AP® English Literature and Composition review sheet from Aim for Five (aimforfive.com/lit/units/8/8-5)
Unit 8 · Topic 8.5
8.5 How allusions build meaning
An allusion is a brief reference to a well-known story, person, place or text, such as the Bible, a myth or a play by Shakespeare. Because readers already know the reference, one allusion can bring a whole set of feelings and ideas into a poem in a few words.
Key terms
- allusion
- biblical allusion
- mythological allusion
- shared knowledge
- association
How allusions work
An allusion is a kind of shortcut. Instead of explaining an idea, a poet points to something readers already know and lets that knowledge do the work. The allusion borrows the associations of its source: its story, its emotions, its moral weight.
To analyze an allusion, ask three questions. What is the source? What does the source mean or feel like? How does the poem use it: to agree with the source, to extend it, or to argue with it?
| Common source | Example in a poem | What it brings |
|---|---|---|
| The Bible | Keats's "the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home, / She stood in tears amid the alien corn" (Ode to a Nightingale) | Ruth, a widow far from her homeland: exile and loyal sorrow |
| Classical myth | Keats's "Lethe-wards had sunk" in the same ode | Lethe, the river of forgetting in the underworld: a wish to forget pain |
| Classical literature | Owen's "Dulce et decorum est / Pro patria mori" | A line from the Roman poet Horace: "It is sweet and fitting to die for one's country" |
| Shakespeare | Frost's title "Out, Out—" | Macbeth's speech on how brief and meaningless life is |
Allusions can argue
Owen ends "Dulce et Decorum Est" by quoting Horace's famous line and calling it "The old Lie." The allusion isn't decoration. Owen sets the noble Latin phrase against the horrible death he has just described, and the contrast turns the allusion into an accusation. Poets often use allusions this way: they bring in a famous idea in order to test it or reject it.
You won't recognize every allusion, and that's fine. Capitalized names you don't know, phrases in another language, and lines that sound borrowed or old-fashioned are all clues. If you can tell a reference is there, describe what the poem seems to want it to bring in, and keep your claim modest.
Frost and Macbeth
Robert Frost's "Out, Out—" (1916) tells of a boy on a New England farm who is cut by a buzz saw and dies. The title quotes Macbeth, who, on hearing of his wife's death, says, "Out, out, brief candle! / Life's but a walking shadow," and calls life "a tale / Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, / Signifying nothing."
The allusion makes you ask whether the boy's death means anything. The poem's ending answers coldly: "And they, since they / Were not the one dead, turned to their affairs." The title brings Macbeth's despair into an ordinary farm accident, and the ending leaves you to decide whether the family's return to work is heartless, or simply how people survive.
Worked examples
Try each one yourself first, then open the solution.
- Example 1
Explaining what an allusion adds
Explain how the title of Frost's "Out, Out—" shapes the meaning of the poem's ending: "Little—less—nothing!—and that ended it. / No more to build on there. And they, since they / Were not the one dead, turned to their affairs."
Show the solutionHide the solution
- Step 1: Identify the source: Macbeth's speech after his wife's death, which begins "Out, out, brief candle!" and calls life a tale "Signifying nothing."
- Step 2: Connect the candle to the boy: his pulse fades like a flame, "Little—less—nothing!" The dashes make the life go out step by step.
- Step 3: Bring in the source's meaning: Macbeth says life is brief and meaningless. The title asks you to consider whether the boy's death is, too.
- Step 4: Look at the ending: the others go back to their work. The allusion makes that return to normal feel either bleak or necessary, and the poem doesn't decide which.
Answer: Sample answer: Frost's title imports Macbeth's bleakest idea, that life is a "brief candle" and a tale "Signifying nothing," into a small farm accident. The boy's pulse fading "Little—less—nothing!" plays out the candle going out, the dashes snuffing it in stages. When the others, "since they / Were not the one dead, turned to their affairs," the allusion makes their return to work echo Macbeth's despair: one life ends and the world doesn't stop. But unlike Macbeth, the family has no time for speeches. Frost leaves you to decide whether their silence is coldness or the only way people who live by hard work can survive a loss.
Common mistakes
- Naming the source of an allusion without explaining what it adds to the poem.
- Assuming an allusion always agrees with its source. Poets often use allusions to argue with them.
- Spending too long retelling the source story. A sentence or two of background is enough; focus on the poem.
On the exam
- Multiple-choice questions may ask what an allusion contributes, and the question usually gives you enough context to work out the source. Focus on how the reference connects to the poem's subject.
- In the poetry essay, if you recognize an allusion, use it, but only explain as much of the source as you need to show what it adds.
Connected topics
Videos
Check yourself
4 questions on 8.5 How allusions build meaning. Pick an answer to see if you got it, and why.
John Milton, "When I consider how my light is spent" (written in the 1650s), Poems (1673), original spelling
The phrase “that one Talent which is death to hide” (line 3) alludes to a parable in the Bible in which a servant is punished for burying the money (a “talent”) his master left with him. The allusion chiefly
John Keats, "On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer," Poems (1817). George Chapman published an English translation of Homer’s epics in the early 1600s. "Fealty" (line 4): loyalty owed to a lord. "Demesne" (line 6): realm. "Serene" (line 7): clear air. "Ken" (line 10): range of sight. Darien (line 14) is in Panama.
The allusions to Apollo, the Greek god of poetry (line 4), and to “deep-brow’d Homer” (line 6) chiefly
In fact, Balboa, not Cortez, was the first European to see the Pacific from Darien. Which statement best explains why the allusion still works in the poem?
William Blake, "A Poison Tree," Songs of Experience (1794). "Wiles" (line 8): tricks. "Veiled the pole" (line 14): hid the sky.
The “apple bright” that draws the foe into the speaker’s “garden” (lines 10–13) most likely alludes to
0 of 4 answered