Against Metaphor

Figures of speech are a tongue’s gift to the excessive. Some languages rely on this gift enough to turn its usage into an addiction, speakers into addicts, and poetic metaphors into national history. Consider this: is it possible to argue against metaphors—or some other linguistic devices like analogies or similes—without resorting to the thing itself, in some shape? If we can’t stop shaping (and figurating) or stage-designing with words, there can be no incorrect way to formulate such figurations. This is an appeal to use it all gloriously wrong.