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ALLUSION
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I. (noun)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Passing reference or indirect mention
Classified under:
Nouns denoting communicative processes and contents
Hypernyms ("allusion" is a kind of...):
mention; reference (a remark that calls attention to something or someone)
Derivation:
allude (make a more or less disguised reference to)
Context examples:
“I am quite done with that person; and I beg that you will spare me any allusion to one whom I regard as dead.”
(The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll And Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson)
It would be unnecessary I am sure, for you to caution Mrs. Palmer and Sir John against ever naming Mr. Willoughby, or making the slightest allusion to what has passed, before my sister.
(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)
She felt it to be the probable consequence of her allusions to Mr. Wickham, and rejoiced in it.
(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)
The names which occasionally dropt of former associates, the allusions to former practices and pursuits, suggested suspicions not favourable of what he had been.
(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)
He turned away to recover himself, and when he spoke again, though his voice still faltered, his manner shewed the wish of self-command, and the resolution of avoiding any farther allusion.
(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)
She seems somehow more reconciled; or else the very subject seems to have become repugnant to her, for when any accidental allusion is made she actually shudders.
(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)
The fact is that I can hardly pick up a print without seeing some allusion to myself: ‘Sir C. T. does this,’ or ‘Sir C. T. says the other,’ so I take them no longer.
(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
I remember, before the dwarf left the queen, he followed us one day into those gardens, and my nurse having set me down, he and I being close together, near some dwarf apple trees, I must needs show my wit, by a silly allusion between him and the trees, which happens to hold in their language as it does in ours.
(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)
The Gascon warrior winced a little at the allusion, nor were his countrymen around him better pleased, for on the only occasion when they had encountered the arms of France without English aid they had met with a heavy defeat.
(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
The lady’s allusions to her past, and her refusal to take her husband into her confidence, both pointed in that direction.
(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
