29 pages • 58 minutes read
Oscar WildeA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
An allusion is a reference to a (usually well-known) event, person, artistic work, etc. For example, the Nightingale’s sacrifice and impalement on the rose thorn recall the biblical sacrifice of Jesus Christ, who wore a crown of thorns and allowed himself to be pierced with nails to the cross for the sake of humanity. Her song of “the Love that is perfected by Death […] [and] that dies not in the tomb” also recalls Jesus’s sacrifice (65), undying love for humanity, and rising from the dead, as discovered by the Virgin Mary and Mary Magdalen when they open his tomb. This allusion develops the story’s exploration of The Nature of Love and Sacrificing Oneself for Love by lending the Nightingale’s sacrifice an air of holiness.
As in many fairy tales, the animals, plants, and other natural features (such as the moon) in “The Nightingale and the Rose” are anthropomorphic representations of animals, humanlike in their ability to speak and sympathize with others. They all have traits typically associated with humans: the Nightingale is portrayed as thoughtful, the Lizard as skeptical, and the Oak-tree as sympathetic.
By Oscar Wilde
An Ideal Husband
Oscar Wilde
A Woman of No Importance
Oscar Wilde
De Profundis
Oscar Wilde
Lady Windermere's Fan
Oscar Wilde
Lord Arthur Savile's Crime
Oscar Wilde
Salome
Oscar Wilde
The Ballad Of Reading Gaol
Oscar Wilde
The Canterville Ghost
Oscar Wilde
The Decay of Lying
Oscar Wilde
The Importance of Being Earnest
Oscar Wilde
The Picture of Dorian Gray
Oscar Wilde
The Selfish Giant
Oscar Wilde
The Soul of Man Under Socialism
Oscar Wilde