J.R.R. Tolkien, the author of The Lord of the Rings trilogy, once said, "I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and always have done since I grew old and wary enough to detect its presence," when he was asked if The Lord of the Rings was an allegory. Mr. Tolkien felt allegory was a waste of time and a nuisance, but Alfred Lord Tennyson, the author of The Idylls of the King, would have had a very different opinion on allegory. Tennyson used allegory to great effect in all his Idylls, including "The Holy Grail." "The Holy Grail" is, literally, the tale of Sir Percivale's quest to find the Holy Grail, but it has a much deeper allegorical meaning. Allegory is officially defined by Webster's dictionary as the expression by means of symbolic fictional figures and actions of truths or generalizations about human existence. In...