Rappaccini's Daughter

Long sentences with multiple clauses allow the author to create complex descriptions, helping the reader visualize the setting and plot. For example, the story’s second sentence, with three clauses, provides ample information both about Giovanni and his intended domicile:

Giovanni, who had but a scanty supply of gold ducats in his pocket, took lodgings in a high and gloomy chamber of an old edifice, which looked not unworthy to have been the palace of a Paduan noble, and which, in fact, exhibited over its entrance the armorial bearings of a family long since extinct (Paragraph 1).

A metaphor is a figure of speech in which a term is applied to something to which it is not literally applicable to clarify some aspect of that thing. It is like a simile but does not use such words as “like” and “as.” For example, when describing the purple flowers in Rappaccini’s garden, the narrator uses the metaphor “the lustre and richness of a gem” to describe their vibrant color (Paragraph 7).