Back to Basics: Imagery

Imagery is one of the more common and overarching forms of figurative language found in literature. It is utilized in virtually all forms of prose and poetry, and it is at the core of one of the most often given bits of writing advice: show, don’t tell.

What exactly is imagery? You may guess it is language meant to create a picture, and it is. However, it goes beyond that. Imagery is language that evokes the senses in order to better describe a scene or a character’s experience. Most often, this is talking about the “big five” senses: sight, taste, touch, smell, and sound. 

It could be expanded to include descriptors for the lesser known but now formally acknowledged sixth, seventh, and eighth senses: vestibular sense, proprioception, and introception. However, these are a bit trickier to distinguish let alone describe, and few outside of the medical fields, psychology, and occupational therapy, or those with sensory processing disorder, even know about them currently. So, it is unlikely you will come across such examples.

Types of Imagery
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Visual imagery is the most common and easiest form of imagery to recognize. Anytime a poet or writer uses words to create a picture or describe what a person, place, or thing looks like, is visual imagery.

The house was a small, decrepit thing overgrown with creeping ivy and covered in a tattered blanket of moss.

The man was thin and not overly tall. His brown hair naturally stood on end, stubbornly camouflaging the fact there wasn’t as much of it as there had been in years past.

Olfactory imagery calls to the olfactory senses, which can encompass both smell and taste. This one is probably one of the lesser used forms of imagery, but it is also a powerful means of cementing a scene in a reader’s mind. After all, it covers not one but two of the major senses, and the sense of smell is a powerful memory trigger.

The sharp smell of disinfectant wasn’t something she expected to notice upon waking.

The siren call of cinnamon and strong coffee beckoned from the kitchen.

Tactile imagery tells the reader how something within the scene feels. This usually comes into play when a character interacts with something particularly meaningful or to add a bit of visceral impact in fight scenes. Tactile imagery seems to be roughly tied with the last form for second place regarding its frequency of use.

The dog nudged his arm with it’s cold nose. He hugged the dog, burying his face in the soft fur.

She’d expected the low wall to be rough under her fingers, but long years of sandy breezes and lashing rains had worn the stones smooth.

Auditory imagery has a vocabulary dedicated to it. Onomatopoeia, or words that sound like their meaning, are forms of auditory imagery all on their own. Given this, perhaps you have already guessed that auditory imagery gives details about sounds within a scene or image.

She bumped into the table, sending the pans clanging and clattering to the floor.

The heavy doors closed with a slam.

The match hissed to life with a spark.

Figurative Language Overlap
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Because imagery is such a broad form of figurative language, it should be no surprise there are times it overlaps with other forms. Simile and metaphor often rely heavily upon the use of imagery to make their comparisons. Onomatopoeia is sometimes considered a form of figurative language all on its own in addition to being auditory imagery. Personification is often used to evoke a particular type of movement, and when this occurs, you have an overlap between personification and visual imagery.

In essence, imagery can be thought of as the main type of figurative language. It acts almost like an umbrella term, covering any and all figurative language that uses the senses to help get a point across.

We humans experience the world through our senses, so it is only natural our literature is filled to bursting with imagery.

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Download the elementary version of this lesson here.