Some awareness of the author’s intention seems necessary in order to curb unduly fanciful commentary. Equally, determined critics may sometimes find allegorical meaning in texts with less than total justification-instances might include the Hebraic-Christian mystical interpretation of the Old Testament’s Song of Solomon, an erotic marriage poem, or the frequent allegorizing of classical and modern literature in the light of Freud’s psychoanalytic discoveries. Every culture puts pressure on its authors to assert its central beliefs, which are often reflected in literature without the author’s necessarily being aware that he is an allegorist. The systematic discipline of interpreting the real meaning of a text (called the hermeneutic process) plays a major role in the teaching and defense of sacred wisdom, since religions have traditionally preserved and handed down the old beliefs by telling exemplary stories these sometimes appear to conflict with a system of morality that has in the meantime developed, and so their “correct” meaning can only be something other than the literal narration of events. If the attitudes are disengaged from the structure, then the allegorical meaning implicit in the structure is revealed. Every culture embodies its basic assumptions in stories whose mythic structures reflect the society’s prevailing attitudes toward life. The fate of allegory, in all its many variations, is tied to the development of myth and mythology. Allegory may involve either a creative or an interpretive process: either the act of building up the allegorical structure and giving “body” to the surface narrative or the act of breaking down this structure to see what themes or ideas run parallel to it. Many forms of literature elicit this kind of searching interpretation, and the generic term for the cluster is allegory under it may be grouped fables, parables, and other symbolic shapings.
The poet, for example, may describe the ascent of a hill in such a way that each physical step corresponds to a new stage in the soul’s progress toward a higher level of existence. A story is told or perhaps enacted whose details-when interpreted-are found to correspond to the details of some other system of relations (its hidden, allegorical sense).
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