In the following essay I will analyze the figurative language used by Mark Twain in his “Two Views of Mississippi”. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Mark Twain was many things in his life. A writer, a miner, a newsagent's apprentice – but also a steamboat pilot on the Mississippi. After being trained to sail on the Mississippi River, he soon lost his charm and his once beautiful features no longer seemed so endearing. Twain no longer focused on the wonders of the river, but rather on its dangers, as he saw every errant branch or "floating log" as a potential threat to his boat, its cargo, and its passengers. In his writings, Twain recalls a scene from when he witnessed a majestic sunset while he was a novice steamboat pilot. Using imagery, he described the reflections of sunlight and gentle waves on the water, going on to describe how, after becoming a pilot, he would perceive the sunset as an indicator of oncoming winds and the ripples in the water as a fade. sandbar. The beauty of the river was now reduced to obstacles to overcome. The main idea that Twain tries to address in this excerpt is that learning is a matter of both loss and gain. Understanding how something works also allows you to better understand how you can manipulate it, or even how it can manipulate you. This new knowledge erases the mystique of the thing before you know exactly what it is. It's no longer mysterious and intriguing, it's technical and concise. It's the human instinct to shroud the things we don't understand in a veil of magic. This is basically how most traditions and cultures began. For example: “Man, this big rock is making loud, scary noises! Maybe we should throw a human sacrifice or two in there?" Of course, I'm addressing cultures that had yet to understand the natural phenomena around them, like volcanic eruptions and earthquakes, and who therefore had attributed them to something along the lines of "the gods they are angry, let's calm them down!”. What we know today as natural disasters, others see as something much more mystical and amazing. Mark Twain begins his piece with a description of the Mississippi River. Twain uses epithets to describe it, such as “graceful curves, reflected images, wooded heights, soft distances; and over the whole scene, far and near, the dissolving lights constantly floated, enriching it every passing moment with new wonders of color.” With the vivid images written, readers can bring to life the beauty of the Mississippi River, the abundance of epithets contributing to the interest of the piece. In this sense, it seems that Mark Twain is like any other casual observer of the scenery, unaffected by what he actually knows at the time: all the potential dangers beneath the mesmerizing landscape. In the same vein, Twain also uses the simile to emphasize that the sight of the Mississippi River is particularly familiar to him, with the phrase: "Now, when I had mastered the language of this water and had come to know every insignificant feature that bordered the great river as familiarly as I knew the letters of the alphabet.” Twain's use of the comparison between familiarity with the river and the alphabet is significant, as it leads the reader to understand that although he had memorized the landscape as the palm of his hand, was ultimately just the surface he had scratched with his understanding of the river. Shortly after this phrase, Twain uses repetition with: “But I had toolost something. I had lost something...". By pointing out that he has lost something and repeating the phrase one more time, Mark Twain makes it clear to the reader that what he has “lost” must have been of sufficient importance to be worth repeating. In summary, his "loss" was that of innocence, knowing only the beauty of the river and not its ugliness. How strange that, after having just described how vividly he had known Mississippi, he then went on to say that he knew very little about it, in truth. Mark Twain then goes on to discuss the ambiguous nature of the river, which has two faces: the surface and what lies beneath. To signify this, he incorporates abundant use of metaphors and imagery to indicate how the river changes, even personifying the characteristics of the river with descriptions of its color (blood): “A wide expanse of the river was turned into blood; in the middle distance the red hue lightened to gold, through which floated a lone conspicuous black trunk; in one place a long, slanting mark lay glittering on the water.” The effective use of metaphors, imagery, and personification within these lines paints a vivid picture in the reader's mind of the splendor of the river from the average person's perspective. An interesting note can be made about the passage at the beginning of the second paragraph: “I drank it, in a wordless rapture.” Using metaphor to describe his admiration for the river, Twain also includes a pointed comparison to the act of drinking itself. Imagine someone drunk on their favorite type of alcohol (or any alcohol, really). Being drunk dulls your senses and distorts your view of what is actually happening around you. By relating the exhilaration of the river's beauty to that of actual exhilaration, Twain brings to the reader's attention that not all is as it seems, and while the splendor of the river is certainly captivating, it is not the whole picture. A floating log could wreck the boat traveling along it, the stream could drown anyone who falls into it, etc. It can be argued that allegory is the most important figurative language used by Mark Twain in Two Views of the Mississippi because it is used to illustrate larger concepts based on his description of the Mississippi River. First he describes the river in great detail, emphasizing its power and beauty. This superficial view is something any passerby would notice. Instead, Mark Twain would like readers to look beyond the surface and guide them toward this understanding through the use of figurative devices such as metaphors, personification, and similes, as well as his personal account of how he, too, once saw the river only for its greatness, but now he knows better. Toward the end of the piece, Twain compares the duplicity and ambidexterity of the river to people, to doctors, in particular. With the phrase: “The beautiful blush on the cheek of a beauty means to a doctor but a ʺbreakʺ that extends above a fatal disease.” Mark Twain is essentially noting that what most people may consider beautiful, such as blushing on a woman, may actually be something much more dangerous, such as a disease, something that can only be detected by those who have the experience and knows how to take care of it. A passenger on a steamboat sees a beautiful sunset, while the captain of the steamboat can see an approaching storm. Then comes the barrage of rhetorical questions. “Aren't all his visible enchantments sown, think of those that for him are signs and symbols of hidden decadence? Does he ever see her beauty, or does he just not see her professionally and comment on her unhealthy condition all to himself? And don't you sometimes ask yourself whether you gained or lost more by learning your trade? The last line in particular stands out, since..