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Allegory
Definition of Allusion
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to other literary works, famous individuals, historical events, or philosophical ideas... read full definition
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to other literary works, famous individuals... read full definition
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to... read full definition
Key Examples in Brideshead Revisited
Part 1, Chapter 1
Explanation and Analysis—The Garden:
In the following excerpt from Part 1, Chapter 1, Charles describes the manner of his falling in love with Sebastian, utilizing both metaphor and allusion:
I went there uncertainly, for it was foreign ground and there was a tiny, priggish, warning voice in my ear which in the tones of Collins told me it was seemly to hold back. But I was in search of love in those days, and I went full of curiosity and the faint, unrecognized apprehension that here, at last, I should find that low door in the wall, which others, I knew, had found before me, which opened on an enclosed and enchanted garden, which was somewhere, not overlooked by any window, in the heart of that gray city.
Related Themes:
Explanation and Analysis—The Waste Land:
Brideshead Revisited alludes several times to T. S. Eliot's poem "The Waste Land," both directly and indirectly. The poem is arguably the foremost English Modernist poem, substantively capturing post-war ennui and nihilism in the face of emerging wartime technologies and vast cultural shifts. Brideshead Revisited, as a literary text, is in significant conversation with the poem's themes.
Note the following allusion to “The Waste Land” from Part 2, Chapter 2:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Foreigners returning on post from their own waste lands wrote home that here they seemed to catch a glimpse of the world they had believed lost forever among the mud and wire, and through those halcyon weeks Julia darted and shone [...].
Related Themes:
Part 1, Chapter 2
Explanation and Analysis—Sodom and Gomorrah:
During their extensive conversation in Part 1, Chapter 2, Anthony Blanche waxes poetic to Charles about the state of the Flyte family. In particular, Anthony sees fit to remark on Lord and Lady Marchmain's relationship. In the following passage, Anthony utilizes a biblical allusion in his observations about the wealthy couple:
Unlock with LitCharts A+"[Lady Marchmain] refuses to divorce him because she is so pious. [....] You would think that the old reprobate had tortured her, stolen her patrimony, flung her out of doors, roasted, stuffed, and eaten his children, and gone frolicking about wreathed in all the flowers of Sodom and Gomorrah; instead of what?"
Related Themes:
Explanation and Analysis—Narcissus:
In Part 1, Chapter 2, Anthony alludes to Greek mythology when conversing with Charles, referring to an adolescent Sebastian as “Narcissus, with one pustule”:
Unlock with LitCharts A+"He never had spots you know; all the other boys were spotty. Boy Mulcaster was positively scrofulous. But not Sebastian. Or did he have one, rather a stubborn one at the back of his neck? I think, now, that he did. Narcissus, with one pustule."
Related Themes:
Part 1, Chapter 5
Explanation and Analysis—Camel and Needle:
In the following rather strange discussion between Charles and Lady Marchmain in Part 1, Chapter 5, Charles alludes to a Bible verse from the book of Matthew:
Unlock with LitCharts A+"It used to worry me, and I thought it wrong to have so many beautiful things when others had nothing. Now I realize that it is possible for the rich to sin by coveting the privileges of the poor. The poor have always been the favorites of God and his saints, but I believe that it is one of the special achievements of Grace to sanctify the whole of life, riches included. Wealth in pagan Rome was necessarily something cruel; it’s not anymore.”
I said something about a camel and the eye of a needle and she rose happily to the point.
Related Themes:
Part 2, Chapter 2
Explanation and Analysis—The Waste Land:
Brideshead Revisited alludes several times to T. S. Eliot's poem "The Waste Land," both directly and indirectly. The poem is arguably the foremost English Modernist poem, substantively capturing post-war ennui and nihilism in the face of emerging wartime technologies and vast cultural shifts. Brideshead Revisited, as a literary text, is in significant conversation with the poem's themes.
Note the following allusion to “The Waste Land” from Part 2, Chapter 2:
Unlock with LitCharts A+Foreigners returning on post from their own waste lands wrote home that here they seemed to catch a glimpse of the world they had believed lost forever among the mud and wire, and through those halcyon weeks Julia darted and shone [...].
Related Themes:
