Motif

//__Motif __//


 * Definition:: ** A recurring element in a literary, artistic, or musical work that has symbolic significance


 * Origin:: ** French


 * See also:: ** [|Theme]

Definition taken from (dictionary.com)


 * Examples ** from text:

1) Through the various interpretations of //Little Red Riding Hood//, the forrest is a recurring motif, which serves to symbolize the dangers of the world. Little Red Riding Hood, often portrayed as innocence, ventures into the woods only to find the wolf, which threatens her innocence. Little Red Riding Hood's response to this danger may determine development, struggle, or even death, as portrayed in the various interpretations of //Little Red Riding Hood.// The forrest motif can also be seen in other folk tales, such as //Hansel and Grettle// and //Tom Thumb//. > afraid of him." - Little Red Cap > who will be there first.” - Little Red Riding-Hood
 * "The grandmother lived out in the wood, half a league from the village, and just as Little Red-Cap entered the wood, a wolf met her. Red-Cap did not know what a wicked creature he was, and was not at all
 * As she was going through the wood, she met Gaffer Wolf, who had a very great mind to eat her up; but he dared not, because of some fagot-makers hard by in the forest. He asked her whither she was going. The poor child, who did not know that it was dangerous to stay and hear a wolf talk, said to him:— “I am going to see my grandmother, and carry her a custard and a little pot of butter from my mamma.” “Does she live far off?” said the Wolf. “Oh, yes,” answered Little Red Riding-hood; 'it is beyond that mill you see there, the first house you come to in the village." “Well,” said the Wolf, "and I'll go and see her, too. I'll go this way, and you go that, and we shall see



2) In the Batman comic book, //The Killing Joke// by Alan Moore and Brain Bolland, The Joker renovates a rickety old carnival in order to carry out his devious plot. The carnival serves as a motif, which is used to represent societal distortion as it contains a big lady, siamese twins, a hairy man-beast, and cherubic dwarfs. Thus, the carnival is reversing the social order, since redefining what is considered normal. This motif can also be seen in The Cask of Amontillado, as it takes place during Carnival, a festival of excessive indulgence that occurs just before lent. During the festival, the citizens dress up in reverse social order, as to symbolize social and political freedom.
 * "Life is swell in a padded cell, It'll chase those blues away. You can trade your gloom for a rubber room, and injections twice a day!" - The Joker



3) In the //Silly Symphony Skeleton Dance// created by Walt Disney, skeletons dance gleefully to music in a graveyard. Skeletons are a motif, as they display the reduction of man to his fundamental elements, and make us reconsider the significance of human kind. Though the skeletons appear freightening, we are able to laugh at death, as the skeletons are musically displayed.



(CG)