Some context before I ask:
So my dad had picked me up from school today, as he does, and took me to go grocery shopping. The whole time, he asked me nothing of writing, just sung to his music, right? So on our way back home, he suddenly turns down his music a bit and asks, “When something is like something, that’s called an anology, right?” I told him no, like the smartie I am, and explained it was a simile. Then afterward, he goes, “Right, I don’t know all of the fancy writing lingo. I just write.”
So my question.
Does the specific terms for writing help? Such as knowing the difference between a simile and metaphor, your D.Os and OPs… Does it help to know? I’ve been buzzing with the question.
I'd say yes. It helps the writing flow smoothly… of course, this is just me talking…
I think it depends on what kind of writing you’re doing… like literary analysis stuff you might need to pay more attention to simile/metaphor/syntax/whatnot to convey more powerfully, I guess if that makes sense?
But for when I’m writing my book, I don’t think you really need to know the difference too much.
I think knowing different writing techniques really helps, whatever they’re called. It doesn’t really matter on an individual level whether you call similes ‘similes’ or ‘like-things things’, since you know what they are and how to use them. Where the terms come in useful is when discussing writing with others or analysing the writing of others, because I believe it’s important to have a common understanding and vocabulary for that.
To be fair to your dad, though, an analogy is a comparison between one thing and another. If I were explaining my story’s magic system, and said, “the magic is like language”, I have used a simile (a comparison using like or as) to make an analogy (comparing language with magic to help explain and clarify what it’s like). I don’t think all similes could be called analogies, and there are many analogies that don’t use similes, but these two words are closely related terms.
