growth

See Also: SPREADING

1. Accumulate … like acorns beneath the trees of a forest —Thomas H. Huxley
2. Accumulate like a pile of dead leaves drifting onto the pavement of August —Barbara Pym
3. Accumulate like wire coat hangers in a closet —Anon
4. Blooming as a bride —Anon
5. Blooming as spring —John Dryden
6. Bloom like wildflowers in moss —George Garrett
7. [A young girl] blossomed … like a tree or a branch where every bud was breaking into flower —Rumer Godden
8. (Curiosity) blossomed like leprosy —Yehuda Amichai
9. (Life had) blossomed out like a flower in the sun —Ellen Glasgow
10. Blown up like a tumor —Ralph Waldo Emerson
11. Bred and nourished like a gardenia —Pat Conroy
12. Breed as quickly as cockroaches and are as difficult to stamp out —Bob Davis, in article about bugs in computer software, Wall Street Journal, January 28, 1987
13. Breed like cells under a microscope —Doris Lessing
14. Breeds like a rabbit —Jonathan Swift
15. (Ambassadors) cropped up like hay —W. S. Gilbert
16. (His belief … came to the surface and) expanded like some delicate flower —E. M. Forster
17. Expanding like the shade of a cloud on sand —Wallace Stevens
18. Fertile like the divine creation —Victor Hugo
19. (The righteous shall) flourish as a branch —The Holy Bible/Proverbs
20. Flourishing like a weed —Stefan Zweig
21. Flourish like a cabbage rose —John Ashbery
22. Flourish like an herb —The Holy Bible/Isaiah
23. Going [a criminal investigation] like a grass shack fire —Harold Adams
24. Grew … like a balloon being pumped full of gas —Myron Brinig
25. Grew like a larch —Emily Brontë
26. Grew like asparagus in May —W. S. Gilbert
27. [George Ade’s popularity] grew like Jack’s beanstalk —Lee Coyle
28. Grew like weeds in sand —Marge Piercy
29. Grow and grow like a maypole —Erica Jong
30. Grow like a summer pumpkin —W. P. Kinsella
31. (His notions) grow like a tropical forest —G. K. Chesterton
32. Grow like savages —William Shakespeare
33. (I watch our children) grow like stubborn weeds —George Garrett
34. Growth … as fast as the light from polar regions —John Ashbery
35. Have grown like a bug from a bug out of the garden of Eden —Dylan Thomas
36. (In earth) like a man in a woman, I’ll make food out of food —Daniela Gioseffi
37. A major advance … it’s like going from the propeller airplane to the jet —Dr. Bruce R. Baral, a dentist commenting on new cavity removal system, New York Times, December 31, 1986
38. (Disappointment) mounting higher every week, like a quick-growing hedge —Mazo De La Roche
39. Multiplies itself [ultimate truth about fellow men] like taxes —Ogden Nash
40. Multiplies like loaves and fishes —George Garrett
41. Multiply (thy seed) as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the sea shore —The Holy Bible/Genesis
42. Multiply like fruitflies —Herbert Lieberman
43. Progress is like a merry-go-round. We get up on a speckled wooden horse … we think we’re travelling like the devil, but the man that doesn’t care about the merry-go-round knows that we come back where we were —Finley Peter Dunne In Dunne’s Observations by Mr. Dooley some words were in dialect (‘Travellin’ like the divvle but th ‘ …’).
44. Proliferate, like creditors at a bankruptcy —Mike Sommer
45. (Plots) ripen like fruit —O. Henry
46. Soaring like Halley’s comet —Jane Wagner As used in Jane Wagner’s scenario for Lily Tomlin, The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life, soaring refers to a sharp increase, as in the teenage suicide rate.
47. (Poems) sprout like grain from quickened seeds —George Garrett
48. [Popularity] sprung up, like a grass fire —James Thurber
49. Stockpiled … like grain in a grain elevator —Doug Feiden In Feiden’s novel, The Ten Million Dollar Getaway, the people doing the stockpiling are mobsters and bodies are the frame of reference for the comparison.
50. Stretched out like a string released —Henri-Pierre Roche
51. Swelled like bullfrogs at mating time —R. V. Cassill Cassill’s bullfrogs comparison is used by a character in Hoyt’s Child to describe how policemen will fatten up their role if you let them in on your problems.
52. Swelling like a balloon —Robert Silverberg
53. Swelling up like blowfish —Peter De Vries
54. Unfolding like a tree —Philip Levine
55. We grow like a tree from the earth —Marge Piercy