Understanding Metaphor in Literary Texts

Through the expounding of concepts and the analysis of literary texts of the epistemology of metaphors by Paul Demann, this article analyzes metaphor in literary texts, expounding the continuity, the dynamic feature, and the ambiguousness of metaphor in literary texts. The continuity of metaphor in literary texts refers to its working state in the text as a mechanism, and therefore it is the active correspondence of concepts. The dynamic feature of metaphor refers to the transformation of concepts, an Abstract process from one concept to another or a process of meaning changes. Besides, in literary texts, if metaphor is taken as a reference, the real meaning of the metaphor is probably ambiguous, and there is no consistent reference between fact and language. In this case the metaphor will probably destroy the gist of the text.