Definition of Allusion
An implied or indirect reference to a person, thing or event that may be of historical, cultural, literary or political importance.
Etymology of Allusion
The word allusion has come to English from Latin in the middle sixteenth century. It is derived from the Latin word “alludere” which means “to refer to”.
Explanation of Allusion
Allusion is not a direct but an implicit reference that does not describe the person or event clearly. It briefly refers to the name of that person, thing or event because the author expects the reader to know the background of that reference. He does not explain the background of the allusion but gives a hint of it. The author expects his reader to find a relation between the present and the past situations, without any explanation.
Allusion can be internal or external.
External allusion refers to something outside the context of the present document. It can be a person, thing or an event about which the reader already knows.
Internal allusion is the one in which the author refers to something within the context of the present document. It can be a person, thing or an event that the author has already mentioned in the work.
Usage of Allusion
Allusion is frequently used in literature. Different prose writers and poets make use of allusion. Allusion is used as a metaphor or simile, by comparing the present situation with the past one. This comparison simplifies a complex idea because a reader having knowledge of the past situation will relate it to the present one. This reference makes it easier for the reader to easily understand the present piece of literature.
Alluding to different mythological events makes the literary piece interesting to read while religious references make a religious work easy to understand.
Besides its use in literature, allusion is used in daily conversations as well. Alluding to old events or ideas make common speeches interesting. Such as “He acts like Romeo in front of her.” This statement makes an allusion to the Romeo of “Romeo and Juliet” by William Shakespeare. Romeo was Juliet’s passionate lover so the speaker of the statement is talking about a person who behaves like “Romeo” in front of his lover.
Besides literature and daily speech, allusion is also used in other artworks like music when a new musician makes use of the melodies used by the old ones.
Examples of Allusion in Literature
- “All Overgrown by Cunning Moss” by Emily Dickinson:
“All overgrown by cunning moss,
All interspersed with weed,
The little cage of “Currer Bell”
In quiet “Haworth” laid.
“Currer Bell” was the pen name of Charlotte Brontë, who was the author of the famous novel “Jane Eyre”. “Haworth” is an English village where Charlotte Brontë is buried, according to the poem. So in the above lines, “Currer Bell” and “Haworth” are allusions used by the poet and it depends on the reader’s background knowledge to understand these lines.
- “Nothing Gold Can Stay” by Robert Frost:
“Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day,
Nothing gold can stay.”
“Eden” refers to the garden where Adam and Eve lived in Paradise. The poet here wants to say that nothing lasts forever, not even in Paradise.
A reader having the background knowledge about Adam and Eve will find it easy to understand these lines.
- “The Waste Land” by T. S. Eliot:
“April is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
April is considered as “the cruellest month” in contrast to the medieval poet, Geoffrey Chaucer who in the Canterbury Tales has described April as a lively and cheerful month of the year.
A reader must have the knowledge in order to understand the irony, in the above lines, that alludes to Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.
- “Venus and Adonis” by William Shakespeare:
“Narcissus so himself himself forsook
And died to kiss the shadow in the brook.”
“Narcissus” is an allusion to Classical Mythology, where a young man falls in love with his own-self and keeps looking at his image in the water.
- “Hamlet” by William Shakespeare:
“Like Niobe, all tears. Why she, even she- O God, a beast that wants discourse of reason
Would have mourned longer!- married with my uncle”
The word in bold alludes to a mother in Greek mythology who mourned over the death of her sons.
- “The Raven” by Edgar Allen Poe:
“Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door-
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.”
Pallas refers to the Greek goddess of wisdom, Pallas Athena.
