Literal understanding and figurative language

Literal interpretation and figurative language are a recurring point of friction in Christopher’s account: expressions that others use conventionally can mislead him when their words suggest something physically or logically impossible. His close attention to wording also supports a precise alternative. In particular, his distinction between a simile and a lie turns an apparent figure of speech into something he can assess by whether it accurately describes what he sees.

Expressions Taken Literally

On the train, a man tells Christopher that he will be “keeping an eye on you.” Christopher understands the phrase’s intended meaning, but objects that the man cannot literally watch him while he is in the toilet. The exchange makes the problem concrete: a familiar expression depends on separating its conventional sense from its literal image, and Christopher answers the image rather than accepting the social shorthand. The man’s irritation does not resolve the mismatch; it intensifies it, ending with an order to go to the toilet.

A similar gap appears when Mother urges Christopher to go inside before he catches his death. He does not know what the phrase means, so it cannot function for him as the ordinary warning Mother intends. He goes inside, but the words themselves remain opaque. The episode distinguishes practical compliance from understanding: an expression can move an interaction forward without conveying its meaning to the person hearing it.

Simile, Accuracy, and Truth

Christopher gives a more systematic account of figurative language when describing a police inspector. He insists that the image of two small mice hiding in the inspector’s nostrils is not a metaphor but a simile, because it really looked that way to him. He invites the reader to picture the image as a way of understanding the inspector’s appearance, then adds that a simile is not a lie unless it is a bad simile.

That qualification makes accuracy, rather than figurative language itself, the test. Christopher does not reject comparison as inherently false: a simile can convey a real visual impression. But it remains answerable to what it describes. His explanation therefore makes an explicit distinction between a nonliteral form and deception, while preserving a standard of truth that depends on the comparison’s fit.

Language as an Object of Attention

Together, the episodes contrast inherited expressions, whose meanings depend on convention, with a comparison Christopher can defend through observation. “Keeping an eye on you” and “catch your death” require knowledge that their words do not state directly; the mice image, by contrast, is explained through its resemblance to what Christopher saw. The contrast does not make language effortless, but it shows how he examines its parts, asks what a phrase actually asserts, and separates intended meaning from literal wording.

The distinction also shapes the narrative’s way of addressing its reader. Christopher does not merely offer an image and leave its status implicit: he identifies the figure, explains why it is a simile, and sets out the condition under which it could become a lie. Figurative language thus becomes both a difficulty in everyday communication and an object of careful, explicit reasoning.