ENG 1120 Study Guide - Final Guide: Exalted

• School: University of Ottawa
• Department: English
• Course: ENG 1120
• Professor: Gaye Taylor

Document Summary

Often set in the remote past in idealized or supernatural settings (castles, ruins, forests). The characters usually represent extremes of human types or at least have exaggerated qualities (tending to be 1 or 2 dimensional in nature). Each thing in the story represents one concept: there"s a one-to-one correspondence between literal things in the story and their symbolic message. Allegorical meaning stays fixed and clear and never changes. Cannot be reduced to one simplistic reading, a simple formula or right answer. Symbols work like prisms do: one object, and one stream of light, but many different colors emerge, depending on the angle of view. Rationalism: a philosophy emphasized during the age of enlightenment in the. 18th century: exalted human reason and logic; control over self and world, downplayed the emotions, distrusted and/or ignored the miraculous and the supernatural. A precursor to the modern horror story, it features frightening settings, psychologically unbalanced characters, and mysterious, perhaps supernatural, events.