I found the concept of explaining metaphors using metaphors in “seeing trough words” by Michael Erard to be especially interesting. The realization of what was happening while I was reading demonstrated the subtle brilliance in what the author does when crafting a metaphor. As you read deeper into the metaphor of architectural design and furniture you slowly develop a deeper understanding of what metaphors are and how they can be used. In this process I was sort of caught off guard to notice I was reading a metaphor about metaphors that was functioning exactly as the author described it would, the whole thing was sort of well for lack of a better word meta.
Another idea that intrigued me was the idea of the reader needing background knowledge to understand your metaphors. You can never be one hundred percent sure of what your reader knows and what they do not know. However, you are always writing for a target audience even if that audience is everyone. In that case, the information you can assume they know is limited to that which we assume anyone who can read knows. Using this less specific knowledge pool makes your metaphor more easily digestible but can limit its depth. It could be possible to circumvent this with a series of metaphors to explain increasingly complex topics in a chain that compares things back to back to back. What you relate these things to can be done in a way that tilts the reader towards adopting your perspective If you want them to see the trees face the window towards the trees.
Ha. I appreciate your appreciation for all the meta–because there’s a lot of it, no?
Your second paragraph opens up an interesting conversation about some of the challenges that a metaphor designer would face. Consider revisiting this paragraph when you are brainstorming how you want to respond to the first paper prompt. You may be able to include these thoughts in the conversation.
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