Christine de Pisan’s “The Treasure of the City of Ladies” is a manual of education for women of all social classes. Completed in 1405, the book is a continuation of her previous work, “The Book of the City of Ladies,” which introduced the concept of a city of women who were virtuous and knowledgeable. In …
Types of Allegories
Kitne Pakistan is a Hindi novel written by Kamleshwar in the year 2000. Kamleshwar is a noted 20th-century Hindi writer and a pioneer of the Nayi Kahani movement of the 1950s. The novel combines allegory and realism, and deals with a vast expanse of human history, as it follows the rise of sectarianism, nationalism, Hindutva …
Tropic of Orange by Karen Tei Yamashita is a magical realism novel that takes place primarily in Los Angeles and Mexico. The story begins on the longest day of the year and spans the course of a week, covering a magical event that begins in Mexico on the Tropic of Cancer and spreads north to …
Wisdom is one of the earliest surviving medieval morality plays. It is part of a collection of early English moralities known as “The Macro Plays,” which also includes Mankind and The Castle of Perseverance. As an allegory, Wisdom enacts the struggle between good and evil, depicting Christ personified in the character of Wisdom. The play …
Jean Sibelius’ The Maiden in the Tower is a one-act opera that was written in 1896. The piece was a collaboration with the Finnish author Rafael Hertzberg, who wrote the Swedish-language libretto. The opera tells a simple tale of chivalry, where the Bailiff abducts and imprisons the Maiden in a tower. The opera is known …
Macranthropy is an allegorical concept that has historical roots in several ancient civilizations. The idea portrays the universe as a giant human body, with various cosmic elements represented as body parts. In Ancient India, the concept of macranthropy is embodied in the mahant-ātman or “vast self” of the Early and Middle periods. This concept has …
A Passage to India by E.M. Forster is a novel that explores the complex relationships between the British colonizers and the Indian people during the early 20th century. The novel is set in the fictional city of Chandrapore in British India, and it centers around the experiences of Dr. Aziz, a young Indian Muslim physician, …
Bertolt Brecht’s The Caucasian Chalk Circle is a play that has been regarded as one of his most significant works. The play was written in 1944 while Brecht was living in the United States, and it is an example of his epic theatre style. The play tells the story of a peasant girl who rescues …
The Violent Bear It Away is a novel by the American author Flannery O’Connor. The book, published in 1960, is a classic example of Southern Gothic literature. It tells the story of a young boy named Francis Marion Tarwater, who is trying to escape the destiny his uncle has prescribed for him. The novel is …
The Stone Raft is a novel by Portuguese writer José Saramago. It was published in 1986 and translated into English by Giovanni Pontiero in 1994. The premise of the book is that the Iberian Peninsula has broken off from the European continent and is floating freely in the Atlantic Ocean. The story follows the journey …