Stylistic device Similar to 'personification' but direct. The speaker addresses someone absent or dead, or addresses an inanimate or abstract object as if it were human. This is when the name of a character has a symbolic meaning. For example, in Dickens' "Great Expectations", Miss Havisham has a sham, or lives a life full of pretense. In Hawthorne's "The Scarlet Letter", Rev. Dimmesdale metaphorically fades away (dims) as the novel progresses, while Chillingworth has a cold (chilled) heart. A symbol may be an object, a person, a situation, an action, a word, or an idea that has literal meaning in the story
Sondra Sherman begun to express a sense of human character and emotion. For example, the piece Miss Havisham uses Charles Dickens' archetypal character to explore the stereotype of the old maid and society's discomfort with nontraditional women. As Sherman describes, "Miss Havisham, a chagrined, wealthy old woman, was left standing at the alter. The interior of her magnificent house remains as it was decorated to celebrate her wedding day. An atmosphere of bitter disappointment prevails." Sherman has also worked at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston,