Idiom
By extension, "swan song" has become an idiom referring to a final theatrical or dramatic appearance, or any final work or accomplishment. It generally carries the connotation that the performer is aware that this is the last performance of his or her lifetime, and is expending everything in one magnificent final effort.
Agatha Christie's famous mystery novel And Then There Were None includes, as a plot device, a gramophone record titled "Swan Song." When played, it accuses the houseguests and servants of murders for which they were not punished for various reasons. The killer intends to punish the wicked as a final act.
The DC Comics character the Pied Piper plays Queen's "The Show Must Go On" as his swan song, using his control over sound to destroy the entire planet Apokolips, while being trapped inside.
Read more about this topic: Swan Song
Famous quotes containing the word idiom:
“James Joyce is the new Euphues: the melting pot of the language and of present literary idiom and banality.”
—Christina Stead (1902–1983)
“Psychobabble is ... a set of repetitive verbal formalities that kills off the very spontaneity, candor, and understanding it pretends to promote. It’s an idiom that reduces psychological insight to a collection of standardized observations, that provides a frozen lexicon to deal with an infinite variety of problems.”
—Richard Dean Rosen (b. 1949)
“The “sayings” of a community, its proverbs, are its characteristic comment upon life; they imply its history, suggest its attitude toward the world and its way of accepting life. Such an idiom makes the finest language any writer can have; and he can never get it with a notebook. He himself must be able to think and feel in that speech—it is a gift from heart to heart.”
—Willa Cather (1873–1947)