Discussion Forum (Archived)
Guest
In a roman à clef, the fictional characters and events represent real people and events, perhaps in a fanciful way or a fictionalized setting: Jack Kerouac, On the Road; anonymous (Joe Klein), Primary Colors. In an allegory, the fictional characters and events represent ideas, concepts, and groups rather than real individuals: Antoine de Saint-Exupery, The Little Prince; John Bunyan, Pilgrim's Progress.
Aha! These things are never quite as neat in life as they are in academia. I would concur that Animal Farm is an allegory despite the ability to identify some of the characters with figures in history. In my opinion, a true roman a clef would have less in the way of general concepts and characters and more specific references.
The concepts of power and corruption outshine the specific references from historical inspiration. The point is not how specific people became corrupt, but rather that this progression is universal.
So it seems hard for a clef to stay clef because a work that is worthwhile will almost always say something larger than the characters in it.
You mention Kerouac's Road as clef, but it's the anthem of a whole subculture (or it became that in spite of whatever was his intention.)
What about Obama's Dreams? While totally tied down to earth with micro-details about real humans, it is nothing if not a massively ambitious ...whatever.
The phrase literally means "novel with a key". The idea is that if you know who or what one character represents, you have the "key" to figure out who everyone else is supposed to be.
The first time I remember hearing the expression, it referred to the movie The Greek Tycoon, in which the title character breaks off his affair with an opera singer to romance the widow of a president who had previously been a Massachusetts senator and who had, in the White House, appointed his brother Attorney General.
On second thought, just about part of that description could serve as the clef.
So to qualify as clef a work has to have something half hidden, teasing, alluding. An out and out biography like Obama's is not a clef.
To Rafee's point about the difference between clef and allegory, the element of allusion is there in both, but one is about characters, the other philosophical, moral themes.
Martha Barnette
Grant Barrett
Grant Barrett
1 Guest(s)