Use your allusion
Using allusions in your writing can help make an article, story, or even just a passage more interesting, more compelling, or more thought provoking. And it doesn’t take much, either. Simply mixing in a reference to a book, a quotation, or an idea adds a nice bit of spice to any writing.
Sometimes, it’s easy to use an allusion. Sometimes it’s not. Here are a few pieces of advice on what and what not to do.
Make it relevant
Tossing in a random allusion here or there is pointless if it has nothing to do with what you’re writing about. Make sure that the allusion you use has some connection to your subject matter.
Have some fun
Don’t feel compelled to quote or paraphrase verbatim. Feel free to play around a bit. How? Tom Shales, when writing about the Ice Capades many years ago, started his article with the words “I love a Capade”. Simple, but catchy.
Play with the source material. Twist it, bend it, and don’t get too reverential.
Don’t be too obvious
How many times have you read something that alludes to Greek mythology or Marx or Dickens? Probably more times than you care to remember. Like what? Like, when discussing an aspect of popular culture, writing something akin to “An opiate of the teens on my block.” The obvious sources of allusions are many, and they’ve been well mined.
While there’s nothing wrong with referring to those sources, there are many other fountains of allusions. Or, as mentioned earlier, ways of twisting those allusions into interesting shapes. Unfortunately, many writers don’t take advantage of those sources and ways. If they do, they do it badly.
Readers have come to expect those sorts of techniques. They often groan when they encounter them. And they aren’t often impressed. I’m not saying that you should use the most obscure allusions that you can find — that will just leave readers scratching their heads or, worse, thinking you’re pretentious — but do dig deeper than, say, your copy of Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations.
Sources of allusions
They’re everywhere. Film, TV, radio, music, books you’ve read. Keep your eyes and ears open, and pen and paper ready to take down an interesting turn of phrase that you might encounter.
Also, don’t discount online sources, like Wikiquote.
How to use an allusion
It takes a little doing to use an allusion effectively. You need to carefully blend it into whatever you’re writing.
Try not to quote directly; that makes the allusion a tad too obvious. Instead, try to paraphrase or rework it while at the same time keeping the spirit and the flow of the source. Your goal here it to make your readers think a bit and find things out for themselves.
For example, if you’re writing about technology you could use a quote like “Whoever said 640K (of memory) ought to be enough for anybody never tried to run Windows Vista.” OK, I linked to the source but you get the idea.
Allusions can be powerful writing tools. If used properly, that is. Using them takes a bit of practice, but once you get the hang of it they’ll make your writing richer.
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