Blog Entry #88
The first time I came across this word, I thought it was a typo of illusion! But this one’s an easy figure of speech - to allude to something simply means to make a reference to something. Allusions help to quickly create a visual imagery of the scene, provided you’re aware of the context being referred to. It can also aid in making your point quickly and effectively.
Let’s look at an example of allusion from a song written by one of my all-time favourite artists, Taylor Swift. Her hit single Love Story goes like this:
"That you were Romeo, you were throwin’ pebbles
And my daddy said, "Stay away from Juliet"
Another way to hint at something and expect the other person to understand what we are referencing would be to simply say 'Chocolate is his Kryptonite' rather than explaining what the person’s weakness is.
We come across allusions a lot in our daily lives. You might hear people say 'My Mom has a Spartan workout routine', or 'Some people are calling me the Tiger Woods of miniature golf' or a very common allusion of ’You don’t have to be Albert Einstein to understand poetry'. I’ve observed that people mostly allude to famous personalities or well-known superheroes and their traits. It’s interesting to note that people allude differently based on the city they hail from. For instance, I’ve not seen anyone other than Mumbaikars allude to the punctual train schedule or the bus conductor yelling in Marathi to everyone.
A couple of my favourite allusions are "Don Quixote" and "Pandora’s Box", probably because I’ve studied these lessons in my fifth grade at school.
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