Read the excerpt from act ii of hamlet.
guildenstern: which dreams, indeed, are ambition, for the very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.
hamlet: a dream itself is but a shadow.
rosencrantz: truly, and i hold ambition of so airy and light a quality that it is but a shadow’s shadow.
in this excerpt, the characters describe the nature of
a. dreams and ambition by using metaphors.
b. shadows and dreams by using similes.
c. ambition and substance by using apostrophes.
d. substance and dreams by using personification.

a. dreams and ambition by using metaphors.

A metaphor is a literary device that allows the author to identify similarities between two ideas. It is a common rhetorical device in which the author refers to one thing by mentioning another. In this case, the characters are describing dreams and ambition by comparing them to each other, while also comparing them to shadows.

first of all the mood needs to be defined: it is obviously a mood of deceitful relief and serenity. why? because the cape horn is one of the most violent maritime regions of earth and although it has been left behind, it is a personification of ahab’s delirium and the fact that the end of the passage speaks about it about being “hidden” but “raving” immediately conveys the feeling the calm is not permanent but fleeting.

furthermore, the oxymoron “mild stun'sails” is the first instance of such feeling as the adjective “mild” is associated with “stunned” underscoring the fleeting nature of this “tranquil” moment. and the contrasts keep piling up, with the opposition between “dark den” and “blessed light and air” to end with the final conclusion that leaves the reader with the uneasy knowledge that this is just a reprieve.