Allusion Paragraph

In All the King’s Men Robert Penn Warren makes clever use of allusions to parallel Cass Mastern and the Greek mythological character Cassandra, as well as relate Telemachus, son of Odysseus, to Jack Burden. Cassandra received the power to foretell the future from Apollo, the God of the Sun. But later, Apollo summoned a curse upon her that no one would ever believe her claims. In relation, Cass Mastern was never truly heard by Jack Burden. Elements of the times and mistakes in Jack’s life can be spotted through Cass Mastern, but Jack is too stubborn to realize that truth. That is until he finds he was not the creator of the spider web theory, because Cass invented it long before his time. In addition, both Telemachus and Jack Burden were incapable of recognizing who their fathers were, all while they stared them square in the face. An allusion is implemented to represent the similarities between these two characters. Even after Odysseus shot the infamous bow and arrow that proved he was indeed Telemachus’ father, the young man still had trouble believing the news. By comparison, Jack Burden always looked upon Judge Irwin as a Father figure, but never his real Father. Ironically, Jack opened the can of worms that eventually led to the death of the Judge, discovering that all of his life his old man was just up the road, and he hadn’t the slightest inkling.