XPost: rec.arts.books.tolkien, alt.books.cs-lewis, rec.arts.books.childrens   
   XPost: rec.arts.sf.written   
   From: hayesmstw@hotmail.com   
      
   On Mon, 23 Jan 2006 17:33:53 -0000, "westprog"  wrote:   
      
   >   
   >"junior-kun"  wrote in message   
   >news:1138034272.650207.224980@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...   
   >>   
   >> Steve Hayes wrote:   
   >>   
   >> > >To the world at large, it's an allegory.   
   >> >   
   >> > Only to ignoramuses who are clueless about literary genres.   
   >>   
   >> No, pretty much everyone except C.S. Lewis fan boys seems fine with it,   
   >> and Lewis's definition of allegory doesn't match the one in the   
   >> dictionaries.   
   >   
   >> You're basically screaming "Use words the way they did in the   
   >> seventeenth century!"  and I'm pretty much rolling my eyes.   
   >   
   >> Kids these days, no respect for their elders.   
   >   
   >To call it an allegory means missing the point totally. Animal Farm is an   
   >allegory. The animals represent people and groups from the Russian   
   >Revolution. Indeed, 1984 can be read as an allegory. TLTWATW is not an   
   >allegory because Aslan is clearly stated to _be_ Christ in a different   
   >world. Lewis considers the possibility that Christ might become incarnate   
   >somewhere else. That's why Aslan behaves differently to Jesus, and different   
   >things happen.   
      
   "Animal farm" is indeed an allegory, but "1984"? I don't think so. It's a   
   novel set in the future (from the time when it was written), and the setting   
   is what the author thought the world could be like if certain trends in his   
   own time continued. In that respect Aldous Huxley's "Brave new world" was   
   similar, except he chose a different set of trends. Neither is an allegory.   
   They are just novels set in an imaginary future.   
      
   Narnia and "Animal farm" both have talking beasts, but talking beasts do not   
   an allegory make. The Whitw Witch is a tyrannical ruler, sure, and so   
   resembles other tyrannical rulers. But though I, as a reader, could Identify   
   Maugrim with Lieutenant Dreyer of the Pietermartizburg SB, I'm pretty certain   
   that Lewis did not intend that, because he had never met Dreyer, though he   
   portrayed the type -- Maugrim and Fairy Hardcastle.   
      
   But protraying types is not allegory either. If that were so, every spy story   
   written during the Cold War would be an allegory.   
      
      
      
      
      
      
   >   
   >It isn't a matter of dictionary definitions - it's about what the writer   
   >intends to signify.   
   >   
   >J/   
   >   
      
   --   
   Steve Hayes   
   Web: http://www.geocities.com/hayesstw/stevesig.htm   
        http://www.bookcrossing.com/mybookshelf/Methodius   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)