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Symbolism: Reality or Imagination

            
             Short stories provide readers a in depth look into the lives of the characters involved in the plot. Symbolism plays a large role into this perception. As a plot unfolds, the reader is caught up in the story plot leaving them to wonder whether it is reality or imagination. .
             The Lottery is a good example of this perception. Symbolism begins from the beginning to the end. Without the symbolism, the story relates only a handful of characters in mixed up roles. Symbolism promotes a perception in the reader to look deeper into the roles the characters play and often into the life of the author of the story. .
             Symbolism is used by authors to keep the interest of the reader but also to portray their own lives into the story through those characters. The Lottery is one such story. Shirley Jackson had several bouts with mental illness. Characters in the story and bizarre ending reflect on her life and health problems. .
             The Lottery reflected back to her life going back to her childhood. When she was in school, other children began to throw stones at her. When she left the playground, she had gone home and wrote the story of the stoning of Mrs. Hutchinson. Mrs Hutchinson represents Shirley in her younger years and the frustration she felt. .
             Jackson often wrote of evil but under a sort of comedic way. Her use of symbolism to inspire the reader to look deep was unique. If not for this type of writing, Ms Jackson would not have had her stories published. Her twisted way to represent the characters and plot her readers reflected in her stories. .
             Other such authors use the same technique to relate their own lives into their stories. Guy De Mauspant, author of The Necklace, used the same technique. All of his stories reflect the insecurity of himself through his characters. His characters usually reflect self centered egotistical persons. They are usually caught in the moment. .
             Mathilde in The Necklace represents one such person.


Essays Related to Symbolism: Reality or Imagination

1. Paul Gauguin's Transition - Post-Impressionism to Symbolism

In France, starting in the late nineteenth century, two significant artistic movements were engineered. Impressionism was generated to capture a response or feeling for the viewer. The style of Impressionism had a focus on the momentary effect of light, nature, and movement. ... caught his eye.17 He would look to the invisible, imagination and dreams, which he translated into forms of symbols.18 In the article, Paul: Symbolism in Painting, published in 1891, symbolist poet and critic Albert Aurier formulated the first definition of symbolism as an aesthetic, describing it as the subjective vis...

  • Word Count: 1179
  • Approx Pages: 5

2. Labyrinth - Product of Jim Henson's Imagination

... socially concerned - uses everything from modern media genres to folklore, playing to an intelligent audience " (Pompe, 2001). Labyrinth is a multifaceted movie that uses symbolism and fantasy to tell the tale of a young girl's journey from childhood to adolescence. Labyrinth is a cult classic; there is no denying that fact. ... of the themes, however dark and often unnerving, were chosen carefully by the writers and displayed indirectly, cloaked in a veil of fantasy and imagination. Henson's main goal when writing this film was to show the natural progression of age and maturation of t...

  • Word Count: 2010
  • Approx Pages: 8
  • Has Bibliography
  • Grade Level: Undergraduate

3. Reality

Everyone has a dream in this life, the only difference is if they choose to live the dream or the reality. "The Glass Menagerie" by Tennessee Williams, is a perfect example of this particular situation. This play revolves around a poor stricken family that all live ... seemed to be far-fetched dream. Williams demonstrated how the Wingfield family struggles to get a grip on things through using symbolism, foreshadowing, and irony. To begin, the consistency of using symbolism assisting the development of the plot. The fire escape is what Tom sees as an escape route out of the chaos ... support...

  • Word Count: 561
  • Approx Pages: 2
  • Grade Level: High School

4. Indian Art - Aesthetics and Symbolism

... Valley civilizations and the Harappan period spawned a revolutionary new wave, thus inspiring many to carry on the somewhat crude (to western eyes) but amazing blend of skill, mastery and imagination that became the hallmark of popular Indian folk art. This essay will highlight some of the aesthetic differences of Indian and Western art, from a technical, stylistic and symbolic point ... them under control. Neither of these sculptures were openly transparent with their call to action and symbolic nature, unlike western sculptures. As explained earlier, even though depicted as manifestatio...

  • Word Count: 1282
  • Approx Pages: 5
  • Grade Level: Undergraduate

5. Assess the importance of Kezia and Aunt Beryl in some or all

... on the surface appear to be innocent tales of an extended middle-class family early this century. On a hidden level, however, they represent the sad reality of a society which entraps and controls its individuals. In "Prelude" the themes are of entrapment within a patriarchal world, and less explicitly of identity ... the dark bush beyond. Ah, she heard herself cry: 'Faster! Faster!' " (53). Yet she knows there will be no escape except in her dreams and imagination. Beryl, too, is dependent on, and trapped by Stanley. She is dependent on him financially: " 'How frightfully unreasonable St...

  • Word Count: 2129
  • Approx Pages: 9
  • Has Bibliography

6. Robert Frost

... "Birches" was first published in 1915 (Thomason 18). In Robert Frost's "Birches," the theme of reality vs. imagination is discovered through images of bent birches, symbolism of a boy swinging the trees, and the tone of words used. The conflict of reality vs. imagination is explored through images of bent birches. Reality is depicted as birches bending and cracking after a freezing rain from the ice that was ... a long time they can never be straight again. They are permanently stuck in this "bowed" position. We can compare these three lines to our lives because reality is that although...

  • Word Count: 1056
  • Approx Pages: 4
  • Has Bibliography
  • Grade Level: High School

7. Secret Life of Walter Mitty

... to complain. Walter's lack of rebellion clearly indicates that he has finally defeated his nagging wife by escaping into his own world (Mann). The thought of becoming "the best doctor" or a "heroic army general", portrays the way Mitty deals with his self-fulfillment. To the outer world, Mitty seems to be controlled by his wife, however, in his dream world Walter ... reader. For example, both Walter Mitty and Rip Van Winkle use their imagination and dreams to escape adult responsibility and their shrewd wives (Sweet 77). Sweet interprets Mitty's character as another Rip Van Winkle and t...

  • Word Count: 803
  • Approx Pages: 3
  • Grade Level: High School

8. Emerson, Thoreau, and the Nature of Metonymy

... (understood as some expression of language or imagination). Lance Newman founds his reading of Thoreau upon an ecocriticism that emphasizes as "the central axiom in its critical theory" a "direct contradiction" of the claims of "poststructuralist" theories reducing the world to language. "Ecocriticism responds," Newman argues, "by insisting on the independent reality of the nonlinguistic material world." However, in order to locate "the nonlinguistic ... this lengthy essay, his longest since Nature, Emerson elaborates upon a favorite topic from his journals as well as his essays: the po...

  • Word Count: 9971
  • Approx Pages: 40
  • Grade Level: Undergraduate

9. Science And Religion

... science itself, we find that scientism so rigs the methodology and criteria for truth that the meaning of falsifiability itself is reduced. The sterilization of symbolism in science results in a meager envisioning of reality that materializes whatever contemporary physics says is nonmaterial. Tillich said that if,a religious symbol does not suggest its own incompleteness and inadequacy in presenting its ... referent, then it becomes idolatry (Barbour:1974:16). The same can apply to symbolism in science. Imaginative creativity and a non-attached contemplation are neccesary to do ... or ...

  • Word Count: 2403
  • Approx Pages: 10
  • Has Bibliography
  • Grade Level: Undergraduate

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