Allusion

Critics of the now nearly-ancient famous English writer Alexander Pope complain that his style of literary criticism was too "creative." He translated, edited, and commented on many great works of literature, but not without leaving his own special fingerprint on the result. As we read Pope's rendition of Homer's epic poems, The Illiad and The Odyssey, we have no way of distinguishing when we are experiencing a connection with Homer's thinking or Pope's.

Whereas critics now also complain about Pope's style of writing, they admit that his works are rich in references to pop culture and historical events, concluding therefore that therein lies the greatest value to students of his poetry.

Pope's immersion in and complete understanding of the religious experiences and literature of his day also provided him with a reference that, as a writer, he used to full advantage, giving a richness to his poetry. Readers also familiar with these aspects of his culture will have a greater appreciation for the depth of his communications.

In ancient times, a Greek writer referring to Greek mythology to enhance the meaning of his work would have completely lost the ancient Japanese reader unfamiliar with the author's milieu, and vice versa. Similarly today, writers are faced with an extraordinary diversity in background among their readership around the world. As in ancient times, there is no common cultural experience among peoples to draw upon for richness in the literary experience.

American writer Emerson "solved" this problem through the use of metaphor from his observances of nature, which he assumed to be a universal experience. However, today, we no longer share his intimacy with the natural world. Urbanites may never have stood under a waterfall, watched a kitten being born, milked a cow, woken to the sound of a songbird newly arrived from the north, or followed a well-traveled path through a forest. Most have not observed a milkweed pod open and spill its fluffy contents, and then followed with their eyes the seed, dangling from its puffy parasail; nor guessed what path it would take in dancing forth, following the slightest breeze up into the skies and out of sight. How do you feel, when first you notice there are no new spring leaves on a newly failing majestic oak? When was the last time you climbed as high as you dared up the ever-slendering branches of a tree on top of a hill, just to get a better view of the clouds? Did you discern, in the sky's slowly shifting shapes, the outlines of your favorite furry forest friends? I have. I have smoothed the feathers of a dead baby bird, discovered fallen from its nest and mysteriously stilled by the forces of nature before it had had a chance to mate and build a nest of its own. I found its nest, deserted by parents and siblings, and placed the fluffy creature back in place, with a plea to the woodland fairies to perform their promised magic and make it sing and fly again.

The closest we now come to a universally-common experience is in our reckoning with the sky, which covers us all. However, light pollution has rendered enigmatic most allusions referring to the constellations. Sunrise over the ocean is unobservable by all but a few, as is sunset over the mountains. There are no common birds, as each area of the world has its own selection of species, each with its own songs and behaviors. Bees sting us only when we live in places where bees live. Mice scurry only where there are no rats and cockroaches to eat their dinners first.

What common experience of nature do we now share? Not even the drenching rains, which do not fall in snow-persistent regions. Encounters with wind might seem to be a universal experience, until one considers the differences in how wind is constant in some areas of the world, intermittent with stillness in others.

Yes, we all have spiders. But, of different sizes and with different natures, some aggressive, some furtive. Two eyes, six, or eight. Hairy, or smooth. Jumping, or creeping. Even their webs are constructed in various ways, some intricate and elaborate, some simple and merely orderly. Each region of the globe can depend on finding a unique but predictable set of indigenous spiders.

How common is our physical form? Our experience of our own human biology is pre-fashioned by the culture in which we find ourselves immersed. I may start to feel cold when the temperature of the air reaches down to touch sixty-seven on the thermostat, and choose to put on a sweater or turn up the heat. Children raised in the arctic are perfectly comfortable without clothes in the fifty-five degree temperatures inside an igloo. Those living in the hottest climates  may wear very little clothing, but some wrap themselves from head to toe to protect against the heat. I once read of the discovery of an unclothed Australian aboriginal tribe that had not taught their children that "cold" is something that should change one's perception of a person's interaction with the environment. Even after acculturation, in the freezing, windy, and rainy season they were perfectly comfortable in their own skins. They showed no interest in wearing shirts, pants, or shoes, much less the warm coats and boots offered by their benevolent "discoverers."

If we retreat into the recesses of our own minds, will we there find common ground? We discover instead, or even especially, that our thoughts provide no universality. Contrary to popular belief, a smile does not mean the same thing in every language. The ideas of "love," "childhood," "sex," and "spirituality" are all human constructs, with differences more likely than similarities, when comparing what is found in different societies.

How, then, does one write, to express one's thoughts to an audience that spans, not just the globe, but across the eons of time? Will there always be another Alexander Pope, to pick up the pieces of what he finds and make them real again for his own audience? How do we convince the Alexander Pope of five hundred years from now that our own words are still viable and worthy of refreshment? How do we find the eyes of anyone, any people beyond our own selves, who might enjoy having our unique words splashed across their consciousnesses, to be mingled with their own thoughts, and twisted into new and original constructs, and, having passed through, go on to infect others? My own family has not the time nor patience to indulge me with reading more than a page or two of my words over the course of a month. Why would anyone else even attempt that sort of intimate connection?

Homer did it. Shakespeare did it. They took universal fears and hopes and dreams and magnified them. They hooked us with blood and gore and sex and lies and duplicity and lust and greed. It was funny, entertaining.

Should we do the same? To make successful humor, we must get to the filth of it, so the reader can be interested, yet detached. The reader wants to see the horrors of the world defeated, the villains vanquished, the heroes compensated for their heroic efforts. The world saved, to live again.

We will write instead of the inner journey. As the drama swirls around outside, the maelstrom threatens to consume us from within.

Who will understand us? How can we explain ourselves, even to audiences in the present, much less those of the future, when we have so little of a common background that our obscure references go unappreciated?

A writer could include an in-depth explanation of what each of the elements in the work means within its context.

Or, a writer might forge ahead blindly and ignore those readers who might miss the inside jokes. More simply, a writer must focus on writing the familiar.

Just "Pick an audience, any audience!" Write for them and hope they will understand exactly what it is that you, personally a stranger to them, are trying to say. And when they don't understand you, simply throw up your hands and say, "I give up!" Then, pick up your writing and continue wherever it was you were when you left off.

How many of you readers "got" that humorous allusion to the magic trick, "Pick a card, any card!"?

There are as many varieties to that trick as there are magicians. Some card tricks require a stacked or a "trick" deck. Some use an ordinary deck but require the collusion of an accomplice, to play the trick on an unenlightened patsy. At the conclusion of a demonstration of "magic," sometimes you learn how the trick was accomplished. Sometimes you are left mystified and frustrated. Many times you have already blurted out, "I've seen this one before!" You are relieved you were not the patsy of the magician and his accomplice, nor were you left frustrated by participating in a new trick you do not yet understand. Yet, you have learned nothing new. So, you have been cheated, after all.

When invited to "pick a card," in the back of your mind you always know that there is no such thing as "magic," but you always play along anyway. You hope you might learn how to add a new trick to your own repertoire.

You carefully scrutinize the deck. Is it marked? You search the innocence in the look on the face of the magician. His earnest smile encourages your participation in his fun. His scheme, you fear, will leave you feeling defeated.

You survey the scene, hoping to uncover the accomplice, if there is one, and foil the two of them from making you their patsy.

At the very least, you are sincerely hoping not to be left imploring, "How did you do that? Just tell me, I promise I won't give it away!" You know the magician will just smile his smug little smile, "Wouldn't you like to know?" He will actually say only, matter-of-factly, "It's magic." He will pick them up quickly, the deck of cards, sliding them from one hand to the other and back again, keeping your attention on his eyes the whole while. Content that his years of practicing for this trick have once again paid off, he will start shuffling the cards again immediately. He will keep shuffling them until you go away. Shuffling, shuffling, smiling, shuffling. Convincing you that, indeed, it was true that "It's just an ordinary deck of cards!" Shuffling and still shuffling, he is preparing for his next victim, and you are left confounded and angry not to be let in on the secret so you can go on to find a victim of your own to play the trick on.

Half the fun of "Pick a card, any card!" is never knowing precisely which kind of a trick it is that you are encountering. You just hear the magician's words. They convince you to take the risk and "Go ahead. Pick one. Any one!" from the splayed deck which has been thrust under your nose.

You can't decide which to watch more carefully, the magician's hands or his eyes.