” Yet even without a schoolteacher chiming in, we still understand the point of the story. Though sometimes, like with The Tortoise and the Hare, the story begs for a schoolteacher’s voice to enter at the end and say: “The moral of the story is.

The important thing is that the story stands on its own and the underlying message is clear.Įffective allegory does not require explanation. You have space to create more complex characters using techniques like indirect characterization. With allegory, you can employ personification, time travel, even magic if that suits your story. It isn’t speech writing, and it isn’t science class. When are allegories used in writing?Īllegory gives the writer a chance to be creative while conveying an important message. The difference is that anecdotes are true stories used to exemplify a specific message, whereas allegories are mostly fictional tales that convey broader meanings. They are short stories told to make a point. It encompasses fables, which are short-form allegories that use animals or nonhuman characters to teach a specific lesson.Īnecdotes: Similar to allegory, anecdotes have a complete narrative structure. Allegory is the broader of the two terms. The two terms overlap, but they’re not completely interchangeable.

If an allegory is widely known, it might be referenced as an allusion in a piece of writing.įables: The term fable is often used as a synonym for allegory. Technically, an allegory is an expanded work of symbolism and employs various symbols throughout its story.Īllusions: Allusion is a reference to a well-known person, character, place, or event that the writer uses to pack a lot of meaning into a small space. Symbols: Like metaphor, symbols are typically singular.

An allegory is an entire story, complete with characters and narrative arc. A metaphor is a brief literary device that assigns one thing to another. Metaphors: The length of a piece of writing is the easiest way to tell if you’re reading allegory vs. In this way, they are similar to but not the same as: Allegory as a literary deviceĪllegories are one of many literary devices that writers can use to show one thing and say another. Orwell used a story line about farm animals to express his dissent toward the Russian government, a risky subject to discuss outright. One famous example of this is George Orwell’s 1945 novel Animal Farm. In these cases, allegory creates distance between the writer and the message. Sometimes, the message a writer wants to convey is dangerous to talk about explicitly. By using a story to talk about big, abstract, or difficult ideas, allegory takes advantage of our inclination toward story. Have you ever noticed how fiction gets the most shelf space in the bookstore? Stories are compelling. Humans naturally gravitate toward good stories. Rather than having to explain the pitfalls of arrogance and the virtues of persistence, a writer can instead tell a tale about a talking tortoise and a haughty hare. Write with Grammarly What is an allegory?Īn allegory is a narrative story that conveys a complex, abstract, or difficult message.

Allegory sononym