The World Without Allegory

“...truth hidden in beauteous fiction.” Dante, Convivio.

In the twentieth century, and I expect the twenty-first to be a continuance, allegory was generally derided. In a century of disillusionment, of deconstruction, straightforward speech was appreciated. That is one reason I despise politics, and the worminess of those who would escape justice by ambiguity, such as by redefining words, like “the”, “a”, or “is”. In politics all words are under suspicion of allegorical or double meaning. This desire for truthful words meant disdain for figurative speech. In allegory not only the speech but the concepts are figurative.

There was a time, prior to the twentieth century, when all arts – poetry, painting, sculpture, architecture, music – were concerned with beauty. The twentieth century gave that up, for the most part. Dante’s quote reflects the usefulness of allegory – to convey truth in beauty, a statement that was prevalent five centuries later as Keats echoed the statement. But the twentieth century has no use for beauty. Any artist who still expressed the old motto was not taken seriously. Avante-gardism and novelty were the important methods, and thus became the subject of art, or rather, the art became subject to them. Beauty had grown old, irrelevant, delusional.

She still has her servants, the lineage, perhaps, of Dante, Chaucer, and Keats. They may no longer have the role in society they once had – they are the old house staff of the old lady, still not convinced that such servitude is archaic, or that we should give her the finger and proclaim our freedom by smearing her picture with dung.