The Facts on File Dictionary of Allusions - Green Valley High School

Darcy, Mr. See mr. darcy.
Dare, Dan See dan dare.
Dark Ages A period in which intellectual progress
has given way to ignorance and barbarism.
<strong>The</strong> term was originally applied to the period of
history that extended from the end of the Roman
Empire in the fi fth century a.d. to the medieval
period beginning around a.d. 1000, an obscure
era of which relatively few historical rec ords survive.
<strong>The</strong> term is generally avoided by modern historians,
who point out that the period in question
witnessed signifi cant cultural advances and developments
in social or ga ni za tion. In modern usage,
the term is often applied to people or practices
that seem to belong to another outdated, unsophisticated,
or prejudiced time. <strong>The</strong> way he goes on
about the evils of computers and the Internet, you’d think
he was still living in the Dark Ages.
Darkest Africa <strong>The</strong> remotest, least- known parts
of the African continent, where all is mystery and,
probably, horror. <strong>The</strong> phrase dates back to the early
exploration of Africa by white adventurers, who
called the region the Dark Continent because so
little was known about it. <strong>The</strong> British explorer and
journalist Henry Morton Stanley (1841–1904)
wrote books with the titles Through the Dark Continent
(1878) and Through Darkest Africa (1890).
“Thus even in darkest Africa was the light of German
civilization commencing to refl ect itself upon
the undeserving natives just as at the same period,
the fall of 1914, it was shedding its glorious effulgence
upon benighted Belgium” (Edgar Rice Burroughs,
Tarzan the Untamed, 1920).
Dark Lady A woman of mysterious nature or
identity, especially one who is unfaithful. <strong>The</strong> allu-
sion is to the otherwise unidentifi ed “Dark Lady
of the Sonnets” to whom William Shakespeare
addressed some of his best- loved poetry of the
1590s, notably Sonnets 127–152: “Two loves I have
of comfort and despair, / Which like two spirits so
suggest me still; / <strong>The</strong> better angel is a man right
fair, / <strong>The</strong> worser spirit a woman colour’d ill” (Sonnet
144). She has been tentatively identifi ed by
modern scholars as one of a number of real historical
characters, including ladies by the name of
Mary Fitton, Penelope Rich, Mrs. Davenant, and
Lucy Parker. <strong>The</strong> historian A. L. Rowse made out a
strong case for her being Emilia Lanier, the daughter
of a Venetian court musician, who may have
had an affair with Shakespeare around the end of
1592. Because of the strong suggestion of infi delity
in the sonnets, the term “Dark Lady” is often
applied to women who are suspected of being
unfaithful to their husbands or lovers. It may also,
however, be applied more broadly to any brunette,
or any woman with a dark complexion. Everyone
likes her, but my wife thinks she may be a “Dark Lady”
who wouldn’t think twice about running off with someone
else’s husband.
darkness See egyptian darkness.
darkness, outer See outer darkness.
darkness at noon
darkness at noon <strong>The</strong> extinguishing of hope,
freedom, optimism, etc., especially through the
agency of an oppressive regime. <strong>The</strong> allusion is to
a 1940 novel of the same title by Arthur Koestler
(1905–83), in which he depicted life under the
repressive Soviet regime in Stalinist Rus sia. He, in
turn, may have borrowed the phrase from John
Milton’s Samson Agonistes (1671), which includes
the line “O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of
noon,” or from William Cowper’s “<strong>The</strong> Progress of
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