Metaphor

Metaphors set things in movement by means of transference, fill up gaps in thought and can thereby have effects. Imagery and figurative expression can also give structure to cognitive thought processes, and organize rituals and entire texts. The popular genre of Old Comedy is based on these "tropological" processes and thematizes them. Aristophanes often builds his plots around metaphors understood literally. It is fundamental to the genre (GENRE CRITICISM) that "tenor" and "vehicle" stand in a true dialogic exchange relationship with each other and thereby generate plot in gliding chains of metaphorical signification. In New Comedy this technique disappears and metaphor becomes a rhetorical resource. Menander integrates his metaphors closely into the ethos and context of the scene in which they occur, and makes use of them for characterization