NationMaster - Encyclopedia: Allegorists

An allegory (from Greek αλλος, allos, "other", and αγορευειν, agoreuein, "to speak in public") is a figurative mode of representation conveying a meaning other than and in addition to the literal. Through allegory a subject of a higher spiritual order is described in terms of that of a lower which is made out to resemble it in properties and circumstances, the principal subject being so kept out of view that we are left to construe the drift of it from the resemblance of the secondary to the primary subject.

Allegory is generally treated as a figure of rhetoric, but an allegory does not have to be expressed in language: it may be addressed to the eye, and is often found in painting, sculpture or some form of mimetic art. The etymological meaning of the word is wider than that which it bears in actual use. Though it is similar to other rhetorical comparisons, an allegory is sustained longer and more full in its details than a metaphor, and appeals to imagination where an analogy appeals to reason. The fable or parable is a short allegory with one definite moral. Rhetoric (from Greek ρητωρ, rhêtôr, orator) is one of the three original liberal arts or trivium (the other members are dialectic and grammar). ... The Mona Lisa is perhaps the best-known artistic painting in the Western world. ... Ancient Greeks depiction of ideal form of the body is expressed through sculpture such as this one. ... This page is a candidate to be moved to Wiktionary. ... Etymology is the study of the origins of words. ... In language, a metaphor is a rhetorical trope where a comparison is made between two seemingly unrelated subjects. ... An analogy is a comparison between two different things, in order to highlight some form of similarity. ... In its strict sense a fable is a short story or folk tale embodying a moral, which may be expressed explicitly at the end as a maxim. ... An ill digested lesson The Governess. ...

Northrop Frye discussed the continuum of allegory from what he termed the "naive allegory" of The Faerie Queen to the more private allegories of modern paradox literature. The characters in a "naive" allegory are not fully three dimensional, for each aspect of their individual personalities and the events that befall them embodies some moral quality or other abstraction. The allegory has been selected first: the details merely flesh it out. Since meaningful stories are always applicable to larger issues, allegories may be read into many significant stories, sometimes distorting their author's overt meaning. J.R.R. Tolkien's distaste for allegory is famous. Herman Northrop Frye (July 14, 1912 - January 23, 1991) was a Canadian literary critic, one of the most distinguished of the 20th century. ... J. R. R. Tolkien in 1916. ...

The allegory has been a favourite form in the literature of nearly every nation. The Hebrew scriptures present frequent instances of it, one of the most beautiful being the comparison of the history of Israel to the growth of a vine in the 80th Psalm. In the Rabbinic tradition fully-developed allegorical readings were applied to every text, with every detail of the narrative given an emblemmatic reading, a tradition that was inherited by Christian writers, for whom allegorical similitudes are the basis of exegesis, the origin of the arts of hermeneutics. The late Jewish and Early Christian visionary Apocalyptic literature, with its base in the Book of Daniel, presents allegorical figures, of which the Whore of Babylon and the Beast of Revelation are simply the most familiar. An emblem consists of a pictorial image, abstract or representational, that epitomizes a concept - often a concept of a moral truth or an allegory. ... This article discusses textual hermeneutics. ... Hermeneutics (Hermeneutic means interpretive), is a branch of philosophy concerned with human understanding and the interpretation of texts. ... This entry only concerns the historical genre of apocalyptic literature. ... This article is about the Biblical book. ... The Whore of Babylon or Babylon the Great is one of several Christian and Rastafarian allegorical figures of supreme evil, who is mentioned in the Book of Revelation in the Bible. ...

In classical literature two of the best known allegories are the cave of shadowy representations in Plato's Republic (Book VII) and the story of the stomach and its members in the speech of Menenius Agrippa (Livy ii. 32); and several occur in Ovid's Metamorphoses. In Late Antiquity Martianus Capella organized all the information a 5th-century upper-class male needed to know into an allegory of the wedding of Mercury and Philologia, with the seven liberal arts as guests, an allegory that was widely read through the Middle Ages. In the late 15th century, the enigmatic Hypnerotomachia, with its elaborate woodcut illustrations, shows the influence of themed pageants and masques on contemporary allegorical representation. Some elaborate and successful specimens of allegory are to be found in the following works, arranged in approximately chronological order: Statue of a philosopher, presumely Plato, in Delphi. ... In a broad definition a republic is a state or country that is led by people who do not base their political power on any principle beyond the control of the people living in that state or country. ... Titus Livius (around 59 BC - 17 AD), known as Livy in English, wrote a monumental history of Rome, Ab Urbe Condita, from its founding (traditionally dated to 753 BC). ... Engraved frontispiece of George Sandyss 1632 London edition of Publius Ovidius Naso, (March 20, 43 BC – AD 17) Roman poet known to the English-speaking world as Ovid, wrote on topics of love, abandoned women, and mythological transformations. ... Disambiguation: This article is about the poem Metamorphoses written by the poet Ovid. ... Martianus Minneus Felix Capella was a writer of the late Latin period, whose career flourished some time during the 5th century, before the year 439. ... In the history of education, the seven liberal arts comprise two groups of studies, the trivium and the quadrivium. ... The masque was a form of festive courtly entertainment which flourished in 16th and early 17th century Europe, though it was developed earlier in Italy. ...

Aesop – Fables
Plato – The Republic (Allegory of the Cave)
Plato – Phaedrus (Chariot Allegory)
Book of Revelation
Martianus Capella – De nuptiis philologiæ et Mercurii
The Romance of the Rose
Piers Plowman
The Pearl
Dante Alighieri – The Divine Comedy
Edmund Spenser – The Faerie Queene
John Bunyan – Pilgrim's Progress
Jean de La Fontaine – Fables
Jonathan Swift – A Tale of a Tub
Joseph Addison – Vision of Mirza

Modern allegories in fiction include: Aesop, as depicted in the Nuremberg Chronicle. ... Statue of a philosopher, presumely Plato, in Delphi. ... The term The Republic might refer to any of the following The Republic - a book by Plato Rzeczpospolita (The Republic) - unofficial name of the Republic of Both Nations This is a disambiguation page — a navigational aid which lists other pages that might otherwise share the same title. ... Platos allegory of the cave is perhaps the best-known of his many metaphors, allegories, and myths. ... Plato, in Phaedrus, uses the Chariot Allegory to explain his view of the human soul. ... Visions of John the Evangelist, as depicted in the Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry. ... Martianus Minneus Felix Capella was a writer of the late Latin period, whose career flourished some time during the 5th century, before the year 439. ... The Roman de la Rose is a late medieval French work of fiction in allegorical dream form. ... Piers Plowman (1360 - 1399) is the title of a Middle English allegorical narrative, written in unrhymed alliterative verse, generally considered the earliest great work of English literature, and one of a very few Middle English poems that can stand beside Chaucers Canterbury Tales. ... Pearl may mean several different things: pearl, a round shiny object produced by molluscs and used in jewelry a whitish iridescent color similar to the color of pearls The Hymn of the Pearl, a passage of the apocryphal Acts of Thomas The Pearl, a book by John Steinbeck and the... Dante in a fresco series of famous men by Andrea del Castagno, ca. ... Dante shown holding a copy of The Divine Comedy, next to the entrance to Hell, the seven terraces of Mount Purgatory and the city of Florence, in Michelinos fresco. ... Edmund Spenser Edmund Spenser (c. ... Una and the Lion by Briton Rivière The Faerie Queene is a poem by Edmund Spenser, first published in 1590 (the first half) with the more or less complete version being published in 1596. ... John Bunyan. ... The Pilgrims Progress from This World to That Which Is to Come by John Bunyan (published 1678) is an allegorical novel. ... Jean de La Fontaine (c. ... Jonathan Swift Jonathan Swift (November 30, 1667 - October 19, 1745) was an Anglo-Irish writer who is famous for works like Gullivers Travels and A Tale of a Tub. ... This article is about the satire by Jonathan Swift. ... Joseph Addison, the Kit-cat portrait, circa 1703-1712, by Godfrey Kneller. ...

Allegorical films include: Sir William Gerald Golding (September 19, 1911 - June 19, 1993) is a Cornish novelist and poet and winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature (1983) for his novels which, with the perspicuity of realistic narrative art and the diversity and universality of myth, illuminate the human condition in the world... A Lord of the Flies cover Lord of the Flies is an allegorical novel by the Nobel Prize-winning author William G. Golding. ... George Orwell George Orwell was the pen name of British author Eric Arthur Blair (25 June 1903 – 21 January 1950). ... Animal Farm book cover Animal Farm is a satirical novel (which can also be understood as a modern fable or allegory) by George Orwell, ostensibly about a group of animals who oust the humans from the farm they live on and run it themselves, only to have it corrupted into... Arthur Miller in his later years Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist, and author. ... The Crucible is a play written by Arthur Miller in 1953. ...

Allegorical artworks include: Friedrich Anton Christian Lang (December 5, 1890 - August 2, 1976) was an Austrian film director, screenwriter and occasional film producer, one of the most famous emigrés from Germanys school of expressionism to work in Hollywood. ... Metropolis Metropolis is a German science fiction film set in a futuristic urban dystopia. ... Ingmar Bergman Ingmar Bergman listen (pronounced in Swedish, but usually in American English, IPA in Unicode notation) (born July 14, 1918) is a Swedish film director. ... Det sjunde inseglet (The Seventh Seal) is a 1957 film directed by Ingmar Bergman, most notable for the scene in which a medieval knight (played by Max von Sydow) plays chess with the personification of Death, with his life resting on the outcome of the game. ... El Topo (The Mole) is a 1970 violent allegorical western movie, directed by and starring Alejandro Jodorowsky. ...

Sandro Botticelli – La Primavera (Allegory of Spring)
Albrecht Dürer – Melancholia I
Artemisia Gentileschi – Self-Portrait as the Allegory of Painting; Allegory of Inclination
Jan Vermeer – The Allegory of Painting

Alessandro di Mariano Filipepi, better known as Sandro Botticelli (Florence March 1, 1445 – May 17, 1510) was an Italian painter of the Florentine school during the Early Renaissance (Quattrocento). ... Self-Portrait, 1493, Oil on Canvas Albrecht Dürer (May 21, 1471 - April 6, 1528) was a German painter, wood carver, engraver, and mathematician. ... Albrecht Dürers engraving Melancholia I (originally known by Dürer as Melencolia I) is notable for being an allegorical depiction of the main symptoms of Melancholy, now better known as depression. ... Judith Beheading Holofernes (1612_21) Oil on canvas 199 x 162 cm Galleria degli Uffizi, Florence Artemisia Gentileschi (July 8, 1593 - 1653) is today considered one of the most accomplished Early Baroque painters in the generation influenced by Caravaggio (the Caravaggisti). Remarkably, in an era when women painters were not easily... View of Delft, 1660-1661 Johannes Vermeer (1632 - December 15, 1675) was a Dutch painter. ...

External links

Good brief definition of Allegory (http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/lit_terms/allegory.html)
Dictionary of the History of Ideas: (http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/cgi-local/DHI/dhi.cgi?id=dv1-07) Allegory in Literary history

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