Abstract

The current paper is devoted to study the human body parts metaphorically which Thomas Stearns Eliot recruits in his poems. Eliot is conventionally known of metaphorizing many body parts in order to fabricate situations that embrace certain implications which are often difficult for the reader to decode their real meanings. The poet creates his images and symbols involving body parts through utilizing specific figures of speech including conceptual metaphor and synecdoche that added an artistic value to his poetry. However, the aim of the paper is to figure out these human body parts which are used figuratively, then analyze them metaphorically to grasp their intended meanings easily. In addition, this paper aims at showing how Eliot frames the symbolic images through hiring human organs and how to perceive their connotations within the context. A model of conceptual metaphor has been utilized in the process of analysis for it is adequate to the research’s objective. It has been proved that Eliot focuses on some basic human body parts, particularly the sensory organs, such as ‘eyes’, ‘feet’, ‘hands’, ‘hair’ and ‘heart’. Each one expresses certain conceptions in the sense that ‘hands’ are used as a symbol of work, while ‘heart’ symbolically represents sensations and ‘eyes’ is a metonymy for woman or man. Consequently, these are called organic images.

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The article was added to IASJ on 2022-01-25

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