title: David Copperfield
author: Charles Dickens
description: Charles Dickens's early childhood was happy until his father was imprisoned for debt. The 12-year-old Dickens then began working ten-hour days in a boot-blacking factory pasting labels on the jars of thick polish. The shocking conditions of the factory made a profound impression on him. His anger at his situation and at the conditions endured by working-class people became major themes in his fiction.
zlib_text:  
  17 
   
  DAVID COPPERFIELD by Charles Dickens – Grammar and Style 
   
  EXERCISE 9  
  STYLE:  FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE 
   
  Identify the figurative language in the following sentences.  Label the underlined words: 
  p = personification          s = simile          m = metaphor          o = onomatopoeia          h = hyperbole 
   
  ____1. 
  As the elms bent to one another, like giants who were whispering secrets, 
   
  and after a few seconds of such repose, fell into a violent flurry, tossing 
   
  their wild arms about . . . 
   
   
  ____2.      
  He was but a poor man himself, said Peggotty, but as good as gold and 
   
   
  as true as steel. 
   
  ____3.      
  The case is so hopeless, and I feel that I am wallowing in such a bog of  
  nonsense, that I give up all idea of getting out, and abandon myself to  
  my fate.   
   
  ____4.      
  . . . the influence of the Murdstones upon me was like the fascination of  
  two snakes on a wretched young bird.          
   
  ____5.      
  I felt the words of my lesson slipping off, not on