Metaphor Research Library

The Metaphor Research Library is a guide to free reading on language, cognition, literature, creativity, mythology and therapeutic conversation. It brings books, papers, dissertations and official recordings into the wiki's existing subject routes.

Entries identify the available format. Complete works, historical editions, excerpts and limited previews are labelled separately. Links lead to the source or authorised host; some publishers supply a book as a set of chapter PDFs.

Choose a reading route

• Language and evidence: start with Metaphor and Reasoning, then compare the experiments and critical follow-up listed below.
• Body, sensation and feeling: use Embodied Cognition and Metaphors of Emotion alongside the sensory and movement studies.
• Literature and creative language: begin with Metaphor in Literature and Creativity, then follow the books and reader-response studies.
• Languages and translation: read Metaphor Across Languages and Cultures alongside Creative Multilingualism and Metaphor and L2 Learning.
• Myth and narrative: start with Joseph Campbell, The Hero's Journey and The Golden Bough. Keep each author's comparative framework distinct from the stories being discussed.
• Conversation and therapy: Metaphor in Therapeutic Conversation compares patient accounts, therapist interviews and analyses of dialogue.

Explore a book in more depth

• Metaphor Identification and Corpus Research uses Stefanowitsch's chapters on retrieval and annotation, with an example of a research record.
• Sensory Metaphor connects Zawisławska's Polish corpus study with Turner and Littlemore's research on sensory descriptions.
• Metaphor in Economics examines a chapter from Mateo and Yus's collection on letters to shareholders.
• Narrative and Interpretation introduces Phelan's distinctions among story, discourse, narrators and audiences.

Detailed topic articles

The following articles develop the reading routes through worked examples, source discussions and questions about evidence. Theory, research findings and illustrative interpretations are identified separately.

Foundations and theories

• Conceptual Metaphor Theory
• Image Schemas: Containment, Paths, Balance and Connection
• Conceptual Blending and Mental Spaces
• Metaphor, Metonymy, Simile, Analogy and Symbol
• Metaphor and Polysemy: How Words Acquire Related Meanings
• A History of Metaphor Theory
• Interaction Theories of Metaphor
• Metaphor, Context and Speaker Meaning

Body, time, gesture and images

• Time as Space and Movement
• Force Dynamics: Pressure, Resistance and Release
• Metaphor and Gesture
• Visual and Multimodal Metaphor

Science, learning and the brain

• Metaphor in Science and Scientific Models
• Metaphor in Education and Learning
• Learning Metaphor in a Second Language
• How Children Learn to Understand Metaphor
• The Neuroscience of Metaphor Comprehension

Public language and ethics

• Metaphor in Politics and Public Debate
• The Ethics of Metaphor

Campbell and comparative mythology

• Myth as Metaphor: Joseph Campbell's Approach
• Joseph Campbell's Four Functions of Myth
• Comparative Mythology: Methods, Evidence and Limitations
• Rites of Passage, Liminality and Thresholds
• Descent into the Underworld
• Death and Renewal in Myth and Metaphor
• The Trickster: Boundaries, Reversals and Disruption

Literature, dreams and personal narratives

• Metaphor in Poetry: Close Reading and Interpretation
• Numbers, Pattern and Symbolism in Literature
• Dreams, Metaphor and Interpretation
• Metaphor and Personal Narratives

Further studies of everyday and public language

• Personification and Agency - human roles, intention and responsibility in nonhuman descriptions
• Primary and Complex Metaphors - simple associations, elaborated scenes and the evidence for their development
• Mixed Metaphors and Coherence - why multiple images can cooperate, conflict or create humour
• The Conduit Metaphor of Communication - ideas as objects, words as containers and the role of interpretation
• Metaphor and Idioms: Motivation, Meaning and Use - conventional meaning, imagery, context and translation
• Susan Sontag and Illness Metaphors - stigma, blame and the uses of disease imagery in personal and public language

The expanded Metaphors of Emotion and Metaphor Across Languages and Cultures pages examine Kövecses's accounts of force, cultural variation and context. The new articles also discuss books that are not offered here as free complete editions; each article identifies its sources and any available official excerpt or open research paper.

Using the reading list

A book develops an argument at length; a research paper answers a more specific question using particular methods. A theoretical article, qualitative interview study and experiment should be read for the different evidence each provides. Publication in a journal does not make every interpretation in an article an established fact.

For historical mythology, record the author, edition and translator. Older comparative collections preserve material and interpretations from their period; they should not be used as a timeless dictionary assigning one meaning to every culture's images. The Campbell links include his own recordings and selected passages as well as explicitly identified later scholarship.

Language, cognition and research methods

• Analyzing Meaning: An Introduction to Semantics and Pragmatics. Paul R. Kroeger (2022), third edition. Complete book. Foundations in meaning and interpretation.
• Corpus Linguistics: A Guide to the Methodology. Anatol Stefanowitsch (2020). Complete book. Research methods, including a chapter devoted to metaphor.
• Metaphor and Senses. Magdalena Zawisławska (2019). Complete book. Corpus-based analysis of sensory metaphor in Polish discourse.
• Metaphor and L2 Learning. Elisabetta Materassi (2022). Doctoral dissertation. Comprehension and learning of metaphorical expressions in a second language.
• Metaphor in Economics and Specialised Discourse. José Mateo and Francisco Yus, editors (2021). Complete edited book. Metaphor beyond everyday conversation, in professional and economic discourse.
• Mapping the brain's metaphor circuitry: metaphorical thought in everyday reason. George Lakoff (2014). Theory article. A conceptual and neural account; read its proposed mechanisms as theoretical claims.
• Metaphors We Think With: The Role of Metaphor in Reasoning. Paul H. Thibodeau and Lera Boroditsky (2011). Research paper. Experiments on crime framing and proposed responses.
• Natural Language Metaphors Covertly Influence Reasoning. Paul H. Thibodeau and Lera Boroditsky (2013). Research paper. Follow-on experiments using supplied response options.
• When Do Natural Language Metaphors Influence Reasoning?. Gerard J. Steen, W. Gudrun Reijnierse and Christian Burgers (2014). Research paper. Critical follow-up to the framing studies; read the papers together.
• The Taste of Emotion. Yanyun Zhou and Chi-Shing Tse (2020). Research paper. Associations between taste words and emotional words.
• Metaphorical Action Retrospectively but Not Prospectively Alters Emotional Judgment. Tatsuya Kato, Shu Imaizumi and Yoshihiko Tanno (2018). Research paper. Movement, timing and judgements of emotional images.

Literature, rhetoric and creativity

• Creative Multilingualism: A Manifesto. Katrin Kohl and colleagues, editors (2020). Complete edited book. Begin with chapter 1, The Creative Power of Metaphor.
• The Many Faces of Creativity: Exploring Synaesthesia through a Metaphorical Lens. Sarah Turner and Jeannette Littlemore (2023). Complete short book. Sensory experience, emotion and creative metaphor.
• Letters of Blood and Other Works in English. Göran Printz-Påhlson; Robert Archambeau, editor. Complete book. Poetry and literary criticism with discussion of metaphor.
• Word and Figure: The Language of Nineteenth-Century French Poetry. Carol de Dobay Rifelj (1987). Complete book in chapter PDFs. Figurative language and the interpretation of poetry.
• Narrative as Rhetoric: Technique, Audiences, Ethics, Ideology. James Phelan (1996). Complete book in chapter PDFs. Broader reading on narrative and its relations with audiences.
• Structural Arithmetic Metaphor in the Oxford Roland. Eleanor Webster Bulatkin (1972). Complete book in chapter PDFs. A specialised study of numerical symbolism and literary structure.
• The Metaphor: A Study in the Psychology of Rhetoric. Gertrude Buck (1899). Historical book. An earlier approach to metaphor and rhetoric.
• A Dataset of Metaphors from the Italian Literature. Valentina Bambini, Donatella Resta and Mirko Grimaldi (2014). Research paper and dataset. Literary context and rated properties of metaphors.
• Difficulty and pleasure in the comprehension of verb-based metaphor sentences. Patrick J. Errington, Melissa Thye and Daniel Mirman (2022). Research paper. Reader responses to changes and extensions of familiar metaphors.

Mythology and storytelling

• The Golden Bough. James George Frazer. Complete 1922 abridgement. Use the named edition alongside the wiki article on Frazer’s comparative method.
• Myth, Ritual and Religion, volume 1. Andrew Lang. Historical book. Comparative mythology; volume 1 of the work.
• Myth, Ritual and Religion, volume 2. Andrew Lang. Historical book. The second volume, available separately.
• Poetics. Aristotle; S. H. Butcher, translator. Complete translated text. Background for studying poetry and the construction of narrative.
• Myths of Babylonia and Assyria. Donald A. Mackenzie (1915). Historical book. An older presentation of stories and comparative interpretations.
• Indian Myth and Legend. Donald A. Mackenzie (1913). Historical book. Identify Mackenzie’s account when comparing its retellings.

Joseph Campbell and later interpretations

• Metaphor as Myth and Religion. Joseph Campbell; Brad Olson, host. Official lecture recording. Campbell speaking in 1985, with later introduction and commentary.
• Pathways with Joseph Campbell. Joseph Campbell Foundation. Official podcast collection. Free listening to archival lectures.
• Joseph Campbell’s Advice to Follow Your Bliss. Stephen Gerringer; includes Campbell excerpts. Foundation essay and selected passages. Identified sources for Campbell’s remarks about direction and commitment.
• The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Joseph Campbell. Publisher information and preview. A preview is not a free complete edition.
• Pathways to Bliss. Joseph Campbell. Limited book preview. The available preview pages may vary.
• The Metamorphosis of the Hero: Principles, Processes, and Purpose. Scott T. Allison and colleagues (2019). Review article. Later psychological scholarship drawing on Campbell; not written by him.

Therapeutic conversation and health communication

• Digging down or scratching the surface. A. Malkomsen and colleagues (2021). Qualitative research paper. Patients’ metaphors for psychotherapy and improvement.
• How therapists in cognitive behavioral and psychodynamic therapy reflect upon the use of metaphors in therapy. A. Malkomsen and colleagues (2022). Qualitative research paper. Therapist interviews and responses to patient imagery.
• Enacting Metaphors in Systemic Collaborative Therapy. Zuzanna Rucińska and Thomas Fondelli (2022). Theoretical discussion with examples. Agency and the development of meaning within dialogue.
• The Therapeutic Use of Metaphor: A Heuristic Study. Jonathan Lloyd (2015). Thesis. Book-length exploration of metaphor in therapeutic work.
• Metaphor in Cognitive Behaviour Therapy. Fiona Mathieson (2019). Doctoral thesis. Book-length research focused on cognitive behaviour therapy.
• Metaphor Menu for People Living with Cancer. Lancaster University, Metaphor, Cancer and the End of Life project. Research-based resource. A short illustrated resource, distinct from a journal article or treatment manual.
• Metaphors in Mind. James Lawley and Penny Tompkins (2000). Publisher excerpt only. A 14-page preview, not the complete book.

Additional primary texts and open research

• “Conceptual Integration Networks”. Gilles Fauconnier and Mark Turner (1998). Author-hosted full paper.
• “Force Dynamics in Language and Cognition”. Leonard Talmy (2000). Author-hosted book chapter.
• “Metaphor”. Max Black (1954–1955). Full paper hosted for teaching.
• “Relevance Theory and Metaphor”. Robyn Carston (2015 manuscript). Author manuscript in an institutional repository.
• How Metaphors Guide, Teach and Popularize Science. Anke Beger and Thomas H. Smith, editors (2020). Complete open access book.
• “Political metaphor in world Englishes”. Andreas Musolff (2020). Open access research paper.
• Les rites de passage. Arnold van Gennep (1909). Digitised French text.
• Hesiod, the Homeric Hymns, and Homerica. Hugh G. Evelyn-White, translator (1914). Complete historical translation.
• West African Folk-Tales. William H. Barker and Cecilia Sinclair (1917). Complete historical collection.
• Songs of Innocence and of Experience. William Blake. Complete public domain text edition.

Browse the library

Concepts and language | Stories and literature | People and authors | Subject index