Pictorial Description Example: Comparatively

The pictorial description is the literary form in which a description of a person, object or place is made, as if contemplating a photograph or a painting, that is, a static observer who observes (describes) a static object.

This type of pictorial description has three variants: plastically (highlighting sensitive aspects such as smells, colors and textures), through antithesis (contrasting opposite or contradictory elements) and comparatively.

In this last variant, we use various comparisons between sensations or objects known to the reader, to expose the idea of ​​what is being described. Many of these comparisons are metaphorical, showing a parallelism between two elements that in sense have no relationship, and yet they give a more precise or poetic idea of ​​what is describes.

Thus, a simple and objective phrase such as "His life was very changeable", can be expressed through a comparison such as "His life was like a winding road ”, which makes us think of a broader concept, of ups and downs, than the simple adjective“ changing ”.

Simple and complex comparisons:

The simple comparison it is the one in which an attribute is replaced by a simple image, a quick and immediate parallel: "his face was pale as wax."

The complex comparison he substitutes an attribute or description for a much more elaborate image, and consequently, more complex and far-fetched: "His face was pale, like the livid white of someone taking his last breath."

According to the intention of the writer, the pictorial description can be comparatively clear and enriching, or on the contrary, comparisons may be obscure with the intention of being understood only by some readers or to convey a hidden message.

Examples of comparatively pictorial description:

The news

In the large waiting room, like a neighborhood patio where you can reach the door of each tenant, where we expected him, he arrived, with a disjointed face, like that of someone who has seen a daunting and unspeakable scene, with the pallor that the condemned have when he knows that the last hour has come, his eyes wide as if he had seen the grim reaper herself, anticipating the terrible news that, as in a third-grade novel (What would we have given because it was a bad novel and not real life!), suddenly fell like a heavy anvil when we lived a quiet calm. His hands clenched like iron tongs, squeezed a sheet of paper, which we did not have to read to know his terrible sentence. The paper absorbed the sweat from his hands and faded the letters, which, however, did not erase or lessen the severity of their content. She only had six months to live.

A moment on the beach

The sun at the zenith covers everyone on the beach like a blanket of light from which no one can step aside. The smell of the sea, like perfume of royal manufacture, fills the atmosphere. Moisture mitigates the burning sensation of Helios embers on the skin. In the water a group of children, like happy little fish, play with a colored ball. Later, some old men, with their skin wrinkled like parchment, and their bathing suits as old as they, as if they were A postcard from the 20s is about, they enjoy the water, the sun and the sand, playing like small children of 80, 85 or 90 years. A little closer, a Young Girl with an alabaster face, golden hair, coral lips and eyes of heaven, like a porcelain doll, is standing under an umbrella. She is wearing a swimsuit covered with a very light silk fabric, which highlights his musical guitar figure. The soft sea breeze plays with her figure and with her fabric and with her hair and seems to read my thoughts, which she then tells in her ear with every secret that the breeze tells her, her eyes of Heaven, they give me a warm and tender look and a knowing smile, like the smile that the girl with whom you have just done a mischief or to whom you have just told a secret.