by personification; "In my travels around the world, I've often seen people speaking of love and looking toward the heavens," the wind said, (Coelho 240). "From where I am," the sun said, "I can see the Soul of the World" (Coelho 242). By adding personification, the author made it seem as if the Sun and wind actually have human characteristics.

To see the wind, with a man his eyes, it is unpossible, the nature of it is so fine, and subtle; yet this experience of the wind had I once myself, and that was in the great snow that fell four years ago: I rode in the highway betwixt Topcliff-upon-Swale, and Borowe Bridge, the way being somewhat trodden afore, by wayfaring men.

    In chronological order, Petry introduces the wind. Her selection of detail opens up the thought of the wind being brutal by stating “a cold November wind”. She goes on to use imagery to explain how disruptive this wind was. By Petry using her imagery, selection of detail and figurative language, she opens up a deeper analysis of what the wind actually represents.

“On November 24 six people were killed in automobile accidents...On November 26 a prominent Pasadena attorney, depressed about money, shot and killed his wife, their two sons and himself.” Didion uses vivid imagery and description to portray saddening deaths around the time of the winds, therefore increasing the fear that both the reader and the outsider feel toward the Santa Ana winds without ever experiencing them. Since Didion uses second hand accounts, the writing is given a distant and almost fearful tone. This is because the writing is no longer personal, therefore it impacts the way that the reader perceives the message that the writing is trying to

. . is lost in embrace, passionate kisses no one seems to notice”. Love to some degree can be viewed as a “start of another life”, which is why once again the winds allow a cycle to take place. Lastly, Didion adds to her Pathos by using words and imagery to some degree to highlight the destruction caused by the winds. The usage of words like death, shot, killed, burn, destruction brings out the ominous tone prevalent in the piece. Thomas ,though, uses words like passionate and embrace (which makes it seem like it is a normal occurrence) to add to her Pathos. Thus, both the authors use the three appeals to get their points across to the audience.

Through the use of figurative language, Didion conveys the ominousness of the Santa Ana winds. She explains that the winds will come “whining down through the Cajon and San Gorgonio Passes.” The author personifies the winds, causing them to appear more threatening. The foreboding atmosphere of the winds causes a mechanistic and unusual change in people’s behavior. Didion describes how she “rekindle[s] a waning argument with the telephone company.” The threat of the winds causes the author restart an old argument The use of personification characterizes the winds as threatening and shows how the winds alter people’s behavior.

Ascham possesses a pleasant attitude toward the subject of this piece, and that reflects in both his word choice and sentence structure. As an example of his use of diction, he uses an interesting word choice in the first sentence of the piece. “To see the wind, with a man his eyes, it is unpossible, the nature of it is so fine, and subtile…” (Ascham 1-2). In this quote, Ascham uses a unique choice of words. “Unpossible” is not a word one would commonly use in everyday conversation— due to the fact that it is most likely an old or middle English word. Ascham also wanted to emphasize how it is not possible to visibly see the wind. His diction is also prominent in lines 12-13. “And I had a great delight and pleasure to mark it, which maketh me now far better to remember it” (Ascham 12-13). Ascham uses words like “delight” and “pleasure” to convey his attitude about the wind; he enjoys the presence and behavior of the snow even though he can not visibly see it. Also, Ascham uses a periodic sentence structure in the above quote, as a way to create a whimsical and sing-songy sound. He achieves this by using multiple phrases to lead up to the main point, which is that the wind is too fine to see. He also uses the periodic sentence structure again, but more prominently, in the last

She states, “I did not know then that there was any basis for the effect it had on all of us, but it turns out to be another one of those cases in which science bears out folk wisdom.” In her essay, she talks about her neighbor carrying a machete around at night in anticipation of danger, also mentioning that depression becomes more common when the winds arrive, and “children become unmanageable”. Didion’s tone shows inquisitiveness, because she provides learned facts, however, without explanations for them. This is because she cannot fathom the reason the winds affect everyone in such negative ways. This creates the notion that there are some natural phenomena that are beyond the human’s ability to understand.

Form is an essential component of any poem; it can make certain words stand out, and can convey the author’s meaning even more. In Claude McKay’s “Subway Wind”, his repetition of assonance and consonance throughout the poem brings about a word flow that makes the poem read much more smoothly. In addition to using these devices, McKay’s careful use of ten syllables per line brings about a distinct structure and form to the piece.

In order to give a greater sense of authenticity and awe, Didion utilizes a wide range of descriptive phrases. For example, “There is something uneasy in the L.A. air this afternoon, some unnatural stillness, some tension. What it means is that tonight a Santa Ana will begin to blow, a hot wind from the northeast whining down through the Cajon and San Gorgonio Passes, blowing up sandstorms out along Route 66, drying the hills and the nerves to the flash point.” This opening group of sentences clearly describe the Santa Ana winds and give them a corporeal form. These sentences

sense of her emotional deadness; her lack of emotion is itself an emotional state, and she

On a still night during the summer solstice, a young man lied in the grass fields alongside his humble home, concentrating on the wind’s whistle, the way it caressed his skin so gingerly. His name was Typhion, son of commoners—Agenor and Agathe—whom passed during his seventeenth year. Alone in the latter part of his life, he became inevitably appreciative of his natural surroundings...particularly the wind and the water (as he lived by a great ocean). Typhion thought of the wind as his supreme companion, for it always held him, guided him, and swept soft music through his ears. He would smile as the sky wept, its tears dancing down, performing for his unaccompanied self.

By means of composition, “Ode to the West Wind” is an intense combination of figurative language, sentence structure, cantos, sonnets, rhyme, and the list continues. As a start, take a look at Shelley’s use of