The Emperor's New Clothes

The fabric that the swindlers pretend to weave is symbolic of ideas or beliefs that are presumed to be true. This symbol has an extremely wide range of real-world applications, ranging from critical reception of a work of art, to commonly held social beliefs or even, as in the narrative, the ideas which uphold the social hierarchy.

The weavers repeatedly describe their fabric as being unmatched in its beauty and richness. Their audience (the emperor and his noblemen) accept the weavers’ reports despite being unable to see the fabric with their own eyes. The fabric is a central symbol of many of the story’s key themes. Each member of the emperor’s court insists on pretending to see the non-existent fabric out of a sense of conformity and a fear that they will lose their powerful stations. The fabric is also responsible for distorting the valuation of labor within the kingdom, as the swindlers are richly rewarded for providing an immaterial and dishonest service.

The perpetually-empty looms that the weavers pretend to work at are symbolic of lies, hollow ideas, and empty social systems. The looms are explicitly the tools used to create and propagate lies in the emperor’s kingdom.