Thunderball Metaphors and Similes

Thunderball Metaphors and Similes

Amoeba Simile, Chapter One

Bond's hangover was said to cause "a cloud of small luminous black spots across his vision like amoebae in pond water." This simile emphasizes the sheer number of the spots as like amoeba they are too multitudinous to count unless using a microscope. It also stresses that the hangover was continual as the spots continues to move across his field of vision en masse without stopping.

Fruit Stones Metaphor, Chapter Two

The temporary secretary filling in for his own during illness spoke to Bond "through a mouth full of fruit stones" which is a British metaphor for a person with a "posh" accent; the secretary barely opens her mouth sufficiently for annunciating clearly and this also denotes a prim and starchy demeanor.

Kids In The Larder Simile, Chapter Two

The patients at Shrublands who went to the local tea shop were said to "order mounds of the stuff and hog it down just like kids who've broken into the larder"

The diet at Shrublands was so sparse that the patients felt both starving hungry and very deprived. Consequently when they went to the tea shop for their permitted up of tea they lost all self control as soon as they saw other patrons eating buttered toast and cakes, ordering the same but bolting it down at speed for fear of being seen eating, much like kids stealing food from the pantry would do to avoid being caught.

Donkey Simile, Chapter Three

The machine known as the rack made a "soft iron hee-hawing, like a mechanical donkey" as the rhythmical engagement and disengagement of the gears produced a mule-like braying noise that became almost hypnotic and also lets Bond know when the machine is going faster than the original pace.

Largo's Hands Simile, Chapter Ten

Largo's hands are described as "extruding from the white sleeves that rested in the white chart, almost like large brown furry animals quite separate from their owner."

Indeed, everything about Largo is larger than life from his large frame to his musculature and especially his hands that were almost twice normal size and being tanned and hairy did not seem part of him, especially against the white of the cuffs of his shirt, and seemed like animals in their own right. It literally seems impossible for hands like that to be part of the person in front of Bond.

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