Compare literal vs. figurative language and understand the differences. Explore both literal and figurative language examples and see how they are used.
Updated: 11/21/2023
Literal vs. Figurative Language | Definition & Examples
Table of Contents
- Literal vs. Figurative Language
- What is Figurative Language?
- What is literal language?
- Literal vs. Figurative Examples
- Lesson Summary
Frequently Asked Questions
What is difference between literal and figurative language?
Literal language is the language that means just what it says without using comparison, overstatement, or understatement. Figurative language, on the other hand, uses comparison, overstatement, or understatement to mean something other than the simple dictionary definitions of the words.
What are some examples of literal and figurative language?
One example of using literal vs. figurative language can be seen in different uses of the word "fluffy." If you said, "That cat is fluffy," then you would probably mean, literally, that the cat has long, soft fur covering its body. On the other hand, you might say that a politician's speech was "fluffy." In that case, you would be using the word figuratively in order to imply a comparison between the politician's speech and a literally fluffy object, like a pillow or cushion, meaning that his speech was stuffed full of unnecessary bits and lacked solid substance. Another example would be saying "the wind stings" vs. "the wind bites." The first statement is literal--you're just noting the facts. The second statement, however, uses personification (a kind of figurative language) in order to convey the same idea.
What is an example of being literal?
Literal language is any kind of language that means exactly what it says and nothing else. If you were to talk literally about a "brown house" or "hot stove" you would mean that the house is literally the color brown and the stove is literally a high temperature. Similarly, if you said, "The dog is running," you would be making a literal statement about what the dog is actually doing.
Table of Contents
- Literal vs. Figurative Language
- What is Figurative Language?
- What is literal language?
- Literal vs. Figurative Examples
- Lesson Summary
Both literal and figurative uses of language are common not only in literature but also in our daily conversations. For instance, if you said "it's raining cats and dogs," you would probably be speaking figuratively--using an idiom to say that it is raining very hard. If, on the other hand, you meant that it was literally raining cats and dogs then that would mean that cats and dogs were falling out of the sky--a frightening and tragic situation!
What Do "literally" and "figuratively" mean?
When used to describe language, "literally" means that the words mean exactly what they say--with no comparison, understatement, or overstatement. The word "figuratively" refers to language that does use comparison, understatement, or overstatement. Both literal and figurative language are used to convey truth, but they do so in very different ways.
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Figurative language covers any non-literal use of language, which is to say any kind of language that is saying something other than or in addition to the precise dictionary meaning of the words. Figurative language often helps to convey meaning in a more engaging, interesting, and enriching way, so it is especially prevalent in literature. Some literary techniques for applying figurative language are metaphors, similes, personification, and hyperbole. We will look at some examples of these techniques in literature in the next section, but it is helpful to remember that we all use these techniques in our daily lives more often than we realize.
- Metaphors: Metaphors are implicit comparisons of two things, where one thing is spoken about as if it were another. For instance, a revolutionary might proclaim that the fires of freedom are spreading; they would mean that the spirit of revolution is spreading like a fire: fast, hot, and dangerous.
- Similes: Similes are explicit comparisons of two things using "like" or "as." If you were to say that your romantic partner was "like a flower in spring," for example, you would probably mean to say that they were similar to a flower because they were beautiful or delicate, or fragrant.
- Personification: This figurative technique sometimes overlaps with metaphor and simile. Personification happens when someone uses language to describe an inanimate thing (like a chair or the wind) by ascribing to it qualities possessed only by living beings. If a chair fell on top of you, for instance, you might exclaim: "That chair attacked me!" We would all know that you did not mean the chair literally came to life and hit you. But your way of phrasing helps us to see the situation in a funnier and more imaginative light.
- Hyperbole: This is just a good old-fashioned exaggeration. For instance, if your feet are cold you might complain that they are "cold as ice." If this were literally true, then you would have terrible frostbite, but what you would really mean is simply that your feet were very cold.
Figurative Language: Examples of Uses
- Allegories: In allegories like Pilgrim's Progress all of the language is figurative rather than literal because everything in the whole story is a metaphor for something else. "Mr. Worldly Wiseman" rather than being a specific, literal person is a symbol for every person who fancies themselves wise in the ways of the world, and Doubting Castle is a symbol of the experience of painful doubt.
- Novels and short stories: Narrative fiction is full of figurative language. Sometimes it is used for brief descriptions, like when Edgar Allan Poe's narrator in "The Tell-Tale Heart" describes a ray of light as being "like the thread of the spider." Other times the figurative language might be more subtle, embedded in aspects of the text that are literal but also act as a metaphor at the same time, such as Herman Melville's famous white whale in Moby Dick.
- Poems: Poetry probably makes use of figurative language more than any other kind of writing or speech. T.S. Eliot, for instance, uses this famously unusual simile to begin his influential poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock": "Let us go then, you and I, / When the evening is spread out against the sky / Like a patient etherized upon a table." And Mary Oliver uses personification in her poem "Song for Autumn" when she asks: "Don't you imagine the leaves dream now / how comfortable it will be to touch / the earth instead of the / nothingness of the air and the endless / freshets of wind?" Even if something in a poem is not obviously a simile or personification, it likely has a figurative meaning, like the decision to choose one path over another that Robert Frost agonizes over in his popular poem "The Road Not Taken".
- Idioms: Idiomatic phrases are often figurative language that has become easily understood through common usage. The example of the phrase "raining cats and dogs" that I used earlier is one use of a figurative idiom. Another example would be "a stitch in time saves nine." This phrase can be used to refer to far more than literal efficient sewing methods. Rather, it can be applied metaphorically to any situation where timely action could prevent future inconvenience. Profane language often works this way as well; the literal meaning of many obscenities is usually not what they are being used to refer to in a particular situation.
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Literal language refers to any use of language where the meaning of the words can be boiled down to their dictionary definitions. Literal language is used for direct communication (e.g. "the car is parked on 1st street") and for non-metaphorical description (e.g. "the red car"). Literal language is often a bit dry or dull compared to figurative language because it does not engage our imaginations in the same way. We have to think and imagine in order to understand a figurative description such as "the sunset blossomed like a rose," but we don't have to do that to understand a simpler, literal statement like "the sunset began with a little bit of pink but then it spread and became more orange." However, literal language is vital for many important kinds of communication because it is more easily understood and less ambiguous than figurative language. In the sunset example, for instance, different people might imagine very different things about what it means for sunset to blossom like a rose, but they would interpret the literal description more similarly to one another. That kind of clarity is vital for things like analytical arguments or prescriptive instructions. However, literal language is not only used for dry, practical communication! In fact, it plays an important role in literature and can often be extremely beautiful.
Literal Language: Examples of Uses
- Recipes and Instruction Manuals: You don't want your directions for how to bake banana muffins or how to assemble your new desk to use a lot of figurative language. You want a straightforward, literal description. When you are told to add one tablespoon of salt, you can safely assume that you are meant to add one literal tablespoon of literal salt--no metaphor here.
- Analytical Arguments: When scientists, psychologists, sociologists, or analytic philosophers publish arguments based on their research they write using mostly literal language. With the exception of some idiomatic uses of figurative language, most academic articles with empirical studies or objective analysis will rely on literal language to make their meaning as clear and unambiguous as possible. This is still mostly true of academic articles in the softer humanities, but you might encounter more use of similes and metaphorical descriptions in a paper published within the fields of literature, or music, or art.
- Novels and Short Stories: Although narrative fiction usually uses abundant figurative language, it still relies most fundamentally on literal statements and descriptions. Consider, for example, when O. Henry in his story "The Cop and the Anthem" writes: "On his bench in Madison Square Soapy moved uneasily." O. Henry does not intend for us to understand that Soapy or his sitting or the bench are symbols for anything else. Rather, he simply means to tell us exactly what Soapy was literally doing at a given moment. Literal statements like this are the backbone of novels and stories--without them, there would be no story at all.
- Poems: As replete as poetry is with figurative language, that does not mean that poems do not use ample literal language as well. Take William Carlos Williams' famous poem "The Red Wheelbarrow" for instance:
So much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
beside the white
chickens.
In this poem, Williams offers an evocative and beautiful description of a seemingly simple object without the use of any kind of figurative language. The wheelbarrow is literally red and literally glazed with rainwater. Part of the point of the poem is that the wheelbarrow is enough, in itself, without any fancy figurative language and symbolism.
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Now that we have talked about both figurative and literal language let's compare some examples of the two to make sure that we understand the difference. Let's say that you're struggling to move a heavy couch. You might speak literally and say: "This couch is super heavy!" You are not using any kind of metaphor to describe the couch in terms of something else, nor are you using hyperbole; you are simply stating the facts of the case. Now, on the other hand, you might speak figuratively and use a simile and hyperbole combined if you said: "This couch is like Mount Fuji!" You would be expressing the same basic idea, meaning that the couch is so heavy that it feels emotionally as heavy as the tallest mountain in Africa, but you have expressed it in a more evocative way and you might even relieve your friends' frustration with a laugh!
It is important to note, however, that sometimes language can be both literal and figurative. Some of our earlier examples demonstrate this. Herman Melville's descriptions of the great white whale, for instance, are simultaneously literal descriptions of the beast itself and figurative reflections on whatever the beast represents as a symbol (God, Nature, etc.). Similarly, when Robert Frost describes his choice of path in "The Road Not Taken" he is literally speaking of a choice between two directions to walk in the woods and figuratively alluding to the painful difficulty entailed in any decision in life where we must choose one thing and not choose another.
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In this lesson, we have learned that literal language is language that means exactly and only what it says. Figurative language, on the other hand, is language that uses metaphor, simile, personification, or hyperbole in order to mean more than the mere dictionary definition of the words. We learned that metaphor means talking about one thing as if it were something else, simile means comparing one thing to another using "like" or "as," personification means talking about an inanimate object as if it were alive, and hyperbole means exaggerating the quality of something in order to emphasize a point, and we looked at examples of each of these kinds of figurative language. We then saw some common contexts in which figurative language can be used, including allegories, narrative fiction, poems, and idioms. Next, we turned our attention to literal language and learned how literal language is useful for direct communication and non-metaphorical description, especially in things like recipes, instruction manuals, and analytical arguments. However, we also saw that, even though literal language can often be dry or boring, it is an important part of literature, not only in narrative fiction but also in poetry. Finally, we looked at some more examples of the difference between literal and figurative language and noted that sometimes language can be both literal and figurative.
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Video Transcript
Take It Literally - Or Don't
Writers often like to put a great deal of imagery into their work. After all, how many times have you heard an English teacher mention the importance of showing, not telling? One common element used to enhance imagery is figurative language, which is phrasing that doesn't have a literal meaning, but rather suggests something with the use of creative language. Metaphor and allegory, for instance, are forms of figurative writing.
Think of figurative language as the opposite of literal language, which is the text that means exactly what it says. Literal language can be read literally, word for word. Let's look at these types of language more closely and see examples of each.
Literal Language
If you're doing something highly technical, like building a rocket, you'll want to know exactly what the instructions say without any possible confusion. In an instance like this, literal language is essential, because it explains exactly what should be done through the course of the rocket construction. Of course, literal language is used in all types of writing, not just instructional texts. You can find it in everything from a book report to the pages of your favorite novel. Let's look at an example of a literal sentence:
- The hot flames roasted the fibers of the asparagus until it had dark grill marks.
Here, there is no potential confusion, and the language is very straightforward. The asparagus has dark grill marks from being roasted over the hot flame.
Because it's very straightforward, literal writing can be a bit dry and even downright boring; but it doesn't have to be. Especially when used in stories and other creative pieces, a strong command of syntax and vocabulary can help you craft an entertaining and detailed piece.
Figurative Language
Figurative language is generally more colorful. Literature drips with figurative language! Instead of using an exact description of what is happening in the text, figurative language creates comparisons and uses suggestive language to paint a picture in the mind of the reader. There are many forms of figurative language, but let's take a look at some of the most common:
- Simile: A comparison that uses 'like' and 'as.' For example, You are sweet like candy is a simile that compares the person's character to the sweetness of candy using 'like.'
- Metaphor: A comparison that equates two things. For example, Your mother is a saint is a metaphor that equates the person's mother to a saint. The mother is not literally a saint, but she is kind and gracious, much like a saint.
- Hyperbole: An exaggeration for the purpose of emphasis. For instance, I just ate a million cupcakes is hyperbole emphasizing that I ate a lot of cupcakes--not literally a million.
- Personification: Language that gives human character and personality to inanimate objects. For instance, The wind sang a soothing song refers to the calming sound of the wind--the wind did not literally sing a song.
Examples
As we mentioned, figurative language is rife in literature. Often, you can find figurative and literal language side by side in a novel. Take the novel Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. The narrator switches between literal and figurative throughout.
For example, in one instance, the narrator says, ''George's fingers groped for the side of his head.'' This is a literal sentence that tells you exactly what is happening in the story. In another part of the story, the narrator says, ''Harry felt a slight squirm of discomfort, as though a small snake had stirred inside him.'' This is figurative language. There isn't actually a snake inside of him. Rather, his discomfort is making his stomach feel uneasy.
Sometimes, readers disagree about the nature of language, whether it's literal or figurative. This is especially true with the Bible. Some people believe that the text in the Bible is meant to be read literally, while others believe the text is largely composed of metaphors that teach us lessons about how to live a moral life.
For instance, many theologians argue over a statement in Exodus 20:11: ''For in six days the Lord made the heavens, the earth, the sea, and everything in them.'' Some say that the Bible is literal here--that the world was created in six days, or 144 hours. Others say that a 'day' is actually representative of thousands of years, or other larger expanses of time.
There are many examples like this in the Bible and other texts. So, while readers may find figurative language to be much more exciting than literal language, it's important that writers are careful that the figurative language doesn't overshadow the meaning.
Lesson Summary
To review, both figurative and literal language can often be found side by side in a text and even on the same page. Literal language is text that means exactly what it says--it can be interpreted word for word. Figurative language is language that doesn't have a literal meaning, but rather suggests something with the use of creative language. Common forms of figurative language include metaphor, simile, personification, and hyperbole.
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Literal vs. Figurative Language | Definition & Examples
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