Literary Narrative Passages · Lesson 4

Figurative language and imagery

Literary passages are full of comparisons: a sound like a door that had not been opened all winter, a note that opens like a lake when the wind drops. A figurative-language question asks what the comparison suggests or emphasizes.

Use a two-step routine. First, ask what is true of the picture: a door stuck all winter is stiff and creaks; a lake with no wind is still and smooth. Second, carry that quality back to the real thing being described: the sound was stiff and harsh; the note was steady and calm. The answer describes the real thing, not the picture.

Watch also for images that come back. When a later paragraph reuses an earlier picture (I could find the lake), the image has become a name for an experience. Its meaning comes from where it first appeared.

Low Notes

1The trombone the school lent me was older than my mother, and it came in a case that smelled like pennies and old rain. On the first afternoon, I put it together wrong twice. When I finally blew into it, the sound that came out was less a note than a complaint, a long, flat groan like a door that had not been opened all winter.

2Ms. Ferreira, the band director, did not wince. "Good," she said. "Now we know it works."

3For the first month I practiced in the garage, because my sister claimed the sound made the dog worried. I learned the seven slide positions the way you learn the stairs in a dark house, by counting and by bumping into things. Third position was a little past the bell. Sixth was nearly the length of my arm. I missed them constantly, and each miss came out sour, a note that leaned to one side.

4What changed was not my arm but my ears. Ms. Ferreira had us play long tones at the start of every rehearsal, the whole low brass section holding one note together while she walked slowly between the chairs. At first I heard only myself, a thread of sound tangled in the others. Then, one gray Thursday, I heard the place where my note rubbed against the note beside me, a faint wobble, like two ropes twisting. I moved the slide a fraction of an inch, and the wobble smoothed out. The note opened, wide and still, like a lake when the wind drops.

5I did not tell anyone. I was afraid that if I mentioned it, it would not happen again. But the next day it did, and the day after that, and by spring I could find the lake most afternoons, though never all of them.

6In May, Ms. Ferreira stopped beside my chair during long tones, listened for a moment, and moved on without a word. It was the first rehearsal all year that she had not touched my slide to nudge it into place. My sister still claims the dog prefers silence. But last week I found the dog asleep on the garage floor beside my music stand, which I am choosing to take as a review.

Worked example Easy

Show the whole passage

Low Notes

1The trombone the school lent me was older than my mother, and it came in a case that smelled like pennies and old rain. On the first afternoon, I put it together wrong twice. When I finally blew into it, the sound that came out was less a note than a complaint, a long, flat groan like a door that had not been opened all winter.

2Ms. Ferreira, the band director, did not wince. "Good," she said. "Now we know it works."

3For the first month I practiced in the garage, because my sister claimed the sound made the dog worried. I learned the seven slide positions the way you learn the stairs in a dark house, by counting and by bumping into things. Third position was a little past the bell. Sixth was nearly the length of my arm. I missed them constantly, and each miss came out sour, a note that leaned to one side.

4What changed was not my arm but my ears. Ms. Ferreira had us play long tones at the start of every rehearsal, the whole low brass section holding one note together while she walked slowly between the chairs. At first I heard only myself, a thread of sound tangled in the others. Then, one gray Thursday, I heard the place where my note rubbed against the note beside me, a faint wobble, like two ropes twisting. I moved the slide a fraction of an inch, and the wobble smoothed out. The note opened, wide and still, like a lake when the wind drops.

5I did not tell anyone. I was afraid that if I mentioned it, it would not happen again. But the next day it did, and the day after that, and by spring I could find the lake most afternoons, though never all of them.

6In May, Ms. Ferreira stopped beside my chair during long tones, listened for a moment, and moved on without a word. It was the first rehearsal all year that she had not touched my slide to nudge it into place. My sister still claims the dog prefers silence. But last week I found the dog asleep on the garage floor beside my music stand, which I am choosing to take as a review.

In paragraph 1, the comparison of the first sound to "a door that had not been opened all winter" suggests that the sound was:

  1. cold, quiet, and hard to hear
  2. sudden and very brief
  3. loud enough to be heard outdoors
  4. stiff and harshAnswer

How to solve it

  1. Picture: a door unused all winter is stiff and creaks.
  2. Carry it back: the sound was a "groan," a "complaint."
  3. Choose stiff and harsh.

Why each choice is right or wrong

  • A. Incorrect. "Winter" belongs to the picture, not the sound; and a "groan" that the narrator calls a "complaint" is not quiet.
  • B. Incorrect. The sound was "a long, flat groan," so it was not brief; nothing in the sentence suggests suddenness either.
  • C. Incorrect. This takes the door literally; the comparison is about the quality of the sound, not where it could be heard.
  • D. Correct. A door shut all winter sticks and creaks, and the sound is "less a note than a complaint, a long, flat groan." It was stiff and harsh.

Worked example Medium

Show the whole passage

Low Notes

1The trombone the school lent me was older than my mother, and it came in a case that smelled like pennies and old rain. On the first afternoon, I put it together wrong twice. When I finally blew into it, the sound that came out was less a note than a complaint, a long, flat groan like a door that had not been opened all winter.

2Ms. Ferreira, the band director, did not wince. "Good," she said. "Now we know it works."

3For the first month I practiced in the garage, because my sister claimed the sound made the dog worried. I learned the seven slide positions the way you learn the stairs in a dark house, by counting and by bumping into things. Third position was a little past the bell. Sixth was nearly the length of my arm. I missed them constantly, and each miss came out sour, a note that leaned to one side.

4What changed was not my arm but my ears. Ms. Ferreira had us play long tones at the start of every rehearsal, the whole low brass section holding one note together while she walked slowly between the chairs. At first I heard only myself, a thread of sound tangled in the others. Then, one gray Thursday, I heard the place where my note rubbed against the note beside me, a faint wobble, like two ropes twisting. I moved the slide a fraction of an inch, and the wobble smoothed out. The note opened, wide and still, like a lake when the wind drops.

5I did not tell anyone. I was afraid that if I mentioned it, it would not happen again. But the next day it did, and the day after that, and by spring I could find the lake most afternoons, though never all of them.

6In May, Ms. Ferreira stopped beside my chair during long tones, listened for a moment, and moved on without a word. It was the first rehearsal all year that she had not touched my slide to nudge it into place. My sister still claims the dog prefers silence. But last week I found the dog asleep on the garage floor beside my music stand, which I am choosing to take as a review.

In paragraph 3, the comparison to learning "the stairs in a dark house" mainly emphasizes that the narrator learned the slide positions:

  1. by feel and by trial and errorAnswer
  2. mostly during late-night practice
  3. easily, once they were memorized
  4. with help from the narrator's sister

How to solve it

  1. Picture: on dark stairs you count steps and bump into things.
  2. The sentence says this outright: "by counting and by bumping into things."
  3. Choose by feel and by trial and error.

Why each choice is right or wrong

  • A. Correct. The same sentence says how: "by counting and by bumping into things," and then "I missed them constantly." The narrator found the positions by feel and by mistakes.
  • B. Incorrect. This takes "dark house" literally; the narrator practiced "in the garage," and nothing points to late-night practice.
  • C. Incorrect. The narrator "missed them constantly," so the learning was not easy, and the comparison stresses groping in the dark, not ease.
  • D. Incorrect. The sister only "claimed the sound made the dog worried"; she does not help.

Trap Taking the image literally

One wrong choice usually turns the picture into an event: the narrator practiced at night, rode a boat on a lake, or tied two ropes together. The passage is describing sounds and skills, not stairs, lakes, or ropes.

Ask, "What is the writer telling me about the real sound, feeling, or person?" If a choice describes something you could photograph in the scene, check that the scene really contains it.