Water: cleansing, origin of life, regeneration Wind and storms: turbulent or violent (negative) emotion, adversity Unfortunately, that does mean that when you first start exploring this device, you may find yourself frequently looking up the common meanings. These common symbols make it easier for writers to get meanings and concepts across without the need to develop a new symbol that their reader needs to figure out. Which one does it represent? Well, you just need to keep reading and find out! The character’s actions will show you more about what that fire means. Instead, you search your stored knowledge of symbolic meaning (either the knowledge already in your brain, or what you found in a dictionary of common symbols and realize that the fire in this person’s eyes may represent ferocity, determination, anger, or evil. Take a look at this example: you’re enjoying your favorite novel or comic, when you come across a character “with a fire always blazing in their eyes.” You know that they do not literally have fire burning in their eyes every time you see them (that would hurt!). These symbols are easily recognizable to a wide range of readers. The appearance of a dog often symbolizes friendship and loyalty, a flood of light might signify understanding or goodness, and winter represents death (remember this one for later!). In order to easily convey ideas without directly stating it in their writing, many creators use common symbols that already have a widely recognized meaning attached to them. An example might be “your eyes are the deep blue sea,” which makes the point that someone’s eyes are extremely blue and seemingly endless, but doesn’t cause their eyes to represent a concept or idea. Metaphors tend to be a lot more short-term, comparing two unlike things for the sake of making a point. Symbols are specific objects, seasons, animals, or characters (pretty much any noun) that represents something else, often throughout a work (but not always).
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Make sure that you don’t confuse symbolism and metaphor. Rain popularly symbolizes sorrow, and doves symbolize peace. We know things like this without being told because these are common symbols. Ever notice that rainy scenes in movies such as Mulan or The Hunchback of Notre Dame often pop up during sad moments? Likewise, if you see a picture of a dove at a rally, you can recognize it as a peace rally. It’s a way to liven up your writing, and offers creators fun ways to give a wink to the discerning reader by giving them additional insight to better enjoy the work with. In other words, authors take an idea or feeling and represent it with a person, place, or thing.
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In it’s most condensed form, let’s call it “the use of symbols to signify ideas and qualities by giving them symbolic meanings that are different from their literal sense.” That definition comes from, a handy website for all of your literary device needs. What is Symbolism?īefore we can delve into an analysis of Over the Garden Wall using symbolism, we need to define it. Spoiler Alert: If you have not experienced the pleasure of watching Over the Garden Wall in its entirety yet and plan to, I recommend that you stop reading this exploration and go watch it right now! Serious spoilers ahead! Watching Patrick McHale’s imaginative work for the first time is a fun ride, and I don’t want to spoil it for anyone. This delightful miniseries contains a lot of great examples of symbolism in its 10-episode run. In order to gain a deeper understanding of this literary device, let’s focus on the 2014 Cartoon Network miniseries Over the Garden Wall. For simplicity, I’m mostly going to use the words “author” and “creator” interchangeably to speak about the brilliant minds behind these works, but keep in mind that this applies to any storyteller in virtually any medium. You can find them in comics, cartoons, movies, videogames and even in paintings. Many literary techniques (including this one) lend themselves well to mediums outside of text-based mediums like novels. So instead, let’s explore this element through pop culture in order to get a better understanding of it and how authors use it to enhance the stories they craft. One of the fastest ways to kill someone’s interest in a tough topic like symbolism is to set them up with a novel they end up hating. As a result, I also didn’t care about exploring the symbolism within. I remember hating the unit because I didn’t care about the general plot of the book at all. In my own high school experience, we studied this literary device in-depth using Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter.
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It’s hard to make it through an English class without talking about symbolism at least once.