Chapter 12: Is That a Symbol?

By: Rutu PatelPeriod 69/28/11

Symbols• Symbols have many meanings to them, but

are not stated directly in a work of literature and are not given to you easily.

• There are plenty of possible meanings to them and “can’t be reduced to standing for only one thing” (Foster 98). Symbols vary on how you as the reader interpret the text.

• To find out what the symbol for any novel, you have to combine information from the story and existing knowledge. It is the process of brainstorming, organizing and grouping your knowledge.

Allegories• Allegories are completely different from symbols. • An allegory has one meaning to it and it is stated clearly

throughout the book. The meaning is easy to find because of the numerous times the same message is stated in the novel.

• Although an allegory may also involves construing the message and thinking, the author was trying to tell the readers it is much easier to figure it out based on the way the novel was written. Allegories are right in front of you , whereas symbols make you look deeper into the book.

• An example of an allegory is Animal Farm by George Orwell. He was eager to express his message. He ended up informing the readers that “Revolutions inevitably fail…because those who come to power are corrupted by it and reject values and principles they initially embraced” (Foster 98).

Symbolic Action• Symbols are not just objects and images, but can also

come from the action or events in any type of literature.

• Robert Frost is referred to as “the champion of the symbolic action” because of the way he wrote the action in his poems to mean something bigger than it truly is (Foster 105).

• For example, Frost’s poem “Mowing” states that the action in the story is mowing the fields and making them clean, even though cleaning and mowing is just one part of the poem, it still contains deeper meanings. The poem actually “carries weight beyond its immediate context, seeming to stand in for labor generally, or for the solitary business of living one’s life” (Frost 105).

A Passage to India• A story that was mentioned in this chapter

was A Passage to India.• A Passage to India is a story about Adela and

Mrs. Moore, Adela’s mother in law, going into a cave and coming out as completely different people and completely different reactions.

• Foster includes that both Mrs. Moore and Adela had went into the same cave, but the symbolic meaning of their experiences in the cave were both different.

• This example proves that symbols can have multiple ways of interpreting them.

Symbolism in A Passage to IndiaMrs. Moore's Symbolism

• Mrs. Moore’s cave experience was symbolic because “the cave seems to force her into contact with her deepest personal fears and anxieties” (Foster 101).

• When she was in the cave she had found out her fears were other people and she had felt that India had endangered her.

Adela’s Symbolism• Adela’s cave experience is

symbolic because “the horror of her cave experience and its booming echo ride roughshod over her soul” (Foster 102). Foster is telling us that in the cave Adela had reached inside of herself found saw the person she had become. She was forced to do things, and she didn’t like the way it was turning out.

• Adela wasn’t frightened of the cave, she was frightened because she had found out what her life had become.

• From this you know that both cave experiences are not at all the same in any way, sort, or form.

Rivers• In different works of literature, some of them talk about a same

specific topic, but that doesn’t mean they all have the same meaning. Take Mark Twain, Hart Crane, and T.S. Elliot for example, they all wrote rivers as a part of their books, but all of them had a different way of symbolizing the rivers.

• Mark Twain, in his book The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, writes about a river that symbolizes danger, safety, and a sense of growing up and maturing.

• Hart Crane writes a poem The Bridge and symbolizes the river as a connection of two things and in this case it connects the northernmost and the southernmost part of the nation. In this poem, “the river and bridge constitute in image of total connection” (Foster 104).

• In Elliot’s book, The Waste Land, the river symbolizes “corruption of modern life and collapse of Western civilization” (Foster 104).

• In conclusion, even if one thing is mentioned in different works of literature, they don’t have the same symbolic meaning.

Symbolism in Great Expectations• There were many symbolic things in Great Expectations,

one of them being the candle in the Sluice house. Pip had been sent a message telling him to go to the Sluice house, where he would receive more information on his benefactor. There had been a candle there and it has two symbolic meaning. The candle at the Sluice House in Great Expectations both could symbolize safety because it lighted your way or death if it was blown out. The candle, in this book, proves that symbols can have more than one meaning.

• The candle meant safety because Pip knew “that some one must have been there lately and must soon be coming back or the candle would not be burning” he had probably thought that if something bad were to happen then there would be someone to come help him soon enough because of the candle (Dickens 406).

Symbolism in Everyday Life

• Symbolism is present in our world. We all know that a four-leafed clover is a symbol of luck.

• When someone smiles at you, you know that means they are showing that they are happy.

• The eagle represents our country and its freedom.

• These are a few examples of how symbolism is present in our lives.

Works Cited

Dickens, Charles. Great Expectations. New York: Barnes and Nobles, Inc., 2004. Print.

Foster, Thomas C. How to Read Literature Like a Professor. New York: Harper-Collins Publishers, Inc., 2003. Print.