Sometimes it clarifies meaning, most of the time it adds nothing. "Sneakier than a fox" doesn't help. That quote is from Orwell's Politics and the English Lang

Sometimes it clarifies meaning, most of the time it adds nothing. "Sneakier than a fox" doesn't help. That quote is from Orwell's Politics and the English Language: https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwell/essays-and-other-works/politics-and-the-english-language/ https://www.orwellfoundation.com/the-orwell-foundation/orwel... While the one sentence out of context seems unnecessarily complex, most of Orwell's writing is pretty simple to read. Another bit from that essay: "The writer either has a meaning and cannot express it, or he inadvertently says something else, or he is almost indifferent as to whether his words mean anything or not. This mixture of vagueness and sheer incompetence is the most marked characteristic of modern English prose, and especially of any kind of political writing. As soon as certain topics are raised, the concrete melts into the abstract and no one seems able to think of turns of speech that are not hackneyed: prose consists less and less of words chosen for the sake of their meaning, and more and more of phrases tacked together like the sections of a prefabricated hen-house." Arguably, Orwell would probably agree with PG. Using imagery to clarify meaning can be done well, but part of doing it well is using the tools sparingly and intentionally with an eye towards clarity. Another relevant bit from that Orwell essay: "As I have tried to show, modern writing at its worst does not consist in picking out words for the sake of their meaning and inventing images in order to make the meaning clearer. It consists in gumming together long strips of words which have already been set in order by someone else, and making the results presentable by sheer humbug. The attraction of this way of writing is that it is easy. It is easier – even quicker, once you have the habit – to say 'In my opinion it is not an unjustifiable assumption' that than to say 'I think'." I'd argue 'sneakier than a fox' is an example of what he's talking about. A lame pre-existing set of words that does little to explain or clarify anything.