An informative introduction discusses types of metaphor: mixed, extended, personification, allusion, metonymy, and antonomasia. A brief bibliography for further reading on these topics follows. A table of subject headings serves as an outline of contents. Subjects range from such abstract ideas as Abandonment, Enthusiasm, and Guilt to the concrete: Rainbows, Pets, and Diaries. Entries are arranged alphabetically by subject and then by author. Brief annotations that include background information, variants, or related metaphors accompany many entries. The source is given for most metaphors. The metaphors are from all periods of history, Homer to Bill Clinton, and represent the words of poets, speech writers, journalists, scientists, philosophers, business people, actors, and "just plain folks." There are author-speaker and subject indexes, a list of one-or two-word "common" metaphors, and a section of 600 metaphors from Shakespeare. A lengthy bibliography lists the works from which the authors chose the metaphors. Literary and classical metaphors predominate; many others are from newspapers and speeches. (From Booklist)