Editing Foreshadowing

{{Short description|Literary technique}}
{{About|the literary device|the security vulnerability|Foreshadow|other uses|Foreshadowing (disambiguation)}}{{Multiple image
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| caption1          = In the [[Book of Genesis]], [[Joseph (Genesis)|Joseph]] dreams of his brothers' grain bundles bowing to his own.
| caption2          = Later on, when Joseph becomes [[Vizier (Ancient Egypt)|vizier of Egypt]], his brothers bow to him as hinted by the dream.
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'''Foreshadowing''' is a [[narrative device]] in which a storyteller gives an advance hint of what is to come later in the story. Foreshadowing often appears at the beginning of a story, and it helps develop or subvert the audience's expectations about upcoming events.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Ginsburg|first=Michal Peled|date=1997|editor-last=Prince|editor-first=Gerald|editor2-last=Reid|editor2-first=Ian|editor3-last=Duyfhuizen|editor3-first=Bernard|title=Framing Narrative|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/1773187|journal=Poetics Today|volume=18|issue=4|pages=571–588|doi=10.2307/1773187|jstor=1773187 |issn=0333-5372|url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|date=2019-10-08|title=What is Foreshadowing? {{!}}{{!}} Oregon State Guide to Literary Terms|url=https://liberalarts.oregonstate.edu/wlf/what-foreshadowing|access-date=2021-06-30|website=College of Liberal Arts|language=en}}</ref>

The writer may implement foreshadowing in many different ways such as character dialogues, plot events, and changes in setting. Even the title of a work or a chapter can act as a clue that suggests what is going to happen. Foreshadowing in fiction creates an atmosphere of suspense in a story so that the readers are interested and want to know more.

The literary device is generally used to build anticipation in the minds of readers about what might happen next to add dramatic tension to a story.  Moreover, foreshadowing can make extraordinary and bizarre events appear credible, and some events are predicted so that the audience feels that it [[anticipate|anticipated]] them.<ref name=devices>{{cite web|title=Foreshadowing|url=https://literarydevices.net/foreshadowing/|website=Literarydevices.net|access-date=December 8, 2017}}</ref>

Hints may be about future events, character revelations, and plot twists to create mood, convey theme, and build suspense, usually to hint at the good events that will likely cross paths with or happen to the main character later on.<ref>{{cite web |title=Foreshadowing |url=https://literarytechniques.org/foreshadowing/ |website=www.literarytechniques.org |access-date=20 June 2019}}</ref>

Plot can be delayed by situations or events to give the impression that something momentous will occur to build anticipation and emphasize importance to them, which gives the audience a series of questions, particularly after [[cliffhangers]].

The literary device is frequently adapted for use by [[composers]] of theatrical music, in the composition of [[operas]], [[Musical theatre|musicals]], [[radio]], [[films]], [[television]], [[video game|gaming]], [[podcasts]], and internet scores and [[underscoring|underscores]], and [[incidental music]] for spoken theatrical productions.

==Methods==

Foreshadowing can be accomplished by the use of story-driven or fictional events which can bring original dialogue, emotional investment in the plot, such as for the main character, unknown and present characters.

A [[Flashback (narrative)|flashback]] is the interruption of a sequential narrative plot to present important events that have happened in the past to present plot points that are difficult to bring into the narrative, such as character traits, events, or themes which may drive the current narrative or to be revealed.

[[Flashforward]]s move the plot forward in time where formerly revealed or new character traits, events or themes are brought into the story. They might embellish past or current plot points.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Shorey|first=Paul|date=1933-07-01|title=Foreshadowing and Suspense in the Epics of Homer, Apollonius, and Vergil. George Eckel Duckworth|url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/361639|journal=Classical Philology|volume=28|issue=3|pages=245–246|doi=10.1086/361639|issn=0009-837X|url-access=subscription}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Glossary of the Gothic: Foreshadowing {{!}} Glossary of the Gothic {{!}} Marquette University|url=https://epublications.marquette.edu/gothic_foreshadowing/|access-date=2021-06-30|website=epublications.marquette.edu}}</ref>

[[Chekhov's gun]], a principle where an object or character is shown numerous times, referring to that same object will be used that is important to the narrative. A [[red herring]] may also be played here.<ref>{{Cite web |title=What is Chekhov's Gun? A Guide To Chekhov's Gun and the Power of Foreshadowing {{!}} Literature & Latte |url=https://www.literatureandlatte.com/blog/chekhovs-gun-and-the-power-of-foreshadowing#:~:text=%22Chekhov's%20gun%22%20is%20one%20of,one%20it%20should%20be%20fired |access-date=April 28, 2024 |website=www.literatureandlatte.com |language=en}}</ref>

==Related concepts==
Foreshadowing is often confused with other literary devices.

A [[red herring (plot device)|red herring]] is a hint designed to mislead the audience. Foreshadowing only hints at a possible outcome within the confinement of a narrative and leads readers in the right direction. 

A [[flashforward]] is a scene that takes the [[narrative]] forward in time from the current point of the story in [[literature]], [[film]], [[television]], or other media.<ref>{{cite book|author1=Ulrike Spierling|author2=Nicolas Szilas|title=Interactive Storytelling: First Joint International Conference on Interactive Digital Storytelling, ICIDS 2008 Erfurt, Germany, November 26-29, 2008, Proceedings|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vIkhA9zuvSUC&pg=PA156|date=3 December 2008|publisher=Springer|isbn=978-3-540-89424-7|page=156}}</ref><ref>[http://www.thefreedictionary.com/flash-forward flash-forward - definition of flash-forward by the Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus and Encyclopedia<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> Foreshadowing is sometimes employed through characters' explicitly predicting the future.<ref>Philip Martin, ''The Writer's Guide to Fantasy Literature: From Dragon's Lair to Hero's Quest'', p 146, {{ISBN|0-87116-195-8}}</ref> Flashforwards have scenes shown out of chronological order in a [[nonlinear narrative]], with chronology in an [[anachronism#Art and literature|anachronist order]], such as to make the reader or the audience think about the climax or [[reveal (narrative)|reveals]].

[[Chekhov's gun]] dictates that everything superfluous must be deleted. In relation to foreshadowing, the literary critic Gary Morson describes its opposite, '''sideshadowing'''.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Morson|first1=Gary Saul|title=Sideshadowing and Tempics|journal=New Literary History|date=Autumn 1998|volume=29|issue=4|pages=599–624|doi=10.1353/nlh.1998.0043 |jstor=20057502|s2cid=145159406 }}</ref> Found notably in the epic novels of [[Leo Tolstoy]] and [[Fyodor Dostoevsky]], sideshadowing is the practice of including scenes that turn out to have no relevance to the plot. That, according to Morson, increases the verisimilitude of the fiction because the audience knows that in real life, unlike in novels, most events are in fact inconsequential. The "sense of structurelessness" invites the audience to "interpret and question the events that actually do come to pass."<ref>{{cite news|last1=Calixto|first1=Joshua|title=LET'S TALK ABOUT ROSA VAR ATTRE, THE IMPOSSIBLE ROMANCE OF THE WITCHER 3|url=http://killscreendaily.com/articles/lets-talk-about-rosa-var-attre-impossible-romance-witcher-3/|access-date=3 August 2015|work=[[Kill Screen]]|date=3 August 2015}}</ref>

==References==
{{Reflist}}

{{Narrative modes}}

[[Category:Narrative techniques]]