What is the figurative language and tone in chapter 6 of Bud, Not Buddy?
Figurative language uses various figures of speech, like metaphors and similes, to make a piece of writing more effective. Figurative language also applies to imagery because it attempts to appeal to the senses of readers. Chapter 6 begins with Bud going to one of the shelters that is going to feed people. He has a little trouble getting in line, and he is fortunate that a family fakes being his family. This allows Bud to get into the building much sooner than he would have been able to do from the back of the line. We are told that everybody stands in line very quietly; however, once let into the building, the silence ends quite dramatically. Readers are given a great bit of figurative language that uses a simile.
When we finally got around the last comer and could see the door
and folks going in it seemed like a bubble busted and people started laughing and talking.
As for the tone, chapter 6 continues with Bud's standard storytelling tone. He's honest and straightforward with readers. His account of his hunger is quite frank, yet Bud is always somehow able to maintain a playful tone. Describing the people moving and talking like a bubble bursting is a fun way to describe a scene that is not about something fun.
What figurative language is used in chapter 6 of Bud, Not Buddy?
Figurative language is a very broad set of literary devices. In general, figurative language is language that uses various figures of speech to be more effective and/or impactful. It could include imagery, metaphor, simile, hyperbole, personification, onomatopoeia, and so on.
Chapter 6 begins with Bud trying to get a meal, but he is actually being physically removed from the line until a family decides to be his fake parents so that he can get a meal. They stand and stand in line for a long time, but they finally get within sight of the door. Once the group is within sight of the door, they all begin talking freely and happily. A really great simile is used here to explain how the flood of talking begins.
When we finally got around the last corner and could see the door and folks going in it seemed like a bubble busted and people started laughing and talking.
Once Bud gets into the place, he sits down for an actual meal. There is a paragraph at this point that gives readers a great deal of auditory imagery about the sounds going on in the big dining hall.
The only sound you could hear was when someone scraped a spoon across the bottom of their bowl or pulled a chair in or put one back or when the people in front of you dragged their feet on the floor moving up to where they were spooning out the food.
What figurative language is used in Chapter 7 of Bud, Not Buddy?
Figurative language is the opposite of literal language. Literal language says exactly what it means. ("That is a big red gumball" is literal.) Figurative language doesn't say exactly what it means. Instead, it relates unrelated things to give you an idea of how someone experienced or perceived something. ("That gumball looks like a clown's nose" is figurative.)
In Chapter 7 of Bud, Not Buddy, there are several examples of figurative language. In this chapter, Bud walks into the library. When he's describing the air in the library, he uses a kind of figurative language called a simile when he says, "…it feels like you're walking into a cellar on a hot July day." Obviously, a library is not the same as a cellar. But the simile gives you a clear feeling of what the experience of walking into the library was like for Bud.
Bud uses another simile when he talks about how people look when they start to fall asleep in the library. He wants to describe the way their heads move. If he wanted to be literal, he'd say something dull like "their heads move up and down." Instead, he compares the way the people's heads move to an unrelated thing when he says "…their heads start bouncing up and down like they're bobbing in a big tub of water for apples."
Similes (which often compare two things using the word "as" or "like," as in the examples above) are just one kind of figurative language.
You can read more about figurative language here.
You can also discover more types of figurative language (beyond similes) here.
What is symbolic to the character Bud in "Bud, Not Buddy"?
The story Bud, Not Buddy has quite a few pieces of symbolism in it; however, the question specifically asks which item is symbolic to Bud. If I had to pick one, I think it would be doors. This symbol develops in Bud's mind over the course of the story. He doesn't understand the symbolic significance at first. In chapter 5, readers are introduced to the idea that doors are symbolic to Bud. We get a little flashback story about Bud's mother telling him about doors:
no matter how bad things look to you, no matter how dark the night, when one door closes, don't worry, because another door opens.
When his mother first tells him this information about doors, Bud thinks that she is talking about a literal door; however, he begins to understand that "doors" are opportunities.
But now that I'm almost grown I see Momma wasn't talking about doors opening to let ghosts into your bedroom, she meant doors like the door at the Home closing leading to the door at the Amoses' opening and the door in the shed opening leading to me sleeping under a tree getting ready to open the next door.
Chapter 7 has another good example of Bud telling readers about his doorways of opportunity opening and closing:
That library door closing after I walked out was the exact kind of door Momma had told me about. I knew that since it had closed the next one was about to open.
His chance to find Miss Hill has closed, but the next morning Bugs shows up, and Bud steps through that doorway for his next adventure and opportunity with Bugs.
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