Literary Terms - Allegory

 

Literary Terms

Allegory 

An allegory is a story within a story. It has a “surface story” and another story hidden underneath. For example, the surface story might be about two neighbors throwing rocks at each other’s homes, but the hidden story would be about war between countries. Some allegories are very subtle, while others can be more obvious.

In most allegories, the hidden story has something to do with complex subjects that are difficult to understand directly. Many authors translate the complex subjects into allegories, which are easier to understand and more fun to read.

Allegories are always rich in symbolism. That is, nearly everything in them stands for something else: each character can represent a historical figure, a philosophical idea, or an aspect of human psychology, etc. Most stories have this kind of symbolism here and there, but it is extremely used in allegories. It’s important to remember that while allegory is dependent upon symbolism, the presence of symbols in a literary work does not make it an allegory. Symbolism is essential to allegory, but it can also be found in any literary work that is not considered an allegory.

Allegory vs Metaphor

Although it seems that allegory and metaphor are similar, they are entirely different from each other. Whereas an allegory is a complete story told either in verse or in prose, a metaphor is a small figure of speech. An allegory presents parallelism of human life on a wider scale as compared to a metaphor that presents the same on a smaller scale, mostly a single sentence. Also, an allegory is meant to teach a moral lesson or outline a lesson for the people, while a metaphor does not stipulate such a lesson. An allegory could have several metaphors when describing a character, a metaphor does not become an allegory. It is just a linguistic feature of the prose used to describe something or a person.

Types of Allegory

There are four major types of allegories.

Classical allegory: Allegorical stories told in the classical Grecian times about animals and other things to demonstrate human existence and teach the people a lesson. One of the best examples is Plato’s Allegory of the Cave.

Biblical allegory: Biblical allegories show stories used in the Bible to convey Christian teachings. These stories often evoke Biblical themes such as the conflict between evil and good.

Medieval allegory: This type of allegories presents stories such as the unity of Christianity

Modern allegory: Modern allegories include stories of animals and birds to depict modern themes such as The Chronicles of Narnia and Animal Farm.

Examples:

The Scorpion by Paul Bowles

This is the story of an old lady who is marooned in a cave away from the town whereas her sons left her. An old man tried to take her with him but she refused and dreamed of the town when she suddenly woke up with the scorpion in her mouth and her son calling from outside.

The Dumb Man by Sherwood Anderson

This story comprises three characters, a reluctant narrator, and a woman upstairs with a newly arrived fourth man. The gist of the story is Anderson’s thesis on how a man could be happy at the same place when the other one is sad.

Young Goodman Brown by Nathaniel Hawthorne

This story revolves around the journey of a young man, Goodman Brown, to the devil to talk to him and meet with several pious people on the way which opens his eyes that virtue is not as he has seen but what actually exists.

George Orwell’s Animal Farm

George Orwell’s Animal Farm is one of literature’s most famous allegories. The surface story is about a group of farm animals who rise up, kick out the humans, and try to run the farm themselves. The hidden story, however, is about the Russian Revolution, and each of the characters represents some figure from that revolution. The pigs represent Communist leaders like Stalin, Lenin, and Trotsky, the dogs represent the KGB, the humans represent capitalists, the horses represent the working class, etc.

Seuss’ The Sneetches

Seuss wrote The Sneetches as an allegory for racism and other forms of prejudice. The story is all about creatures who are treated as inferior because they don’t have stars on their bellies. It is written in a child-friendly, playful style, but it still contains an important political message.

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

And some in dreams assurèd were

Of the Spirit that plagued us so;

Nine fathom deep he had followed us

From the land of mist and snow.

And every tongue, through utter drought,

Was withered at the root;

We could not speak, no more than if

We had been choked with soot.

Ah! well a-day! what evil looks

Had I from old and young!

Instead of the cross, the Albatross

About my neck was hung.

In Coleridge’s poem, an “ancient” mariner appears and stops a wedding guest from attending a matrimonial celebration. The old man begins a story of a ship and its crew. During the story, as the three stanzas indicate, the mariner describes how the Albatross he has killed has brought misfortune upon himself and everyone aboard the ship. This poem is an allegory on many levels, but particularly reflects the fall of man and the betrayal of Jesus by Judas as symbolized by the death of the Albatross. Coleridge sets forth in his poem, not just the mariner’s surface story, but underlying narratives of sin and redemption.

There are two forms of Biblical allegory:

I.        One that refers to allegorical interpretations of the Bible, rather than literal interpretations, including parables;

II.        A literary work that invokes Biblical themes such as the struggle between good and evil.

Examples of Biblical allegory:

The Chronicles of Narnia (C.S. Lewis)

The Old Man and the Sea (Ernest Hemingway)

The Prodigal Son (parable from the Bible)

The Pilgrim’s Progress (John Bunyan)

The Adventures of Pinocchio (Carlo Collodi)

The Good Samaritan (parable from the Bible)

The Baggage Handler (David Rawlings)

Hinds’ Feet on High Places (Hannah Hunnard)

The Divine Comedy (Dante Alighieri)

Goblin Market (Christina Rossetti)

The most common examples of allegory are fables. A fable is considered a short allegory featuring anthropomorphic characters such as animals or other non-human characters that behave like humans and have human characteristics.

Fables, in general, feature an overt moral lesson or rule of behavior as part of the story, and fable characters often stand for abstract ideals. Like all allegory, fables work as standalone (or surface) narratives while also providing an instructive narrative lesson about behavior and/or values.

Examples of Fables:

The lion and the mouse

The tortoise and the hare

The city mouse and the country mouse

The fox and the grapes

The grasshopper and the ants

The wolf in sheep’s clothing

The fox and the crow

The little red hen

The hare and his ears

The shepherd and the wolf