SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion

I'd like to kick off a discussion of allegory's proper role in fiction, especially fantasy.

I've noticed a strong disdain for allegory across genres and by both high-brow and low-brow commentators. What about allegory made it so great during the late middle ages and so inappropriate now? Or is today the new golden age of allegory? With shows like Battlestar Galactica and 24 on tv and quite popular, does it make sense for "allegory" to be an insult?

In our neck of the woods, I don't think you can ignore Tolkien saying, "I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations..." Is that where it all started, or was there a distrust of the style before Tolkien?
Are there other luminaries who have also damned allegory publicly?

I hope this is enough for you to chew on and write back.

As you say, the general trend in fictions of all types has been to move beyond allegory. In literary fiction, that means eschewing allegory in favor of allegory's kid brother, symbolism.

Whereas allegory is meant to have a particular meaning, symbols tend to be more ambiguous and evocative. Allegory has a moral, its purpose is to teach, while symbolism tends to be more open and explores meanings. That's not to say that symbols can mean anything you want while allegory is pinned down, but there's something more expansive about using symbolism rather than allegory.

I think to a large degree, allegory does focus on "a kind of code breaking exercise," as Donna described it, which is a big part of why it has largely fallen out of favor. I think at least in part it's because we don't have sufficiently shared cultural assumptions. Pilgrim's Progress works in a narrowly Christian context such as Puritan New England, but it tends to lose its appeal outside of those shared beliefs.

Now, that said, some authors can still pull it off, when the allegory is couched in a good story that works as a story rather than simply as allegory. But it's all too easy for allegory to fall into the trap of preaching first and storytelling only second or third.

I was trying to come up with a comment when this topic was first posted. I was having a hard time coming up with how to say what I was thinking. John expressed my own ideas very eloquently.

Well what I hate is heavy-handed allegory and flawed allegory.

Heavy-handed in the obvious "no duh, this really about ". The story should stand alone without being a stand-in for . If didn't exist, would it still tell the story, teach the moral? Would the story still be worth telling?

Flawed allegory is when either the story fails to actually teach the lesson (poor writing) or when critical thinking is applied, the "true outcome" presented by the author isn't the only one available, or even the most likely. Or even worse, when critical thinking is applied, another more sinister moral is taken from the story.

A good example is actually on snopes.com. The email being passed around is about a girl who was saved from being raped when walking down a deserted alley because the would be assailants saw her with big bodyguards (angels). So they didn't attack her. So the message is "believe in God and he will protect you" right? Well except for the part where another girl right after her was attacked and raped (because she had no such heavenly bodyguards). That changes the message to "the victim just wasn't a good enough person, believed enough, or believed the wrong thing."

I was very interested to discover the many positive reviews of Pilgrim's Progress at John's link. Great Ctulhu's review was certainly unexpected. Maybe we should bring him into this discussion. (It was also surprising to read that Pilgrim's Progress sparked Debbie's love of fantasy.) A quick look at the variety of posted reviews suggests that even if Ender's Game does not, divides readers along ideological lines. At first glance, this evidence seems to support John's thesis that a multicultural society has difficulty supporting blunt allegory. Little could be further from the truth.

In fact, diversity of opinion does nothing to quiet readers' love of didactic symbolism unless those readers buy into relativist, multicultural values. The recent discussion of Horton Hears a Who as a commentary on abortion and Lara's website are other examples of this tendency. I assert that allegory and other forms of preachy metaphor are very much in keeping with popular tastes of the shrill 21st century.

I'd like to get to "code breaking" and the origins of the critical distaste for allegory, but I think I'll save that for another night.

Anyway, I'll certainly agree with y'all that some allegory is not fun to read. I didn't get very far in Pilgrim's Progress before putting it down. As always, I look forward to your comments.

Is it really just those readers who "buy into relativist, multicultural values"? Or is it the case that in our "shrill 21st century" people like the allegory of their own group (which of course is just "telling it like it is") and detest or dismiss as propaganda other groups' allegories?

Good point, Donna. But are you certain that Pilgrims Progress was intended to be read aloud as a teaching tool? Just asking. I haven't researched this yet.

Earlier, you said that Tolkien didn't want people to pick apart his works for simplistic analogies. Do you share this opinion? Or do you think it's useful, wise, or fun to "break the code" sometimes?

John, perhaps I should have left this discussion in the political bias thread. Of course most persons prefer literature that reinforces their convictions to that which doesn't. However, I don't see this as much of a change from the past. The difference is that we now have to live in close contact with people who have very different perceptions and have the option to read their stuff. I would argue that just because your neighbor wouldn't read your book doesn't mean you won't read (or write) it. Do you really think there is an inhibiting effect arising from others' discomfort with an allegory?

Another thing to remember is that back in Medieval Europe people, especially the peasants, were looking for ways to live better. The Church had a heavy hand in day to day life, and many people sought to better themselves so that they could live as better Christians. Many of these works, such as Dante's Divine Comedy and Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, told people what was good and bad, right and wrong.

Now, in today's enlightened age, people don't want to be told how to live. they want to live life however they want. Most people will resent any kind of criticism, even when it comes from friends and family. No one wants some strange author they've never met and who doesn't know them to tell them they're living life wrong.

Donna, you're right about Chaucer. I took a whole semester course in him at college and allegory wasn't mentioned once in relation to his work. It was fairly revolutionary for its time.

(BTW, one of the reasons I loved "Hyperion" by Dan Simmons was that he used "The Canterbury Tales" as a template for his narrative.

If C.S. Lewis really did say, "nowhere in Chaucer do we find a radically allegorical poem," then you are in good company. [Got the quote from a rather sketchy internet source.] I would imagine that Lewis would recognize an allegory if he read one. Nevertheless, that seems a bit sweeping to me. Chaucer's narrator does seem to be more interested in realistic than allegorical characters. The frame does not seem to have more analogies than most poetry. However, each character tells a story with fairly heavy doses of symbolism. Indeed, the Nun's Priest's Tale is almost always referred to as a beast fable. Even if you think that Chaucer's intent is to parody an existing story, it stands as a pretty good fable on its own. The Knight's Tale can be summarized as "One damn symbol after another." I think I could go on, but this is already a long post. Sandikal, my college lit class also didn't mention allegory in reference to Chaucer, but that's because they focused on the easy-reader stuff, like the Miller's Tale. [I'm not trying to imply anything bad about your class, which was probably not taught by a goof with phallic obsessions.]

As for teaching moral lessons, Chaucer (or his narrator) definitely has moral opinions on marital relations and church corruption. What makes the Canterbury Tales revolutionary is that Chaucer doesn't want us to take the ostensible morals of his tales at face value. It's also interesting that Chaucer expresses regret for writing his "fun" works but not his serious, instructional ones. Whether or not you believe the retraction, it implies that the critical assumptions of his day were very different from those of the present.

I'm a little bothered by your last couple of sentences, Donna. They imply that a bit of didactic symbolism isn't fun--one of the widespread dualisms that caused me start this topic.
Also, here's an alternative hypothesis to your oral reading theory: maybe the low literacy rate of previous centuries represents a two-tier system with most written books intended for an educated elite and other forms of instruction and entertainment for the masses.

Robert, while I agree with your final sentence, let me twist it a little: "Everyone wants someone smart to tell a story that reinforces their lifestyle choices and criticizes those of other people." Do you buy that? If so, it follows that there is a huge market for "niche instructive fiction" in a plural society.

I'm sorry if this post is a muddle. I have too much to say here and I've had trouble cutting stuff out.

Isn't allegory defined as an extended metaphor? If so, then a work can be full of metaphor and symbolism and still not be allegorical. In the case of Chaucer, he does use his characters to teach moral lessons sometimes, but his characters themselves don't stand for something other than what they are. It's not like the whole Narnia thing where Aslan is symbolic of Jesus.

Ok, I'll admit to using the word "allegory" loosely throughout this topic. In a sense, I don't regret it. I've been trying to respond to the use of "allegorical" as a slur in posts like this one in the Ender's Game folder: "but to its credit the work isn't preachy, allegorical, or theological." In that same topic, many other readers expressed the sentiment that they didn't mind messages they didn't agree with, as long as the story is "well-written." I'm not sure I believe them.

If people genuinely don't like certain literature, that's their prerogative. But I think that it's frequently dishonest to pretend that the problem is overt representation or morals. Too often, people feel that a work is "preachy," "heavy-handed," or "allegorical" only if its message contradicts their own beliefs. In message 7, I tried to provide some empirical evidence to support the notion that most readers really like representative fiction. Of course, we all want to present ourselves as open-minded, wise judges of storytelling merit, so it's hard to admit that the message is frequently king [or queen].

Are the Canterbury Tales are allegorical? Well, I'm willing to take the opposing view, but I'm not sure how deeply we should take that debate in the sci-fi club's pages. Would you like to continue that debate in a new topic? I guess we could justify a Canterbury Tales topic, as it could be construed as a work of fantasy.

Heck, it's been at least 15 years since I read it. And, because I read it in Middle English, I doubt I absorbed very much at all. I think our professor was more into having us learn how to read Middle English than analyze and understand Chaucer's work.

Donna, an excellent summary of some of the concerns which led me to start this thread. To which I would add some other points:
There is an intellectual assumption that didactic fiction is bad, which is what makes it a convenient insult.
The use of "allegory", "preachy", or similar terms as a negative descriptions reinforces this assumption, creating a vicious cycle.
It's possible that the vicious cycle extends to deterring the best authors from creating certain kinds of fiction. Possible, but not an assertion that I'm ready to make.
Despite this assumption, people currently enjoy stories which are rich with both symbolism and overt morals.
Code-breaking can be a fun and useful activity.

Anyway, I was hoping that all this would come up in an organic discussion in which other people were discussing their own concerns and interests, but I seem to be posting a little too often for that to happen.

If I can insert a slightly different point of view, perhaps not in such a learned way as Donna's and Thomas's, I think that most great stories, the ones that have endured throughout the ages, have a didactic component (we could start with Aesop's Fables) that is essential to the writing.

It's my contention that any art, whether it's music, painting, or writing, must disturb the recipient in some form or the other, whether it challenges prejudices, a way of thinking, a perception of things as they are, or simply makes one try to answer a question the author/artist has put forward. In order to do that, you cannot escape the didactic, whether it's in the form of allegory or even less subtle than that.

I'm reminded of Blindness, for instance, in which Saramago deftly demonstrates the fragility of our societal structures and how close to animals we are. The story is one larger than life allegory and works splendidly.

Well, I'd agree with the last two posts, except for the charge of anti-intellectual views. As for that, the assumption I'm criticizing is the one that "disregards the long history of some very great literature...including the didactic."
I haven't read either the The Faerie Queene or Blindness, but now I'd like to.