Symbols In The Seventh Seal

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Within the film “The Seventh Seal” by Ingman Bergman, songs and images were used with varying success to inform the characters of the most unavoidable aspect of their world, Death, and of any way to delay him. Antonius Block uses these references to postpone his own demise by at least a few days, while his faithful Squire Jöns bares witness to the creation of one of these artistic messages and yet still was blind sighted by future events when they play out exactly as he was shown. Selma Lagerlöf’s “The Saga of Gösta Berling” does not dally around with messages hidden within works of art, however. Important information that the characters needed to know, for felt it was necessary to share, was spoken directly between them without a middleman such as music or art. In the freezing woodland of Lagerlöf’s Värmland within the 1820’s, …show more content…
It would seem that that deal, although seemingly innocuous and odd, corresponded with the yearly death of a Cavalier, however. The gentlemen did not question the word or likelihood of the Devil visiting them on that cold and cheery night, and even Gösta who literally helped Sintram get into position quickly fell victim to his storytelling. His token argument, that Sintram wasn’t the real Devil, was quickly overshadowed by drunken men frightened for their lives and a man more than willing to take advantage of that fact. “As if that would make any difference, as if I wouldn’t be as good a devil as anyone else” Sintram insists, his story weaved from fantasy and reality painting an image for them that they have no choice but to believe (36). The story, then, becomes reality for the Cavaliers and their disgraceful