Recurring Motifs in World Lite

Recurring motifs in literature can be found through many eras. The similarities in various works are often striking because there appears to be no link to their origin yet they share many fundamental concepts and the message is often the same. By tracing a few similarities through specific works that span time and geography one is able to draw certain conclusions as to why the ideas men have expressed through literature bear such a striking likeness. Two motifs will be examined, one of betrayal and the other of flood type events.

The betrayal of a trust reappears often as a motif in world literature. A state of trust between friends or between man and wife is often transgressed. This often embodies itself as an act of infidelity between lovers or man and wife or the act of betrayal can even be between men a god figure. The flood motif is nearly universal in its meaning and bears so many similarities through many varied cultures that one can imagine there being a true flood event that gave birth to the many stories of such an event. Taken into the context of greater human experience one realizes that rather these commonalities among cultures and their literary traditions are displayi

ng certain human values that are held as universal ideals. Betrayal is as common as in Europe as it is in Asia and the lessons to be learned from such things is not limited to one culture or time. The same can be said for a motif that expresses rebirth after a long trial, such as the flood motif. In the case of betrayal we can assume that the emotions involved led rise to the motif because the state of human emotion is universal, but one can only imagine of a true cataclysmic event that led to the rise of the flood type motif. The question as to why such an idea reappears throughout history, and more interestingly the world, leads one to question the origins of such literary expressions and if they are based on a shared event or like human emotion are there because of a shared desire to express things are best described through a similar means.

Shared motifs in world literature provide great insight to the ideas of man. I have found that through tales one not only finds a strong link to literary tradition throughout the world but an also a link among cultures and societies that is shared through time and across great distance. This lends me to think that the similarities found can be explained either through shared experience or by the fact that man so similar in nature that there really is very little unique experience to be had. Different cultures tend to explain only their own frame of reference for many things, and through the examination of world literature one can see that this is a human limitation that is displayed in the literature itself. It is the similarities that men portray in their writings that are the most telling. Ideas are not lone proprietary concepts of only one culture and time, but rather shared concepts and expressions bringing together all of man. Universal themes are universal because they fulfill a need or answer a question that is ever present in the culture of man. It is comforting to know that despite the differences experienced in life, culture and history that we all share literature through common motifs.

Betrayal is a common human experience. It can be fo

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