: Re: Why is having too many symbols a bad idea? I'm writing a speech on using symbols, and I've just made the statement that you should generally stick with one, maybe two, symbols that span the

@Gail2416123

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There are probably many reasons, but I feel that this is the big one:

With each additional symbol, their individual importance lessens.

If everything is based around a single symbol, then it makes the stakes much higher when everything is revolving around it.

Even if, as you say in your example of LOTR, all of the items were together, possibilities of Frodo losing The One Ring become less meaningful and would have less impact, as he would still have a handful of items about his person that are also important.

I've read stories where, for example, there are three magical stones that hold a great power. But they are never separated, never even referenced as being separate entities, and the three stones become one symbol.

I understand what you mean about the difficulty of articulating this idea, I'm struggling to come up with the words myself without throwing a bunch of examples out and hoping that their significance is understood from the context.

I suppose we can only be invested in so much within a story. If there are a massive amount of symbols being carried throughout the story, and we need to be just as concerned with each individual symbol, then we can only be focused on them so much before we have to divert our attention to another.

The story would become over-saturated with things that we need to be concerned about, and eventually the reader would realize that they don't mean all that much if there are just others cropping up all the time.

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