英語修辭與寫作·10.1　Personification

10.1　Personification

10.1A　Personification的含義與形式

1） Personification譯作“擬人法”，它實際上也是一種比喻，尤其是隱喻。其形式是通過把原屬于人所特有的品質(zhì)、行為、情感等賦予大自然其他有生命或無生命的東西，使它們具有類似人的特征，因此，也有人把擬人法叫做“靜物動化”的一種修辭技巧。例如：

The sun kissed the green fields.

The thirsty desert drank up the water.

Ambition is but Avarice on stilts and masked.

（Walter Savage Landor）

There has been, after all, something in the talk of American innocence. No doubt it is a false innocence, fabricated by a myth-charged education: the lady who was “once a beauty of magnificence unparalleled” nourished her complexion on genocide and slavery. Yet her beauty existed in the eyes of her children, especially her adopted, immigrant children.

（Conor Cruise O'Brien）

2） 擬人法雖然本質(zhì)上是一種隱喻，但有兩個特點：一是與人相聯(lián)系，包括人特有的形象、動作、情感等，二是通常用動詞、形容詞、副詞或副詞性短語，利用這類具有動態(tài)或描述性的詞語“移花接木”，達到借物喻人的目的，若用名詞，則會變成了simile或metaphor。例如：

The little goat was so fussy that he often cried for wolf. — personification

The little goat was like the shepherd who often cried for wolf. — simile

The little goat became a shepherd who often cried for wolf. — metaphor

10.1B　Personification的使用

1） 利用擬人法借物寓情，把人的喜怒哀樂之情滲透到所描寫的客觀對象之中，從而起到烘托人物的作用。例如：

The youth were singing, laughing and playing the music instruments.The trees and flowers around them danced heartily as if touched by merry mood.

（Y. Miyashita）

The interview was over. Mary Thompson said good-bye to the manager, turned back and stepped out merrily and light-heartedly. The gate smiled after her and the sun stretched out her arms to greet her.

（J. Wooten）

The night, like some great loving mother, gently lays her hand at our fevered head, and turns our little tear-stained face up to hers, and, though she does not speak, we know that she would say and lay our hot, flushed cheek against her bosom and the pain is gone.

（Jerome K. Jerome）

2） 利用擬人法借物喻人，不論影射時政，或是鞭撻小人，皆可收到戲劇性的效果。例如：

There is a rowdy strain in American life, living close to the surface but running very deep. Like an ape behind a mask it can display itself suddenly with terrifying effect. It is slack-jawed, with leering eyes and loose, wet lips, with heavy feet and ponderous cunning hands; now and then when something tickles it, it guffaws, and when it is angry it snarls; and it can be aroused more easily than it can be quieted. Mike Fink and Yankee Doodle helped to father it, and Judge Lynch is one of its creations; and when it comes lumbering forth it can make the whole country step in time to its own irregular pulse beat.

（Bruce Catton）

Besides, the Kettle was aggravating and obstinate ... it wouldn't hear of accommodating itself kindly the knobs of coal; it would lean forward with a drunken air, and dribble, a very idiot of a kettle.

（Dickens）

3） 擬人法能使抽象的概念具體化，使之具有人的某種形貌、聲音、性格、行為等。下述前三例皆涉及人生命運，十分感人；第四例講社會變化，其中rank and fashion代表貴族，他們車輪滾滾到西區(qū)，trade代表新興資產(chǎn)者，他們躡手躡腳，但迅速擴展地盤，完全把社會的變動形象化了。

How soon hath Time, the subtle thief of youth, stolen on his wing my three and twentieth year!

（Milton）

Death feeds on his mute voice, and laughs at our despair.

（Shelley）

Ignominy, Want, Despair and Madness have, collectively or separately, been the attendants of my career.

（Dickens）

As London increased, however, rank and fashion rolled off to the west, and trade, creeping on at their heels, took possession of their deserted abodes.

（Washington Irving）