Symbolism was very prevelant in all three of the books that I read this summer (The Grapes of Wrath, The Old Man and the Sea, and Fahrenheit 451). Symbolism is one of my favorite things about reading intelligent fiction because it gives much more meaning to the story than the dialogue and actions of the characters ever could. When symbolism is there, the characters are more than just characters; they start to represent abstract ideas much larger than any individual. Finding the hidden symbolisms of books is always fun, too. That is why it is one of my favorite literary devices.
One of my favorite symbols out of all three books that I read was that of the turtle from Chapter 3 of The Grapes of Wrath. It is not an obvious symbol the first time through the book, but on the second time, it cannot go unnoticed. It was such a perfect symbol for Tom Joad's journey throughout the rest of the book that I even did an entire blog post about it. I could probably write an entire paper on that one little chapter; that is how good of a symbol I thought it was. The fact that it also foreshadowed what was coming up was also a great factor in its amazingness.
That would be my opinion on how amazing symbolism is. It adds depth to stories, and it gives extra meaning to the little things that happen within the story. Symbolism is just one big epic package of greatness.
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