First, because they are. The world is not, whatever your English teachers say, not a stage, and Juliet is not the rising sun. She is just a girl Romeo wants to get into bed. But nearly every English teacher I have ever had, at every level, has given me some version of this spiel: We read fiction, we learn literature because good writing illuminates the truth of our world, the truth of ourselves, in a way that the everyday does not and cannot always. Quibble with that as you like, but there is no small measure of truth in it. And possibly because I am forever an insufferable little twit at heart, it amuses me that great literature less those truths accompanied by so, so many lies.
Why Metaphors are Lies?
First, because they are. The world is not, whatever your English teachers say, not a stage, and Juliet is not the rising sun. She is just a girl Romeo wants to get into bed. But nearly every English teacher I have ever had, at every level, has given me some version of this spiel: We read fiction, we learn literature because good writing illuminates the truth of our world, the truth of ourselves, in a way that the everyday does not and cannot always. Quibble with that as you like, but there is no small measure of truth in it. And possibly because I am forever an insufferable little twit at heart, it amuses me that great literature less those truths accompanied by so, so many lies.