Definition:
A metaphor (or figurative comparison) in which the literal meaning is expressed through more than one figurative term or a combination of primary metaphors. Similar to a telescoped metaphor. See also: Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Metaphor.
Examples and Observations:
- "At least three of the four simple metaphors for intensity seem to characterize this complex metaphor [ANGER IS A HOT FLUID IN A CONTAINER]: HEAT, QUANTITY, and SPEED. If we lose our cool, we become very angry; anger welling up in someone indicates less intense anger than anger coming over or overcoming someone; and a person flaring up is more intensely angry than someone doing a slow burn. But maybe the fourth intensity metaphor also plays a role in this anger metaphor. For instance, an outburst of anger indicates very intense anger as well as the forcefulness of the outbreak. Be that as it may, the point is that the extremely simple local metaphors that are based on basic correlations in human experience jointly apply to this complex metaphor and make it a very natural conceptual metaphor for anger.
"This situation shows very clearly that complex metaphors are based on simple ones, which are in turn based on tight, local correlations in experience."
(Zoltán Kövecses, Metaphor in Culture: Universality and Variation. Cambridge Univ. Press, 2005) - "The telescoped metaphor . . . probably takes its name from the way in which pocket telescopes pull out from themselves when we extend their concentric tubes. . . . It's a complex, permutating metaphor whose vehicle becomes the tenor for the next metaphor, and that second tenor gives rise to a vehicle which, in turn, becomes the tenor of the next vehicle."
(Jack E. Myers and Don C. Wukasch, Dictionary of Poetic Terms. Univ. of North Texas Press, 2003)
Also Known As: compound metaphor
