10 December 2012

Post your allusion here

Under COMMENTS, post your origin and meaning for your allusion so that they're all in the same place. Due tonight by midnight!

20 comments:

  1. Quixotic:
    Origin-The character Don Quixote(from the book Don Quixote by Miguel Cervantes).
    Definition-Impractically idealistic or fanciful

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  2. Galahad:
    Origin- The character Sir Galahad from the book King Arthur and the knights of the round table by Marcia Williams
    Definition- A pure or noble man

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  3. Tartuffe
    Origin: Tartuffe is the protagonist in a play by Molière
    Definition: a religious hypocrite

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  4. Lothario
    Origin: The character Lothario in Nicholas Rowe's play The Fair Penitent
    Meaning: A man whose chief interest is to seduce women

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  5. Don Juan

    Origin: A character in "The Trickster of Seville and the Stone Guest" by Tirso de Molina who devotes his life to seducing women of all ages and stations in life.

    Meaning: Synonymous with "womanizer"

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  6. Pooh-bah:
    Origin: 1888 character in the opera "The Mikado"
    Definition: person in high position or rank; or with high influence

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  7. Pollyanna:

    Origin: Based on the 1913 novel "Pollyanna" by Eleanor Porter who was a child heroine.
    Definition: a person who is excessively optimistic.

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  8. Svengali:

    Origin:
    after the evil hypnotist of the same name in the novel Trilby (1894) by George Du Maurier

    Definition:
    a person who completely dominates another, usually with selfish or sinister motives.

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  9. Walter Mitty: An ordinary, often ineffectual person who indulges in fantastic daydreams of personal triumphs.

    Origin: Walter Mitty is a fictional character in James Thurber's short story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty.

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  10. Brobdingnagian: Originates from the imaginary land of giants from Jonathan Swift's "Gulliver's Travels."

    Meaning: Marked by tremendous size

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  11. Babbitt

    Origin:from Babbitt, a novel by Sinclair Lewis; after George F. Babbitt, the main character

    Definition: a self-satisfied person concerned chiefly with
    business and middle-class ideals like material success

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  12. Scrooge
    Origin- Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol"; character Ebenezer Scrooge
    Definition- a character who is greedy; "penny pincher"

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  13. Uriah Heep
    Origin- A character in Charles Dickens' "David Copperfield" known for his humility, submissiveness, and humble claims, but is insincere and hypocritical.

    Definition- Either a "yes man," or someone who shows respect without sincerity.

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  14. Yahoo
    Origin-Swift's Gulliver's travel

    definition - a stupid person

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  15. Jekyll and hyde origin "The Strange Case of Jekyll and Hyde. Meaning-someone with two personalities, one good one evil

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  16. Uncle Tom is the title character of Harriet Beecher Stowe's 1852 novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin.

    The phrase "Uncle Tom" has also become an epithet for a person who is slavish and excessively subservient to perceived authority figures, particularly a black person who behaves in a subservient manner to white people; or any person perceived to be a participant in the oppression of their own group.

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  17. SIMON LEGREE: Origin - cruel slave trader in an anti-slavery novel by Harriet Beecher Stowe; Definition - a cruel employer who demands excessive work from the employees

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  18. Falstaffian

    originated from Shakespeare's "Henry IV parts I and II"

    definition - being fat, jolly, and debauched

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  19. Guy Friday

    origin: character in the novel Robinson Crusoe named Friday

    meaning: a male or personal assistant that is usually loyal

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  20. Lilliputian

    Originated from Jonathan Swift's novel, Gulliver's Travels, in which there was an island called Lilliput, inhabited by Lilliputians.

    Meaning: A tiny person or being.

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