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Literary Devices
Definition of Allusion
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to other literary works, famous individuals, historical events, or philosophical ideas... read full definition
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to other literary works, famous individuals... read full definition
In literature, an allusion is an unexplained reference to someone or something outside of the text. Writers commonly allude to... read full definition
Act 1
Explanation and Analysis—The Lord's Prayer:
Over the course of the play, Rosencrantz forgets his own name, loses track of the role he’s playing, and occasionally struggles to hold a running conversation. At points, Guildenstern seems no better. He frequently misquotes a verse from the Lord’s Prayer, as when he speaks to Rosencrantz about Hamlet:
“Ros (quietly): Immortality is all I seek…
Guil (dying fall): Give us this day our daily week…”
Guildenstern’s line is a nod to the Lord’s Prayer, which asks God for forgiveness and strength. It is also a cheeky parody: Guildenstern bungles the actual line, “give us this day our daily bread,” by substituting “week” instead. He repeatedly references this verse and never gets it right. By the time Hamlet meets with Fortinbras, Guildenstern is pleading for “our daily round.” The verse from the Lord’s Prayer reappears like a refrain, its final word variously substituted with “mask,” “cue,” and “tune.”
Through these misquotations, Stoppard mixes the sacred and the profane to comical, almost irreverent effect. These absurd twists on a common prayer offer light diversion in a dialogue that is already saturated with puns and strange references. More crucially, these failed allusions to the Lord’s Prayer seems to expose the limits of faith. Try as he might, Guildenstern’s appeals to God won’t spare him his fate or control the immediate events in this play. God is not only powerless—he seems to be absent within the inflexible plotline and absurdity of Stoppard’s play. His botched quotations underscore the puzzling, cruel nature of the world, showing how he is trapped in an existence where belief alone can no longer serve him.
Related Themes:
Act 2
Explanation and Analysis—Butterfly Philosophers:
While debriefing their encounter with Hamlet in the beginning of Act 2, Guildenstern shares with Rosencrantz the story of a Chinese philosopher:
A Chinaman of the T’ang Dynasty—and, by which definition, a philosopher—dreamed he was a butterfly, and from that moment he was never quite sure that he was not a butterfly dreaming it was a Chinese philosopher.
Guildenstern’s reference to Zhuangzi, the ancient Daoist philosopher who dreamed himself to be a butterfly, touches upon the play’s own metaphysical explorations. Zhuangzi’s dream is so compelling that it bleeds past the edges of reality, casting his own existence into question. He awakes, newly wary of his own identity as a human. The safety of logic and common sense have fallen out beneath him.
Zhuangzi’s whimsical confusion anticipates a Cartesian-like dilemma. What is reality? Can humans ever free themselves from their illusions, sure that they are not butterflies? Zhuangzi ultimately cannot prove that he is a human, any more than he can distinguish his waking moments from his dreaming ones.
The story’s philosophical knottiness holds a special place in a play whose characters wander about as through a senseless dream. Cast members and the audience walk into Rosencrantz and Guildenstern’s lives at random, with “never a moment’s peace.” They never choose their tragedy; it simply strikes as they wage bets and flip coins.
The butterfly story’s uncertainty parallels their own questions about free will. Guildenstern notes that even the suspicion that they lack free will might send the whole project to “shambles.” The play’s functioning seems to require their perpetual skepticism—in this case, not knowing is safer than knowing. Guildenstern appeals to Zhuangzi’s tale, trying to remake uncertainty as a guarantee of security.
Related Themes:
