Figurative Language1

Anthony M. Paul

Everyone has at least a vague idea what figurative language is:

speaking figuratively is a sort of flowery way of not saying just
what you mean, quite natural in poetry and politics but presumably
absent from serious legal, scientific, and philosophical discourse.
Attempts have been made to characterize figurative language in
detail but none of them, in my opinion, has been adequate.
Such a characterization is important, for problems involving
figurative language occur in many areas — not only in poetics but
also in linguistic theory and in other fields as diverse as the philoso­
phy of science and the philosophy of religion. Chomsky, for exam­
ple, writes that the central fact for which a linguistic theory must
account is speakers’ syntactic creative ability — their ability to
produce intelligible utterances by arranging familiar elements into
previously unexperienced syntactic patterns.2 But speakers have
a comparable ability for semantic creation — the ability to use
expressions intelligibly in senses they have never heard — which
also requires treatment in a full linguistic theory. The latter ability
is preeminently the ability to use language figuratively.3 Further,
since semantic change is partly dependent on the creative ability of
speakers, a characterization of figurative language is also germane
to the study of linguistic evolution.4
In several philosophical fields there are important theories that
depend on the thesis that figurative language, especially metaphor,
is somehow capable of expressing meaning or conveying insight
which nonfigurative language is incapable of expressing or con­
veying. Some theologians and philosophers of religion have main­
tained that at least some things divine are beyond the power of
normal language to express and can be discussed and understood
226 FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

only figuratively.5 And in the philosophy of science several writers

have recently attempted to show that some kinds of scientific
explanation require certain metaphorical aspects.9 While a frontal
assault on these weighty issues in linguistics and philosophy is
beyond the scope of this paper, I hope that the present attempt to
characterize figurative language may serve as a useful preliminary
to fruitful discussion of them.

I. DEFINITIONS

There are many nonstandard ways o f speaking and writing and a

number of these, for one reason or another, have been classified by
rhetoricians as figurative. However, since the philosophically
important questions about figurative language depend primarily
on its semantic characteristics, the several kinds of locution which
are traditionally classified as figurative but which involve non-
semantic transformations will by and large be ignored in this paper.
These forms fall into three categories:
Grammatical figures. Forms like ellipsis and inverted word order
are nonstandard because they do not conform to the normal
grammatical patterns of the language. Why it is that speakers are
able to use and understand language which is not fully grammatical
is an interesting question, but one which does not seem to be of
special philosophical importance. The following discussion there­
fore will deal only with figurative language which is grammatical,
and with ungrammatical figurative language only where its un­
grammaticalness is irrelevant to its figurative nature. Which
features of language are its grammatical features and which are
not, is itself a current issue in linguistic theory. Thus, whether the
string, “ He had a green thought,” is, if odd, semantically odd or
grammatically odd is now the subject of some discussion. By
“ grammatical” I mean roughly “in accord with the rules of
standard grammar that used to be taught in grammar school.”
Thus I regard the string about a green thought as grammatical,
although perhaps in some other way untoward.
Phonetic figures. These are poetic forms, such as syncope and
elision, which are linguistically nonstandard because in them the
phonetic characteristics of words are altered from the normal.
Rhetorical figures. These are rhetorical devices like apostrophe,
which is a way of addressing someone who is not present to be
 ANTHONY M. PAUL 227

addressed, and apophasis, which is mentioning something by

saying that it will not be mentioned.
Whether these devices are properly regarded as figurative is
debatable, but it will not be discussed here because this paper is
concerned only with what might be called “ figures of sense” or
“ semantic figures.” These are the forms of figurative language
whose status is of greatest philosophical interest. A semantically
figurative utterance is a figurative utterance in which at least one
word or phrase is used in a nonstandard sense. Semantically
figurative utterances are different from the other kinds of figurative
utterances because it is the meanings of their constituents, rather
than their grammatical, phonetic, or rhetorical characteristics, that
make them figurative. Metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, and
oxymoron, for example, are all semantic figures. In trying to
distinguish semantic figures from the other kinds I do not mean
to deny that a single utterance, such as a syncopated metaphor, can
instance both semantic and non-semantic figures. Some of the
following remarks may apply to non-semantic figurative language,
but they do so only incidentally. From now on, “ figurative” will
mean “ semantically figurative.”
Let us begin by examining a useful definition offered by William
Alston:
Let us use the term “ figurative” in the following way.
Wherever an expression is used so that, even though it is used
in none of its established senses, nevertheless, what is said
is intelligible to a fairly sensitive person with a command of
the language, the expression will be said to be used figurative­
ly. It is obvious that this sort of thing is possible only if these
uses are somehow derivative from uses in established senses.7

Although Alston does not so specify, his definition, because it

applies only to uses in nonstandard senses, defines only semantically
figurative use. Assuming (what Alston’s proposal seems to imply)
that nothing else is to count as figurative, he is committed to three
propositions about figurative use:
1. To be used figuratively an expression must be used in none of
its established senses.
2. If an expression is used figuratively, what is thereby said must
be intelligible to a fairly sensitive person with a command of the
language.
3. If an expression is used in none of its established senses and
228 FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

what is thereby said is intelligible to a fairly sensitive person with a

command of the language, this use must be somehow derivative
from the expression’s uses in established senses.
The next three sections of this paper respectively constitute
detailed examinations of propositions 1, 2, and 3 . 1 shall argue that
1 and 2 are essentially correct, although in need of expansion, while
3 is false as it stands and requires revision and expansion.

II. LITERAL AND FIGURATIVE

Concerning 1, Alston indicates that by “established sense” he

means what is ordinarily meant by “ literal sense.” 8 The point of 1,
then, is that to be used figuratively an expression must be used in
none of its literal senses; that is, it must be used non-literally.
Whatever else literalness and figurativeness are, it is clear that they
are opposed characteristics. In fact, it is not unusual to find that in
dictionaries the rhetorical sense of “ figurative” is defined in part
as “ non-literal.” Although not all the non-literal senses of a word
are figurative senses, it will be convenient in characterizing the
concept “ figurative” to begin with the concept “ literal” and then
add the necessary qualifications.
“ Literal” is itself a word with several senses, some of which are
more literal than others. One useful dictionary entry for the sense
of “ literal” which is pertinent to senses of words is as follows:
3. a) based on the actual words in their ordinary meaning;
not figurative or symbolical: as, the literal meaning of a
passage, b) giving the actual denotation of the word; said of
the senses of words, c) giving the original or earlier meaning
of a word; etymological; as, the literal meaning of ponder is
weigh.9
As the authors of the dictionary indicate by subdividing this sense,
the concept of literalness which contrasts to figurativeness has
several components. This is not, I think, because there is more than
one sense in which a sense can be literal; rather, there are several
characteristics which, because it has them in greater or less degrees,
make a sense more or less literal.
Of the parts of this entry, a and b represent important charac­
teristics of literal senses, while b appears to be circular, since the
most perspicuous definition of “ actual denotation of the word”
 ANTHONY M. PAUL 229

would seem to be something like “the word’s denotation when

used literally.” In what follows we will consider the a and c com­
ponents of the concept of literalness, plus one further component,
in more detail.
The operative element of a is the phrase “ ordinary meaning.”
Because “ ordinary” suggests common and frequent appearance it is
not suited to characterizing “ literal,” for many words, such as
“espial,” having perfectly literal senses, are seldom used. Let us use
the concept of “ relative frequency” instead.
A. Relative frequency. In most cases, if a word is used more often
in sense x than in sense y, x is a more literal sense than y.
Relative frequency as compared to the word’s other senses is the
surest indicator of literalness, but it is not infallible. There are, for
example, words which appear most frequently in contexts like
aphorisms and poetry recitations, in which they are used non-
literally. It seems likely that the word “escutcheon” seldom appears
any more except in the sentence, “ Honor is a mere ‘scutcheon,’”
used in portraying or practicing to portray Falstaff. Yet this,
obviously, is not the most literal sense of “escutcheon,” which
means “ shield or shield-shaped surface on which a coat of arms is
displayed.” Usually, if a non-literal sense becomes very common
it tends to become a literal sense, though not highly literal. For
example, when aphorisms like “ Necessity is the mother of inven­
tion” become common, the words which appear non-literally in
them come to be used with the same sense in other locutions. In
this way the “ origin or source of something” sense of “ mother” is
becoming more nearly a literal sense.
Even in more standard cases, higher relative frequency does not
inevitably make for a higher degree of literalness. For example, my
own impression is that one sense of “ insinuate,” “ to get in, push, or
introduce slowly, indirectly and skilfully,” appears less frequently
but is more literal (because of considerations like B and C below)
than another, “ to hint or suggest indirectly, imply.” Even if my
impression is wrong it seems likely that instances of this phenome­
non do exist.
B. Proximity to etymological sense. In most cases, if sense x is
closer to the word’s etymological sense than sense y, then x is more
literal than y.
As the third part of the dictionary entry for “literal” indicates,
the closer a sense is to the original or earlier meaning of the word’
the more literal it is likely to be. For example, the word “ tortuous’,
230 FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

has two senses: “full of twists, turns, curves; winding; crooked”

and “ not straightforward; devious; deceitful.” The first sense is
more literal than the second for two reasons: its relative frequency
is higher (in my language community, at any rate) and it is closer to
the meaning of the word’s Latin root, torquere, “ to twist.” In fact,
the Oxford English Dictionary lists the second sense as figurative,
having first been introduced in about 1800, while the first dates
from around 1426.
However, like A, B has shortcomings as an index to literalness:
1) It may not be clear what the etymological meaning of a word
is. Owen Barfield writes that our normal inclination to ascribe
sensible denotations, like “ breath,” to the ancestors of words
which, like “ spirit,” now have non-sensible denotations is simply
an illicit conclusion from our observation that words having
sensible denotations often acquire non-sensible ones in poetry.10
Whether he is right on this point or not, many linguists agree that
the available etymologies are not very reliable.
2) Even if a word’s origin is well known, its meaning may have
changed radically. For example, consider two senses of “ knave” :
“ serving boy or servant” and “tricky rascal, rogue.” There are
good reasons, such as A and the meanings of the derivatives
“ knavish” and “ knavery,” for regarding the second sense as being
more literal than the first. Yet the first is clearly closer in meaning
to the Anglo-Saxon source of “ knave,” “cnafa” which means boy
or male child. “ Knave” has simply acquired a pejorative connota­
tion which is not expressed by the first sense.
3) Some words, such as “ macadam,” are not derived from any
relevant earlier roots at all.
There is, it seems to me, a third factor contributing to literalness,
which I call “ interpretive priority.” I suspect that it is ignored in
dictionary definitions of “ literal” because it is too intricate for them,
not because it is irrelevant to literalness. My only authorities for its
relevance are my own intuitions and remarks by Gilbert Ryle and
Jerry Fodor, respectively, about “ stock use” and “ standard use.”
Both of these terms correspond fairly closely to “ most literal use,”
although the authors in question are not in this case concerned with
the literal-figurative distinction. W hat suggests this third factor are
Ryle’s remark that the stock use of a word is its teaching use, that
is, the use through which its other uses are most easily taught,11 and
Fodor’s thesis that the standard use of a term is the one which
provides the simplest characterization of its other uses.12
 ANTHONY M. PAUL 231

C. Interpretive Priority. Sense x has interpretive priority over

sense y if and only if knowing only x would enable a normal speaker
to interpret correctly more uses in sense y than knowing only y
would enable him to interpret correctly uses in sense x. In general,
if one sense has interpretive priority over another then it is more
literal than the other.
Two senses of a word, one of which is more specific and the other
of which is more general, respectively exemplify x and y above.
This is because knowing only the more specific sense means having
more information about the word’s meaning and other possible
senses than does knowing only the more general sense, since the
intension of the former embraces that of the latter. Two senses of
“hard" illustrate C. They are 1) “ difficult to crush, pierce, or
scratch” and 2) “ difficult.” Consider the two sentences, “ This rock
is hard” and “ I’ve had a hard day.” Knowing only sense 1, you
would of course understand the first sentence, and you would also
be able to interpret the second. You might reason, “ One cannot, in
any case, crush, scratch, or pierce a day, so the sentence probably
just means, ‘I’ve had a difficult day.’” Knowing only sense 2, you
would be able to understand the second sentence, but you would
probably be unable to interpret the first, since you would not be
able to infer whether it means that the rock is difficult to reach or
throw or scratch or what. In this case, C correctly indicates that
sense 1 is more literal than sense 2.
However, C has at least three shortcomings as an indicator of
literalness. The first is that many pairs of senses do not fit the x-y
model. For example, “hard” has another sense, 3) “ unfeeling,
callous.” Senses 1 and 3 are related — a hard heart is difficult to
affect just as a hard rock is difficult to crush — and 1 is clearly more
literal than 3, but C fails to indicate this fact because sense 1
involves no more information about how the word might be ex­
tended to other senses than does sense 3. The second shortcoming
of C is that sometimes two senses of a word are not obviously
related to each other at all — because, perhaps, of some quirk of
semantic evolution — so that neither illuminates the other. The
two senses of “ discursive” (“ rambling; desultory; digressive” and
“ going from premises to conclusions in a series of logical steps” )
strike me this way. If one such sense were more literal than the other,
this disparity would not be indicated by C. Third, C has counter-
instances in words like “ selection” and “ supply” which have
acquired rather specific technical senses. Such technical senses are
232 FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

not more literal than the words’ ordinary senses, even though they
are more specific.
If a sense clearly satisfies A-C with respect to the other senses in
which the word might be used, then unquestionably it is a highly
literal sense; if it clearly does not, then unquestionably it is non­
literal. Otherwise, its degree of literalness may be uncertain. This
uncertainty results not, I think, from the failure of A-C to capture
some essential principle of literalness; rather, it results from the
fact that the concept is too vague to avoid undecidable borderline
cases and too complex to allow, in every case, a decision as to
which of two senses is the more literal. Literalness, on the standard
concept, is scaled from the highly literal toward the clearly non­
literal, and there does not seem to be any principle by which the
standard concept could usefully be made sharper.
Figurative utterances (that is, utterances containing expressions
used in figurative senses) form a subclass of the non-literal utterances
which adjoins the class of literal utterances. What this means for
the literal-figurative distinction is that it is a vague one with a fairly
wide range of borderline cases for which a decision between ex­
tended literal and figurative could hardly be more than arbitrary.
This does not, of course, mean that the literal-figurative distinction
is a meaningless one, for there are clear examples on each side and
any utterance which is clearly on one side is clearly not on the other.
As is the case with many linguistic concepts, statements about
what is literal in the language as a whole only summarize the idio­
lects of the speakers of the language. To say that a sense is literal
or non-literal is to say that it is so for most speakers or for the most
competent and sensitive speakers. There can, of course, be varia­
tions among idiolects. For example, if, other things being equal,
sense x has a higher relative frequency than sense y in one speaker’s
experience, while for another it is the reverse, then the relative
literalness of the two senses is opposite in the two idiolects.
Let us conclude this section on literal and figurative with a brief
discussion of simile. It is sometimes disputed whether similes are
figurative, like metaphors, or literal, like straightforward com­
parisons. My own view is that they are more figurative than literal,
though not much more so. What is important is not choosing the
right classification for similes but realizing that whichever way they
are classified most of them are near the literal-figurative borderline.
A simile is typically defined as “ a figure of speech comparing two
essentially unlike things and often introduced by like or as." A
 ANTHONY M. PAUL 233

straightforward comparison is not a simile, as this definition

indicates by specifying that in a simile the comparison be between
two “ essentially unlike” things. Thus, “ March came in like a lion”
clearly is a simile, while “ An ocelot is like a cheetah” clearly is n o t
In further analysing simile, let us begin with the concept of assimila­
tion.
An assimilation is an assertion that something is like (or as, or
some other like-locution) something else, that is, a literal compari­
son or a simile. An open assimilation is an assertion that one thing
is like another without any specification of the respect(s) in which
similarity is being asserted, while a closed assimilation includes the
specification. An open simile is figurative because the “like” term
in it is used figuratively.
The primary or most literal sense of “ like” is “ having almost or
exactly the same qualities, characteristics, etc.” To say literally and
without qualification that one thing is like another is to imply that
they have many prominent properties in common. To say of two
things sharing only a few properties, without specifying that only
these properties are in question, that one is like the other, is to make
an assertion which is literally false. The sense of “ like” meaning
“ similar in only one or a few respects” is non-literal on A, B, and
possibly C above, though not highly non-literal. It is a figurative
sense because at least some of the utterances in which it occurs meet
the criteria summarized on page 243 below; in particular, they are
intelligible. An open assimilation which fails to meet these criteria,
one which would not be understood outside especially informative
situations, is not a simile or any other figure; it is more akin to a
riddle or conundrum in which the questioner asks, “ How is a
______ like a _______ ?” and the respondent must rack his brain,
usually without success, to find the obscure similarity.
Unlike an open assimilation, a closed assimilation does not,
literally interpreted, suggest that the things assimilated are alike in
many respects. A closed assimilation in which the things assimilated
are essentially unlike is not necessarily a simile, for it may simply be
a straightforward assertion that they do share the specified proper­
ties. However, some closed assimilations are usually classified as
similes. This is appropriate for closed assimilations in which the
very same property is not attributed to the things assimilated.
Wordsworth’s “ And custom lie upon thee with a weight,/Heavy as
frost...” 13 contains a closed simile, for it does not mean that
custom and frost are heavy in just the same way.
234 FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

Whether an assimilation is literal (a comparison) or figurative

(a simile) may be unclear. In an open simile the things assimilated
must be “ essentially unlike,” but unlikeness is a matter of fairly
continuous degree. In a closed simile the properties attributed must
not be exactly the same, but how different must they be? Is the
business of a housewife enough like that of a bee so that she can
literally be as busy as a bee? I have been arguing that there is no
sharp division between literal and figurative. Assimilations illustrate
this thesis.

III. INTELLIGIBILITY

Alston’s second point (see page 227 above) is that figurative language
must be “ intelligible to a fairly sensitive person with a command of
the language.” Before considering intelligibility in more detail, let
us notice that this point is hardly ever made in the standard
definitions of “figurative” or of the several tropes, and that it is one
on which there could quite naturally be disagreement. It might, for
instance, be objected that intelligibility is a criterion only for good
or poetically valuable figurative language, so that there could be
utterances or utterance types that are figurative even though un­
intelligible.
The problem with this view is that it obliterates the worthwhile
distinction between figurative language and language which is just
plain unintelligible, for if some unintelligible language is regarded
as figurative there is no way of distinguishing it from unintelligible
language which is non-figurative. Appeal to the standard definitions
of the individual tropes will not do for this purpose, because they
are far too broad. For example, since almost every thing is similar
to almost every other thing in some respect or other, virtually any
unintelligible utterance of the proper grammatical form could, on
the standard definitions of metaphor, be construed as a metaphor.
If this is allowed, if the figurative-unintelligible distinction is re­
moved, then the idiot and the aphasiac are simply bad poets. Degree
of intelligibility is not necessarily one of the factors that determines
whether a metaphor or other figure is good or bad.
In restricting figurative language to the intelligible, Alston
implies that there are strings which are intrinsically unintelligible,
that is, strings which could not under normal circumstances be
used to say anything intelligible. This is obviously true of highly
agrammatical strings, but Alston seems to believe that there are
 ANTHONY M. PAUL 235

also grammatical strings which arc unintelligible. He says that “ we

would not know what to make’’ of “ Sleep hammers nails into
arrogance,” whereas “ Sleep knits up the ravelled sleeve of care” is
easily explicated.14
Whether strings like the one about arrogance can rightly be
called unintelligible depends upon whether this is taken as meaning
that they are a) useless for normal communication, or b) useless for
normal communication and impossible to explicate plausibly.
Strings characterized by a are those for which the likelihood is
extremely small that, if uttered apart from especially informative
circumstances like those discussed in section IV, they would be
understood in the same way by both speaker and hearer and so
serve to communicate. There are indeed indefinitely many gram­
matical strings of this nature. If someone just came up to you on
the street and said “ Sleep hammers nails into arrogance” it is
hardly likely that you would get any clear idea of what he might
mean.
On the other hand, it is more difficult to find a grammatical
string for which no explication is plausible, or at least for which no
one explication is more plausible than another. (Even Chomsky’s
notorious “Colorless green ideas sleep furiously” has been expli­
cated.15) One reason for this is that the very outward form of a
grammatical string gives some indication of its meaning, whereas a
highly agrammatical string is, one might say, formless. For example,
“ Sleep hammers nails into arrogance” obviously affirms some
relation between sleep and arrogance, just as “ Sleep knits up the
ravelled sleeve of care” affirms a relation between sleep and care.
It is not clear what the relation between sleep and arrogance might
be, but again the range of possibilities is indicated because “ham­
mers nails into” is a better metaphor for some relations than for
others.
What a string in this category might reasonably be taken as
meaning is often disputable, but such disputes are not always
senseless. Reasonable disagreement about a string’s meaning is not
a sufficient condition for its being unintelligible, for ambiguity and
vagueness are characteristic of many strings one would hardly
want to call unintelligible. Of course, if a string is apparently many
ways ambiguous or very vague in spite of seeming long and detailed,
then its intelligibility is questionable.
Whether a string is likely to be understood when uttered outside
highly informative circumstances and whether speakers would be
236 FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

able to agree in interpreting it in the abstract are two distinct but

related questions bearing on the string’s intrinsic intelligibility. If
speakers are incapable of interpreting a string or agreeing on an
interpretation in the abstract then there is little likelihood that it
would be generally understood if uttered outside especially in­
formative circumstances. The converse, however, does not hold in
every case, since there are probably strings whose utterance speakers
would not normally understand but which could be interpreted,
perhaps by means of some fairly elaborate explication, to the satis­
faction of most speakers or, at least, most sensitive speakers. In
general, the more difficult it would be to obtain firm agreement
among sensitive speakers who are familiar with the literal meanings
and referents of its constituents about the meanings a string might
plausibly be understood as having, the less intrinsic intelligibility
the string has. Like the concept “ literal,” the concept “unintelligi­
ble” is one of degree.
Demarcating figurativeness as opposed to unintelligibility is
accomplished most conveniently by means of the concept of an
utterance rather than the concept of a string. A figurative utterance
is more than the utterance of a figurative string — that is, a string
which would most naturally be interpreted as figurative — for it
also requires a certain kind of intention on the part of the speaker.
To produce a figurative utterance — to speak figuratively — is,
among other things, to speak in such a way that in normal cir­
cumstances one’s message is likely to be communicated. The im­
portant question is not whether the string uttered is intrinsically
intelligible — which, of course, it must be in a figurative utterance
— but whether what the speaker means is likely to be conveyed to
an audience, or at least to a linguistically sensitive audience familiar
with his subject, from what he says.
There are two concepts of an unintelligible utterance: an utterance
which is unintelligible because the string uttered is intrinsically un­
intelligible, and an utterance which is unintelligible because what
(if anything) is meant is not expressed by what is said, even though
the string uttered may not be intrinsically unintelligible. The second
kind of unintelligible utterance, which includes the first, is what
contrasts to figurative utterances. Thus, a person who appears to
be using expressions non-literally is speaking figuratively if and only
if A) he means to express what is in fact a non-literal sense of the
string he uses; and B) what he means to convey is actually a figura­
tive sense of the string he uses.16
 ANTHONY M. PAUL 237

Concerning A, no matter what someone says, he is not speaking

figuratively or making a figurative utterance unless he means to say
something that is not a literal sense of the string he utters; other­
wise he may simply be speaking literally or making a linguistic
mistake. In saying “ George is a cretin,” I cannot be speaking
figuratively unless I do not mean to say that George is medically a
cretin. If George is not medically a cretin then my statement cannot
be true unless it is figurative, but of course it may just be false. If by
my statement I mean that George is a Cretan, I have simply
mistaken “cretin” for “ Cretan.” (This example requires the proviso
that “cretin” is pronounced with a short “e” in my idiolect.) There
are some strings, such as “ Morning opes her golden gates,” that
cannot be used literally to make true (or even, as some would say,
meaningful) statements, but to utter one of these is not ipso facto
to speak figuratively; still the speaker must intend a figurative
sense of his string and not just be mistaken.
Concerning B, it is clear that outside certain peculiar kinds of
circumstances (which are discussed in section IV) no string can be
used to mean just anything. For example, the string “ Morning opes
her golden gates” can be used without further ado to mean ap­
proximately “The sun rises with a golden glow,” but it cannot be
used without further ado to mean “Two plus two equals four.” 17
A person might say “ Morning opes her golden gates” thereby in­
tending “Two plus two equals four,” but his intention cannot be
realized. “Two plus two equals four” is not a sense of the English
string “ Morning opes her golden gates,” not even a figurative sense.
Usually, if a string has any senses at all, there are senses which it
clearly has and indefinitely many other senses which it clearly does
not have. Often, however, there are borderline cases, and it is these
which are relevant to the figurative-unintelligible distinction. What
we must ask, then, is, what determines whether or not a string has a
particular sense or can be used to express a particular sense?
To begin, if a string, S, has a certain sense, M, then S must be
able to mean M fo r someone. If no speaker of the language can be
brought to agree that S has M as one of its meanings, then M simply
is not a sense or meaning of S. (I say “can be brought to agree”
because one sometimes, for example in reconsidering a poem or a
prophecy or in reading an explication de texte, discovers that a string
admits of more interpretations than one had realized.) Thus M is
a sense of S for a person, P, even if P is at first unaware of this,
provided that S can be explicated in such a way that P would
238 FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

finally agree. O f course, if P is hard to convince or if his agreement

is very reluctant then it is less clear that M is a sense of S for him.
Words and combinations of them mean what speakers think they
mean and do not mean what speakers do not think they mean, as
long as everyone agrees.
S must have M as a meaning for at least one speaker, but surely
it need not have M as a meaning for every speaker of the language
in order for M to be one of its meanings. What sort of consensus
must there be that M is a sense of S in order for M to be regarded
as a meaning of S in the language?18
Suppose that S means M to only one speaker, P. That is, P
claims that S can be understood as meaning M, but no explication
of S is sufficient to convince anyone else that it can be so under­
stood. (If someone should maintain that “ Morning opes her golden
gates” can be understood in existing English as meaning “Two plus
two equals four,” I do not think that he would be able to convince
any rational English speaker to agree.) Could we, in a case like this,
say that S has the meaning M for P in the same way a string or­
dinarily has its meaning(s) for speakers of the language? There are
reasons on both sides.
The most important function of language is communication, but
clearly P could not use S to communicate M to anyone without in
some way informing them how he was using S. However, any string
could thus be used to communicate M, so no criterion of successful
communication is capable of distinguishing S from those sentences
which clearly, even for P, do not have M as a sense. The only
difference, in this respect, between S and those other strings is that
P thinks that S has M as one of its meanings; but P may be mistaken.
S may, for example, only remind P of M because of some psycho­
logical accident of his p a st Or, more likely, some element of S has
idiosyncratic connotations for P, given which S could be construed
as having M as one of its meanings. Thus, S may have the meaning
M for P in the way a souvenir has meaning but not in the linguistic
way a string normally has its meanings. What words and word
strings mean in a language is not a matter of whatever idiosyncratic
feelings individual speakers may have about them. Considerations
like this make questionable the supposition that a string might, in
the normal way, admit of a certain meaning for just one
speaker.
On the other hand, there are at least two problems in concluding
that a string cannot have a certain meaning for just one person.
 ANTHONY M. PAUL 239

One concerns ostensible cases like that of Aristotle’s genius-poet

Aristotle wrote that
the greatest thing by far is to be a master of metaphor. It is
the one thing that cannot be learnt from others; and it is also
a sign of genius, since a good metaphor implies an intuitive
perception of the similarity in dissimilars. {Poetics, 1459a)
Suppose that such a genius produces a metaphor, based on his
intuitive perception of some similarity in dissimilars. Others, since
they are unable to apprehend the relevant similarity, do not see the
point of the metaphor. They would not understand it in the poet’s
sense without being informed what he means, and they would not
agree that his sense is a sense of the string he uses.
Should we conclude that the poet’s string means what he thinks
it does in the way strings normally have their meanings? Like P
above, he is unable to communicate his meaning by uttering the
string. Also like P, it would be difficult to tell whether or not his
interpretation of the string is based simply on subjective association.
If the interpretation were based on actual intuition, however, it
would seem to have more claim to legitimacy than if it were not,
for, should other speakers begin intuiting the similarity, it might
succeed in becoming an accepted interpretation of the string. The
difficulty of classifying this sort of case results, I think, from inde­
terminacy in the concept of a string having a certain meaning in a
language.
A second problem in concluding that a string cannot have a
certain meaning for just one speaker is that we must then proceed
to determine whether a string can have a certain meaning for just
two speakers, or just three speakers, and so on. Suppose now that
both P and Q, but no one else, agree that S could be understood as
having the meaning M. P is now able to communicate M by uttering
S, although only to Q. What if it is granted that S suggests M to P
and Q only because of some similar accidents of their pasts and not,
for example, because of some special insight or knowledge that they
alone share? Should we still say that S may mean M for P and Q
only in the way a souvenir has meaning but not in the linguistic
way strings ordinarily have meaning, even though S can now be
used in a limited way to communicate M?
If it is doubtful that S really means M for P, then it is doubtful
for the same reasons that S really means M for P and Q. However,
as the class of speakers who agree that S can be understood as
240 FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

having M as a meaning increases, S(M) comes more and more to

resemble a) a dialectal idiom, in which an expression is used by a
subgroup of the speakers of a language to express a meaning not
discernibly related to its normal meaning, or b) a string having a
figurative meaning which is, for some reason or other, understood
by some speakers of the language and not by others. Now, a dialectal
idiom surely has linguistic meaning for those who speak the dialect,
and a figurative meaning is surely a linguistic meaning even though
some speakers would not apprehend it. Thus, the more speakers
there are who agree that M is a sense of S, the more S(M) comes
to resemble cases of a and b, which clearly have linguistic
meaning.
The difficulty of deciding whether a string can have a given sense
for just one speaker, or how many speakers must regard it as a sense
before it is appropriately classified as a sense of the string in the
language, results from a twofold vagueness in the notion of a string
having a certain meaning in a language. First, this concept is
derivative from the concept of a string’s having that meaning in the
idiolects of individual speakers. If enough idiolects in a language
community have a certain feature, then it can be regarded as a
feature of the language as a whole. But “enough” is not very
precise. Second, the distinction between linguistic and non-
linguistic or souvenir-like meaning is vague. If a string suggests
something to a speaker only because of some idiosyncrasy in his
psychological make-up, then what it suggests is not a part of the
string’s linguistic meaning even in his own idiolect. On the other
hand, if an association of this sort becomes common in a linguistic
community it may become the basis for idiomatic or figurative use
which is perfectly intelligible within the community and may even
result in a change in the string’s literal meaning. But “common,”
again, is not very precise.
This vagueness precludes any but a rather general conclusion
about the senses of strings: if a large proportion of the sensitive
speakers who are familiar with the literal meanings and referents of
the components of S regard M as a sense of S then M is a sense of
S in the language; if the proportion of those who agree is very small
or if agreement is reluctant, then the conclusion that S has M as a
meaning in the language in question is dubious. This concept, like
“ literal,” is a matter of degree.
The point of the foregoing discussion is that not just any utterance
which is intended non-literally or is, literally construed, nonsensical
 ANTHONY M. PAUL 241

is a figurative utterance. If someone using S non-literally claims

to be speaking figurative English and offers S' as an explication or
paraphrase of what he means by S, one of the things we must know
in order to assess his claim is whether qualified speakers would
agree that S can be used non-arbitrarily to express the meaning of
S'. If few would agree or if their agreement is reluctant, then the
claim that S is thus used figuratively is a questionable one. Obvious­
ly this “ consensus” criterion fails to establish a precise distinction
between the figurative and unintelligible uses of strings, but the
difference itself is not a sharp one; it is, in fact, no sharper than the
difference between figurative and literal use.
One more point about unintelligibility: many figurative utterances
are, as it were, unintelligible as they stand. That is, they are un­
intelligible on an attempted literal interpretation. This does not,
however, show that they are meaningless (as some Logical Posi­
tivists held all poetic utterances to be), for they are meant to be
understood figuratively, not literally. It is, of course, possible for a
poem, even a good poem, to contain unintelligible passages; but
these, I am now arguing, are not figurative.

IV. STIPULATION

Thus far, Alston and I are in agreement as to what constitutes

figurative language. The class of figurative utterances is bounded,
although the boundaries are indefinite, on one side by the class of
literal utterances and on another side by the class of unintelligible
utterances. The point on which we disagree is whether this class is
bounded on yet a third side, that is, whether all non-literal but
intelligible utterances are figurative. The third important implication
of Alston’s characterization of figurative use is that if an expression
is used non-literally but intelligibly then this use must be somehow
derived from the expression’s uses in established senses. The pur­
pose of the present section is to show that this third implication of
Alston’s view is false. It is false because there is a second class of
non-literal, intelligible utterances?— which I call “ stipulative
utterances" — whose intelligibility is not dependent on any sort of
derivation, and from which figurative utterances must be dis­
tinguished.
The paradigm of a stipulative utterance is one framed in a code
in which certain words or phrases are assigned meanings arbitrarily.
242 FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

Such an utterance is non-literal19 and is intelligible to anyone who

knows the code, yet it is not figurative, nor is its sense derived from
the literal senses of its parts, since the code is arbitrary. Although
code utterances are the clearest examples of stipulative utterances,
a stipulative utterance does not require the explicit and systematic
stipulation that a code provides. Often the context and socio­
physical circumstances of an utterance provide information about
how certain expressions in it are to be understood, and may thus
serve implicitly to indicate or stipulate new senses or meanings for
those expressions. We frequently learn new expressions and new,
apparently nonderivative senses of familiar expressions, not by
looking them up or being told what they mean, but simply by hear­
ing them used in what I call “ highly informative circumstances,"
that is, circumstances which serve implicitly to stipulate the new
meanings. Two kinds of highly informative circumstances are
ostensive situations and determinative contexts.
An ostensive situation is one in which the socio-physical situation
of an utterance helps to indicate what is meant by it. Suppose that
“ giraffe” is the latest slang for “ policeman,” and that I know this
fact while you do not. The policeman sense of “ giraffe” is in no
apparent way related to its giraffe sense; certainly you would be
unable to understand most policeman uses of “giraffe” even if you
were familiar with its giraffe sense. Now suppose that you and I are
walking down Main Street when several policemen run past,
blowing their whistles and brandishing their espantoons. I say to
you, “There go the giraffes.” You understand, chances are, that
by “ giraffes” I mean, perhaps in a derisive way, “police.”
A determinative context is one in which a certain expression is
very natural, while all others are very unnatural. If a context is
determinative enough it doesn’t matter what expression is supplied:
the hearer will understand the utterance as if it contained the
appropriate expression. Consider the context, “ Last night the
----------arrested her for disorderly conduct.” An uninitiate hearing
“ giraffes” in this context would quite likely reason, “ Well, real
giraffes can't, in any case, make arrests, so ‘giraffes’ must simply be
a slang term for ‘police.’”
Proper understanding of an utterance is often aided by the
meaning clues that accompany it. The need for such clues does not
mean that the utterance is stipulative unless the required clues
actually, like the conspicuous policemen imagined above, serve to
indicate new senses for the expressions used. For example, although
 ANTHONY M. PAUL 243

usually the string used in a figurative utterance makes so much

better sense taken figuratively than taken literally that the utterance
signals its own figurativeness, sometimes outside information in the
form of a circumstantial meaning clue is required for this purpose.
So, when we read of Cleopatra that “The barge she sat in, like a
burnish’d throne/Burn’d on the water,” we learn from the context
that since no conflagration is present “ Burn’d” is to be taken
figuratively, not literally.
Meaning clues may be necessary to indicate that an utterance is
to be interpreted non-literally or to remind the audience that the
expressions used non-literally admit of the derivative or figurative
senses appropriate to the utterance. The need for this sort of
meaning clue is compatible with figurative use. However, meaning
clues may also serve subtly to stipulate entirely new meanings for
the expressions used non-literally. Because of its affinity to code
utterances, an utterance which is understandable primarily because
of such implicit or covert stipulation is not figurative. A figurative
utterance is a non-literal utterance which can be understood primar­
ily because of the hearer’s knowledge of what its components
literally mean or denote, not because of stipulative meaning clues
that might accompany it.
Alston’s claim that it is possible to use expressions non-literally
but intelligibly only if “ these uses are somehow derivative from uses
in established senses” is false. What is true in his third point is that
such uses are notfigurative unless they are derivative from established
or literal uses. There are only two factors that can make a non-literal
utterance intelligible. Either the non-literal senses in it are derived
from the standard senses of its components or they must, explicitly
or implicitly, be stipulated.20
In the degree to which the former factor is operative the utterance
is figurative; in the degree to which the latter is operative the
utterance is stipulative. There may sometimes, especially in com­
plicated poetic passages, be utterances such that it is difficult to
discern which sort of factor makes them intelligible, and there may
be cases on the borderline between stipulative and figurative in
which the two factors operate equally. Therefore, like the literal-
figurative and figurative-unintelligible distinctions, the stipulative-
figurative distinction is not a sharp one and warrants only a rather
indefinite characterization: the harder a non-literal utterance
would be to understand apart from the stipulative meaning clues
that accompany it, the less figurative it is.
244 FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

V. DERIVATION

Figurative uses are intelligible, non-literal uses which are “somehow

derivative from uses in established senses.” That is, one under­
stands the figurative uses of an expression because one can see how
they are related to or derived from its literal uses. How might one
use of an expression be derived from others? Alston says, by way of
example, that in synecdoche “ the derivation is on the basis of a
part-whole relationship... or a genus-species relationship.” 21 What
he seems to mean is that a synecdochal use of an expression is
derivative from its literal uses in that the synecdochal referent(s)
of the expression bears a part-whole or genus-species relation to its
literal referent(s).
He proceeds to discuss, with approval, Henle’s idea that in
metaphor “ we should think of the expression functioning in one of
its established senses to specify a kind of object or situation that we
are directed to use as an icon of what we are speaking about
metaphorically.’*22 The idea, I take it, is that the purpose of a
figurative utterance is to refer to or “ specify” an “ object” or
“ situation” which bears a certain relation to whatever is being
spoken about figuratively. This objective or non-linguistic relation
is the basis on which the figurative use of an expression is derived
from its established or literal uses.
This account of figurative use, although partially correct, mis­
leadingly suggests that the denotative function of an expression is
the only important one in figurative language. That is, the expression
used figuratively need only “specify” the appropriate object or
situation and then the intrinsic relation between the things literally
and figuratively specified does the rest. That this is not always the
case can be seen by considering cases in which two terms have the
same extension but different meanings.23
Forty or fifty years ago the meaning in labor parlance of “ fink”
was such that a man was literally a fink if and only if he was a
strikebreaker. But “ fink” was a derisive term, while “ strikebreaker”
was relatively technical and neutral. The Henle-Alston theory seems
to imply that “ strikebreaker,” because it specified or referred to just
those persons referred to by “ fink,” could always replace “fink” in
a metaphorical utterance without changing the sense of the utter­
ance. But this is surely no more true for figurative use than for
literal use.
Such cases show that in explaining how the figurative uses of
 ANTHONY M. PAUL 245

expressions are derived from their literal uses one must take account
not only of the characteristics of objects, situations, etc., but also
of the meanings of words and phrases. An expression may not
simply “ specify” something; it may also emphasize certain of the
referent’s aspects or certain of the speaker’s attitudes toward it, as
the term “fink” emphasizes the strikebreaker’s imputed treacherous
character. It may even be that this aspect-emphasizing element is
the dominant component of the expression’s meaning, so that
figurative uses of the expression would be more likely to trade on
it than on other characteristics of things to which the expression
literally refers. In this fashion the word “ fink” has lately (if my ear
serves me correctly) come by means of metaphorical extension to
mean “ traitor” in a general sense not at all restricted to activities
similar to strikebreaking.
My point is that if, as Alston says, figurative uses are derived
from established uses, then the relations on which the derivation is
based can range over the meanings of expressions as well as the
properties of things. (Conversely, of course, the relations must
range over the properties of things as well as the meanings of ex­
pressions. Understanding a figurative utterance often requires
knowledge beyond simple knowledge of the meanings of words and
phrases.) A figurative utterance is a non-literal utterance which a
hearer or reader is able to understand because he knows what the
expressions used non-literally in the utterance literally mean or
denote. Knowing this he is able to conceive or is reminded of
related, derivative senses of the non-literal components, given which
the utterance can be appropriately understood.
The question now arises, on what sorts of relation can figurative
derivation be based? In general, as I have suggested, the answer is,
any relation by itself sufficient to render what is said non-literally
intelligible; that is, any relation such that a non-literal use based
on it would be intelligible even in the absence of stipulative meaning
clues. Clearly, then, familiar and direct relations are more likely to
support figurative language than are strange and intricate ones.
A survey of the major tropes indicates the range of figurative
relations. Metaphor can be based on similarity but also, as Aristotle
remarks, on analogy. Metonymy is based on association or sugges­
tion. And synecdoche is a sort of open-ended trope which can be
based on any of a number of relations such as cause-effect,
container-contained, genus-species, part-whole, material-product,
etc.
246 FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

Any relation defines a trope if there can be figurative uses, as

here defined, based on it. Could there, then, be semantic tropes
other than the standard ones? I cannot think of any, for the class of
relations covered by these is quite broad. However, there is no a
priori reason for concluding that there could be no other tropes —
tropes which, perhaps, have escaped nomination because of their
infrequent occurrence. If there can be utterances which are at once
figurative and not instances of standard tropes, then there can be
nonstandard tropes.
An instance of a trope is any figurative utterance which would be
understood because of the relation which characterizes that trope.
O f course, not just any utterance involving the relevant relation will
do, since in a given case the relationship may be too tenuous or
obscure to lead hearers to make the proper connection. Thus, as
someone has remarked, although a cherry and a rare steak are
similar in being red and palatable it is highly unlikely that the
mention of one in place of the other would make a metaphor, since
it simply would not be understood properly.

VI. SUMMARY

I have presented what I believe amounts to a necessary and sufficient

condition characterization of the concepts of figurative utterance
and use, and by extension the concept of figurative language.
My approach has been by sketching, so to speak, the semantic
geography of the domain of figurative language with respect to the
three adjacent domains that surround it — the domains of literal,
stipulative, and unintelligible language. Nowhere are the borders
very definite. In no language are these border areas any narrower
than the relevant variations among speakers, and even within an
idiolect the borders are not sharply defined. In addition, a living
language contains expressions whose senses migrate from place to
place relative to my map, and in crossing a border they tend to blur
it even more. This being the case, we must heed Aristotle’s warning
against seeking more clearness than the subject matter warrants.
And in any case a vague map is better than an inaccurate one or no
map at all.
 ANTHONY M. PAUL 247

NOTES
I An earlier version of this paper, entitled “What Is Figurative Language?”
was read at the annual meeting of the Western Division of the American
Philosophical Association in St. Louis on May 3rd, 1968.
* “Current Issues in Linguistic Theory” in The Structure o f Language,
edited by J. A. Fodor and J. J. Katz (Prentice-Hall, Inc.; Englewood Cliffs,
N.J., 1964), p. 50.
* The semantic theory proposed by Katz and Fodor, for example, cannot
handle figurative language because its “semantic markers” and “selection
restrictions” preclude figurative extensions of meaning. See "The Structure of
a Semantic Theory” in Fodor and Katz, op. cit.
4 Gustav Stern, for example, devotes a good portion of his diachronic
study, Meaning and Change o f Meaning (Indiana University Press; Blooming­
ton, 1965), to the figures of speech.
* See Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, excerpted in Basic Writings o f
Saint Thomas Aquinas, edited by Anton Pegis (Random House; New York,
1945), vol. 1, p. 15; Paul Tillich, The Courage to Be (Yale University Press;
New Haven, 1952), p. 179; Frederick Ferré, “ Models, Metaphors, and Reli­
gion,” Soundings, vol. 51, no. 3 (1968), p. 332.
* See Mary Hesse, “The Explanatory Function of Metaphor,” Proceedings
o f the 1964 International Congress for Logic, Methodology, and Philosophy o f
Science, edited by Y. Bar-Hillel (North Holland Publishing Co.; Amsterdam,
1965), pp. 249-259.
7 Philosophy o f Language (Prentice-Hall, Inc.; Englewood Cliffs, N.J.,
1964), p. 97.
* Ibid., p. 102.
* Webster's New World Dictionary, College Edition (The World Publishing
Co.; Cleveland, 1957), p. 855.
10 Poetic Diction (Faber & Gwyer; London, 1928), pp. 73, 81.
II “Ordinary Language,” The Philosophical Review, vol. 62 (1953), p. 169.
** “The Uses of ‘Use"' (University Microfilms; Ann Arbor, 1960), p. 82.
11 “Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Child­
hood.” Quoted by Monroe Beardsley, Aesthetics (Harcourt, Brace A World
Inc.; New York, 1958), p. 137.
14 Alston, Philosophy o f Language, pp. 97-99.
11 By Roman Jakobson in “Boas’ View of Grammatical Meaning,” The
American Anthropologist, vol. 61 (1959), p. 143.
14 These points may seem to commit me to the curious view that what we
regard as the great figures of poetry may not really be figurative at all, since
their authors may have meant them literally, or have been mistaken, or... etc.
What I am claiming is that a poet is not writing figuratively unless the conditions
I specify are met. Whether what he writes is most appropriately Interpreted
figuratively is a different question. Where the intention of the author is unknown
or is irrelevant, as in interpreting poetry according to some theories, a figurative
utterance is one which is most appropriately interpreted as figurative; that is,
one for which a figurative interpretation is most appropriate to the context.
17 It might be argued by analogy to homonymity that this point follows
trivially from the fact that if a speaker were to use the phonemic string “ Morning
opes her golden gates” meaning “Two plus two equals four” be would be
uttering a different string. That is, just as one word cannot have two radically
different senses because such cases are homonymity rather than polysemy, so
one string cannot have radically different meanings. Therefore, phonetic-
orthographically identical utterances having entirely different intended meanings
must be utterances of different strings. My present thesis is stronger than this.
248 FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

For each phonetic-orthographic string there are many meanings it could not
be used to express. What a string can be used to express may, of course, vary
from time to time with the evolution of our language and conceptual scheme.
18 It has been argued (for example, by Paul Ziff on the occasion mentioned
in note 1) that whether a certain string has a certain meaning is a matter not of
agreement among speakers but of the (in Ziff's view, transformational) structure
of the string. This view overlooks the fact that in linguistics agreement among
speakers, called informants, is the primary evidence. Whatever is idiosyncratic
in an informant's report is not among the data for a description of his language.
One purpose of a structural analysis is to facilitate prediction and explanation
of speakers’ intuitions about their language. If speakers agree that a certain
string does not admit of a reading ascribed to it by such an analysis, or vice
versa, the analysis is falsified.
M A word used stipulatively is used non-literally because of considerations
like those adduced in section II and the peculiarity of the supposition that
anything could at any time become a literal sense of any expression. A defender
of Alston's position might reject code or stipulative utterances as counter­
examples on the ground that they are uses in established senses, the senses
having been established by stipulation. This is a misleading use of “established
sense," which connotes establishment through acceptance by a linguistic
community, not establishment through idiosyncratic fiat. Someone who relies
on this move still owes some hint, which Alston does not offer, at the particular
differences between figurative use and stipulative use.
It should be noted that the difference between stipulative and literal use is
as much a matter of degree as are the other differences we have been considering.
A new term or a new sense which is introduced and at first used stipulatively
may, if it gains acceptance, become literal. But there is, of course, no precise
point at which it changes status.
20 This point may seem to overlook the fact that, as in malapropism, an
utterance sometimes contains a linguistic mistake yet retains its intelligibility.
Thus, the following might be argued. When Mrs. Malaprop says that she wants
her daughter to be a veritable progeny of learning the audience understands
her to mean “ prodigy.” Therefore, there can be intelligible, non-literal utterances
in which neither stipulation nor derivation plays a part.
My own view is that a malapropism is best construed as a mispronunciation
which happens to correspond to another word, not as a misuse. In the example,
then, “progeny” is not used non-literally because it is not used at all. If someone
insists that malapropism is misuse, then it can be regarded as being intelligible
because of derivation, though the derivation is phonetic rather than semantic.
The hearer understands “progeny” in the appropriate way because he perceives
the similarity between its sound and the sound of the word appropriate to the
context. Thus construed, malapropism is akin to the phonetic figures disavowed
at the outset of this paper.
41 Alston, Philosophy o f Language, p. 97.
** Ibid., p. 98, paraphrased by Alston from Paul Henle, “ Metaphor” in
Henle, editor, Language, Thought, and Culture (The University of Michigan
Press; Ann Arbor, 1958), pp. 177-179.
*® A similar criticism is made by Monroe Beardsley in “The Metaphorical
Twist,” Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, vol. 22, pp. 294-297.