is meant to help us start breaking down and analyzing significant symbols in literature, which again goes back to our course goals. Not only is analyzing symbols in itself a rewarding and important element of literature classes, but analyzing symbols can also help us discover the larger themes guiding the texts.

Our textbook helps us complicate our understanding of what symbolism means in literature:

A symbol usually conveys an abstraction or cluster of abstractions, from the ideal to the imperceptible or the irrational, in a more concrete form. In a literary work, a symbol compares or puts together two things that are in some way dissimilar. . . . And because of its significance, a symbol usually appears or is hinted at numerous times throughout the work. In reading literature, it may be challenging to recognize symbols, and readers may have good reasons to disagree about their interpretation, since literary works often incorporate symbolism for which there is no single “correct” interpretation. Reading a short story is not like a treasure hunt for some shiny symbol that clearly reveals all the hidden meanings; the complexity remains and requires further exploration even when we have recognized a symbol’s significance. (Mays 148)

This week’s readings are packed full of symbols, so they’re a great place for us to start our symbolic analysis.

Assignment

After reading our texts for this week, choose one text that has a symbol you’d like to analyze within it.

Next, choose the symbol from the text you want to analyze. Keep in mind that texts often have multiple symbols. You just want to focus upon one. Also, while each of these readings have a fairly obvious symbol (the hot air balloon or the birth-mark for example), there are less obvious symbols as well. While you can focus on any of the symbols you would like, it could be more challenging and interesting to choose a less obvious symbol. For example, I always notice the mushrooms Guy puts in Lili’s hair as an interesting symbol worth exploring.

Then, you’ll write a fully-developed paragraph of at least six sentences where you analyze the symbol by doing the following:

Create a short thesis statement that includes the text’s title, the symbol, and what you think the symbol represents

Example: The hot air balloon in “A Wall of Fire Rising” represents freedom from poverty to Guy.

Support your thesis statement with analysis & evidence from the text.

Try to find evidence from the text to show why you interpret the symbol in that way.

Try to use at least one direct quote.

Explain in your own words what the quote shows, how the symbol should be interpreted, and how that interpretation affects the story’s meaning.

List:

“A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, starts on page 341

“A Wall of Fire Rising” by Edwidge Danticat, starts on page 267

“The Birth-Mark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne, starts on page 152

“The Thing in the Forest” by A.S. Byatt, starts on page 164

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