Close

Create a link to this page

Copy and paste this link tag into your Web page or blog:

<a href="http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O29-ALLUSION.html" title="Facts and informations about ALLUSION">ALLUSION</a>

ALLUSION

ALLUSION. An indirect reference. The term formerly included metaphors, parables, and puns, but now generally means implicit use of someone else's words. Whereas quotations usually come with acknowledged sources, allusions are indirect, even cryptic, sometimes dropped in passing, with little thought, sometimes used with care, so that a speaker or writer can share an understanding with certain listeners or readers. Allusions often adapt their originals to new ends, the audience making or failing to make the connections, as when the US journalist William Safire cries out in his column: ‘Ah, Fowler! Thou shouldst be living at this hour; usage hath need of thee’ (New York Times, July 1989). Here, Safire addresses the master of his craft much as Wordsworth once opened a sonnet: ‘Milton! Thou shouldst be living at this hour, / England hath need of thee.’ Similarly, Wordsworth's paradoxical statement ‘The Child is father of the Man’ is embroidered by the British television critic John Naughton when saying of Richard Burton, ‘the abandoned, motherless child was father to the volatile, generous, self-hating man’ (Observer, Sept. 1988). Newspaper headlines are often allusive: Amid the Alien Porn; Brontë village fears wuthering blight; A Chase That Stopped a Thousand Trips; The Laser's Edge; Comedy of Terrors. See ANALOGY, BIBLE, ECHOISM, QUOTATION, SHAKESPEARE.

Related newspaper, magazine, and trade journal articles from HighBeam Research

(Including press releases, facts, information, and biographies)

	Apostrophe.(Poetry)(Poem) Magazine article from: The Antioch Review; 1/1/2005; ; 152 words ; ...in a field of wheat, and to whom do they belong? 0 death, 0 grave, Bright star, thou bleeding piece of earth, thou shouldst be living at this hour, world without synonym, amen. But I digress, turn away like Giotto's contrapposto Christ... Read more
	The good old cause: John Milton's Areopagitica revisited.(Literature) Magazine article from: Quadrant; 10/1/2005; ; 700+ words ; ...thought Wordsworth got it wrong when he wrote: Milton! Thou shouldst be living at this hour: England hath need of thee: she is a fen etc. For McAuley the only use to...would have amended Wordsworth's sonnet to read: Dryden/Thou shouldst be living at this hour ... McAuley's anger with ... Read more
	Xio's soakbook: criticism takes a bath. (Poetry Today) Magazine article from: The Antioch Review; 1/1/1994; ; 700+ words ; ...and then are absorbed into the bath water; the lyric bath bombes each have a small surprise. For example, the words Milton, thou shouldst be living at this hour semi-dissolve to create a floating portrait of the blind poet, which one may kick into a creamy olalaberry... Read more
	Mannerians exit amid controversy. Newspaper article from: Matlock Mercury (Matlock, England); 11/20/2006; 700+ words ; ...they arrived at Hutchinson before the ball did. A bemused visiting defence could only watch and learn from the old adage 'Thou shouldst always play unto the whistle', as West Leeds pounced on the loose ball to claim the winning try. On balance the normal time... Read more
	Cutting edges: making sense of the '80s. Magazine article from: National Review; 1/31/1986; ; 700+ words ; ...recognition on either side,' etc. Mr. Krauthammer is forever sitting in judgment above Both Sides. He owes nothing to either. Thou shouldst not have been old till thou hadst been wise,' says the Fool to Lear. Mr. Krauthammer maybe shouldn't have been quite so wise... Read more
	There never was an icon of American manhood to compare with the cowboy.(The Week)(Brief article) Magazine article from: National Review; 3/13/2006; 169 words ; ...Fond of Each Other). The song has lines like: What did you think all them saddles and boots was about? and Inside every cowboy there's a lady who'd love to slip out. John Wayne, thou shouldst be living at this hour. America has need of thee. Read more
	GENETICS, ETHICS AND THE STATE. Magazine article from: Quadrant; 9/1/1999; ; 700+ words ; ...nature has bestowed on his friend, then urges the friend to have children: She carv'd thee for her seale, and meant thereby, Thou shouldst print more, not let that copy die. Some people would consider that the creation of children genetically identical to themselves... Read more
	The human specimen.(Bodies On Display)(Body Worlds: The Anatomical Exhibition of Real Human Bodies) Magazine article from: The Christian Century; 3/22/2005; ; 700+ words ; ...of ending up in a beautiful display beyond decay. Discover what you're made of, announces the ad around Chicago. Quotes from great philosophers pepper the exhibit. They begin with Psalm 8: What is man, that thou shouldst remember him? ... Yet Read more
	Paterfamilias. (William Kennedy Smith alleged rape trial) (Editorial) Magazine article from: National Review; 12/30/1991; 338 words ; ...not common for grief to set off an emotional chain reaction, months later, terminating in sex on the lawn. Rube Goldberg, thou shouldst be living at this hour. It is irresistible to recall Kennedy's strident words over the years on behalf of women's rights... Read more
	Hanks a million!(but enough about you) Magazine article from: National Review; 10/20/2008; ; 700+ words ; ...owe the bank $100 million, the bank has a problem. How right he was. Milton, thou should'st be living at this hour. England hath need of thee ... What do you know--this morning's paper has a big front--page story about how dozens of Wall Street firms are clamoring... Read more

For more facts and information, see all related premium articles

Related entries from encyclopedias, dictionaries, and thesauruses

	allusion Book article from: Oxford Dictionary of Rhymes allusion • abrasion , Australasian, equation, Eurasian, evasion, invasion, occasion, persuasion, pervasion, suasion, Vespasian...television • Eurovision •LaserVision • corrosion , eclosion, erosion, explosion, implosion • allusion , collusion, conclusion, confusion, contusion, ... Read more
	hanged Book article from: The Oxford Dictionary of Phrase and Fable hanged hanged, drawn, and quartered in allusion to the traditional mode of execution for traitors, by which...severe penalty it may as well be for something substantial; the allusion is to the former penalty for sheep-stealing. The saying is... Read more
	hearts Book article from: The Oxford Dictionary of Phrase and Fable hearts hearts and flowers used in allusion to extreme sentimentality. hearts and minds people as represented by their emotions and intellect; originally with biblical allusion to Philippians 4:7, ‘And the peace of God, which passeth... Read more
	hip Book article from: The Oxford Dictionary of Phrase and Fable hip on the hip at a disadvantage (sometimes with allusion to Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice , ‘Now, infidel, I have you on the hip’). smite hip and thigh punish unsparingly, originally with biblical allusion to Judges 15:8 of Samson and the Philistines. Read more
	fall Book article from: The Oxford Dictionary of Phrase and Fable ...fail to persist in an endeavour or undertaking; with biblical allusion to the parable of the sower , in which some of the seed ‘...or a suggestion be ignored or badly received; with biblical allusion to the parable of the sower , in which some seed ‘fell... Read more

See all related entries