5592 samples of this type
Introduction “Young Goodman Brown” is a short story by Nathaniel Hawthorne depicting the eternal battle between good and evil. It is a tale of a young man walking through a gloomy forest with an elderly companion to perform a wicked deed. Throughout the journey, the main character, Goodman Brown, doubts...
Introduction Children’s literature can be defined as that form of literature that is designed for readers and listeners of about twelve years or below. Barry (2009) is of the view that children’s literature can be viewed from four perspectives. The first perspective defines children’s literature as that form of literature...
The Fortunes & Misfortunes of the Famous Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe is a novel that already includes the main plot in the title since it tells about the whirlwind life of a criminal – Moll Flanders. Written as a collection of Moll’s memories, the novel follows the main character...
Summary At the heart of the novel “The green mile” by King is the narration of the interaction between the key characters playing the role of either the jail guards or death row inmates, in a state penitentiary located at Cold Mountain. Although the story was recounted from a single...
Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein, or, the Modern Prometheus appeared at a time when the science fiction genre was only at the initial stage of its emergence and development. For the 19th century, the story of a man who managed to create an unnatural living being was, on the one hand,...
Introduction The author’s desire to convey topical and vital issues of modern society is often one of the primary goals of literature. The ability to reflect the problem as sharply and clearly as possible is an indicator of the writer’s talent, and if readers can appreciate the creative message of...
Introduction Sexuality and the construct of ideal love in the novel Tom Jones by Henry Fielding is an explication of the new form of love and sexuality prevalent in the eighteenth century. Love in its discoursed ideal, sentimental form is little presented in the novel. Instead, Fielding presents male love...
Discussion Process and Questions “Brown Girl Dreaming,” the novel by Jacqueline Woodson, presents her life through a series of poems. During the discussion, the classmates revealed various themes and tensions that helped to understand the feelings and messages of the main character Jacqueline. Three themes the discussion was focused on...
“A Streetcar Named Desire” is one of the most popular plays in the US history. Along with two other plays – “Glass Menagerie” and “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” – it brought its author Tennessee Williams tremendous success and fame. The themes opened in the story help the audience...
Home has an emotional connection to each one of us: it is the place where we feel safe, where we grew up, where we go for security, and to find love. It means different things to different people, mostly sentimental and heart-warming. For example, Silas the dying old servant in...
Class difference is an inevitable constitute of literary work. A drama that reflects the social construct of time is an indispensable source to understand class and societal structure of an era. In an attempt to portray, the world dramatists demonstrated the littlest equations that set the people apart. Most prominent...
“Hills Like White Elephant” by Ernest Hemingway is told mainly in the form of a conversation between the couple and even though the words are not actually said, it becomes obvious that the girl in the story is about to get an abortion. The main theme of the story centers...
Introduction In his captivating must-read chef-d’oeuvre ‘The Necklace’, Guy de Maupassant presents the story of Mathilde Loisel who happens to be a woman from a humble background who ends up doomed into a life of poverty by her dreams of wealth. Mathilde Loisel is the central character in the story...
Introduction The Canterbury Tales is perhaps one of the most popular collections of tales from the 14th century. It is a collection of stories told by Geoffrey Chaucer who remains one of the significant contributors to literature in the 14th century. In this collection, Chaucer who doubles up as the...
Check out our Hamlet’s soliloquies analysis sample! Get more ideas and insights about the famous “To Be or Not To Be” quote for your Hamlet soliloquy essay. Hamlet Soliloquy Essay Introduction In his many conversations, Hamlet reminds the people around him and especially his mother that she does not know...
Richard Wright and Langston Hughes are the writers that were very concerned about the racial issues in the society of the United States of America. Both of the authors use their talents to address the problem of racial differences and the outcomes they cause. Hughes and Wright emphasize the equality...
Introduction After reading the short story ‘A & P’, one will be forgiven for believing that Sammy quit his job as a result of his immature, childlike behavior (Uphaus 23). However, a critical analysis of the character will reveal that Sammy did not quit his job on principle grounds. On...
The introduction The fundamentals of the play When speaking about Samuel Beckett’s play Krapp’s Last Tape, it is necessary to highlight some fundamentals of his unusual production. So, first of all, there is a need to state that the peculiar feature of the play is considered to be a lack...
An Early Start in Midwinter by Robyn Sarah In her poem An Early Start in Midwinter, Robyn Sarah employs a great variety of expressive means to show a person’s negative attitude to a midwinter morning, and particularly to the household chores which occupy the largest part of this person’s life....
Introduction Henry Thoreau’s ‘the battle of the ants’ and Virginia Woolf’s ‘the death of the moth’ are two exceptional essays that depict the life of small creatures. The two writers humanize the life of the ants and moth in an extraordinary manner. The two writers use imagery to communicate human...
Certain literary works stand as transformative forces that stimulate the flames of change and alter the course of nations. Among these seminal texts is “Common Sense” by Thomas Paine, a groundbreaking pamphlet that reverberated throughout the American colonies, sparking revolutionary fervor. In this summary of Common Sense by Thomas Paine,...
Introduction Black Boy is one of the most prominent works of Richard Wright. The book is considered a fictional biography because the author, Wright, is both the narrator and the protagonist. The book covers his experiences throughout life, from childhood to adulthood, hence its classification as a biography. The fictional...
Robert Frost’s character in “Mending Wall” is similar to a modern real-life well-known person, Elon Musk, in terms of their shared penchant for pushing boundaries. However, they differ in their approaches to collaboration, with Frost’s character advocating for the traditional practice of mending a wall while Musk actively encourages the...
Reading the Black Boy book was a moving and very emotional experience for me; it hit me with a realization that racism has been a problem among individuals in society since time immemorial as it still carries on today. The topic of discrimination and racism faced by black people is...
Introduction The two plays Julius Caesar by Shakespeare and Equivocation by Bill Cain are contrasting pieces that follow unmatching plot lines. However, the two are similar in the sense that they try to modernize the stories from a distant past to fit their respective era better. They follow conspiracies taking...
Introduction Phillis Wheatley was the first female African-American writer who was published. When transported from West Africa to America, she was sold into slavery. Later the family that purchased Wheatley assisted her; the woman learned to read and write and mastered several languages. Wheatley’s poems frequently investigate her Christian values,...
Medea is an ancient Greek tragedy written by Euripides that focuses on the myth of Jason and Medea, initially published back in 431 BC. Though in a patriarchal environment, Medea portrays a powerful ability that is not only confusing but also inspiring. She holds a controversial character in Euripides that...
The novel Atonement by Ian McEwan is a romantic war tragedy metafiction that follows Cecilia and Robbie’s lives as the protagonist. They experience conflicts trying to fulfill their dream of eternal love and separate, shutting down all their achievements. McEwan intertwines irony and symbolism to explore the theme of love...
Essentially, I like “The Death of the Moth” the most because this reading has a deep meaning related to the struggle of life. The story compares a moth’s insignificant fight to the daily problems of human existence. Nonetheless, I argue that the story’s hidden meaning refers to the moth as...
Introduction The transformational power of human compassion and grace is demonstrated by Flannery O’Connor in her short tale “A Good Man is Hard to Find.” The story’s message is conveyed via changes in the two characters’ archetypes, which the grandmother and the Misfit symbolize. The author illustrates that everyone may...
The socio-economic and generational concepts are the major themes presented in Bully: An Adventure with Teddy Roosevelt. Roosevelt mentions the socio-economic divide between the rich and the poor in the play, with the poor working as laborers being exploited by the rich. His arguments about defending workers’ rights during the...
Paul’s mother, Hester, in Lawrence’s short story “Rocking Horse Winner,” is a character that drives the plot and serves as a basis for unveiling the theme of the dominance of materialistic values in society. Hester is materialistic, greedy, and pessimistic, which is evident from her worldview limited by obtaining money....
A dream is mostly defined as a succession of thoughts, images, feelings, and sentiments that happen unawares and involuntarily at different phases when one is asleep. Gary Hebert once said that dreams were just but universal liars that never lost their reputation for honesty because hope was the bread for...
Introduction Despite being written at the beginning of the 20th century, the play “Trifles” still presents an important source and obligatory to read for people interested in feminism. It was created by an American playwright and journalist, Susan Glaspell, in 1916, and the author conducted pioneer research on the topic...
The play “The Doll’s House” illustrates Henrik Ibsen’s interest in gender inequality and women’s rights. This paper examines the literary work from a Feminist criticism perspective, which is relevant to its central theme. Despite the portrayal of the main character as stupid and dependent on men, the author at the...
Introduction In the pursuit of knowledge, humankind devised science as an important tool for unveiling the mysteries of life. Through science, it becomes possible to generate requisite knowledge that leads to the creation of communication devices that permit people to share information in real time, provide vaccines, and/or answer any...
Introduction Filial piety is a Confucian principle that refers to the act of respecting one’s parents, elders, ancestors, and seniors. The principle is a very important aspect of Chinese society, especially and was embraced after the emergence of Confucianism. Today, it is one of the most important responsibilities of any...
When I began to read The Odyssey, I had some background knowledge of the events and characters described by the author. For example, as a student, I read about the myths created in ancient Greece, and the characters always described by Homer fascinated me. For example, I can speak about...
In Othello, Shakespeare aims to bring out the complexity of human relationships through the interactions of the main characters in the play. The experiences and action of the characters resemble human behaviors in social interactions. For instance, Othello evokes different feelings in various characters; some of those feelings positive, while...
Introduction The literary masterpiece Dante’s Inferno has captivated the imagination of countless generations. People have been fascinated and terrified by the idea of Hell and the punishments that await sinners for centuries. Based on the concept of divine justice, Dante’s depiction of Hell depicts sinners suffering as a result of...
Introduction The lead female figure in August Wilson’s well-known play Fences is named Rose Maxon. The author contrasts the macho physical strength of Troy, who lacks psychic and emotional stability, with the feminine spiritual strength of Rose, who is physically frail. Due to her capacity to resist her husband, willingness...
“Tess of the D’Urbervilles” can be seen as a straightforward love tale. However, the book covers many topics that Hardy and the society of that time could view as rather debatable. It includes the humanity of people in that society, the social morals, religion, and their conflicts. Hardy only shows...
Introduction “All these stories that we haven’t been telling all this time, that we haven’t been listening to, are just part of what we need to heal. Not that we’re broken” (Orange 137). This excellent use of irony demonstrates why Tommy Orange’s “There There” is a stylistic, form, and storytelling...
Introduction The “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass” calls readers on a heart-wrenching journey through the life of Frederick Douglass. This memoir is about Douglass’s years in slavery and his resolution to escape freedom. It was published in 1845 and played a significant role in winning the minds and...
The novelty of Samuel Beckett’s vision of performance art continues to affect the American scene. Postmodernism is apparent in the author’s works, which are thoughtful and complicated in their writing, acting, lighting, and other aspects (McNaughton, 2018). Beckett’s Come and Go is a short play with only a few lines...
Introduction Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) was an American writer, poet, editor, and literary critic. He went down in history as the founder of the genre of psychological prose and the form of classic detective stories. It is no secret that many of Poe’s works have contributed to the development of...
When Dee, an intelligent young African-American woman, visits her childhood home in the Deep South, the story’s first-person narrator, Mama, explains her relationship with Dee. As Maggie and Mama, Dee’s sister and Mama’s younger daughter, get ready for the visit, the story begins. Maggie dresses into a new outfit as...
Introduction The poet of interest is Janice Mirikitani, an Asian American poet who strongly appeals to me even though her culture is different from my own. The main reason is that her works show that there are many similarities between cultures, but the difference is how common human struggles and...
Introduction In the two literary works, the authors show an emerging tension as characters respond and react to new changes. The works illustrate multiple incidences where pressure is created upon introducing new ideas. In So Long a Letter by Mariama Bâ, Ramatoulaye is devastated by the imposition of her culture...
Introduction Various literary symbolism and devices allow poets and writers to talk about complex issues through allegories and metaphors. They can raise philosophical topics and topics not usually discussed in society, using symbols of nature or everyday objects. Rhina P. Espaillat, thanks to her flair, uses extensive and very vivid...
Introduction Gloria Anzaldua’s poem, “To Live in the Borderlands Means You,” explores identities, culture, and self-worth in the modern age and is intricate and profound. The borderland refers to the distinctive phenomenology and sense of identity of the individual who cannot traverse the borders yet resides within its chasm (Ortega...
Joy Kogawa’s Obasan covers the ways of coping with trauma by detailing different Japanese-Canadian characters’ responses to the years of internment and prejudice. In the early 1940s, thousands of Japanese Canadians were forced to move from British Columbia to Alberta to work on farms, providing labor for more than 60%...
Satire In literature, content creators use a lot of art to present their ideas in a specific way they desire. The ideas vary, thus necessitating more than one style to present their information to a targeted audience. Many themes can be depicted in the presentation, with many of them meant...
Thomas King explores one of the many challenges of living in a world where his race has been marginalized in “Borders.” It is challenging to uphold culture and self-identity in a nation as diverse as America. The dilemma in King’s short story “Borders” is one that concerns the issue of...
Introduction Literary works provide different perspectives on various aspects of life. For instance, Jack London’s short story To Build a Fire illustrates an individual’s fateful relationship with nature by describing how the main personage perceives the surroundings of his journey. London’s story is unique due to the use of literary...
The Tragedy of Othello, The Moor of Venice is a sexual jealousy tragedy that pioneers the investigation of racial discrimination. Shakespeare’s play, which the great playwright wrote in 1603, presents the image of Othello, a general of African descent. The main idea of the conflict lies in the fact that,...
Introduction Fences is a play by American playwright August Wilson that was first staged in 1985. Set in Pittsburgh in the 1950s, it explores race relations and the evolution of the African-American experience. In the center of the plot is the character of Troy, the head of the household, who...
“Frankenstein,” Mary Shelley’s famous novel, which she wrote when she was just eighteen years old, continues to captivate people all over the world. This narrative still speaks of the present world two centuries after Shelley’s “Frankenstein” first came to life, and its importance cannot be overstated. In Shelley’s work, scientific...
Introduction Building a world in which time is the main part of life, Harlan Ellison, in Repent, Harlequin! Said the TicktockMan!, rejects the blueprint of chronological storytelling and uses satire to illustrate the startling dependence that humans have on time.” Ellison disregards the principles of a customary time succession and...
Every individual is driven by an ambition which often manifests itself in the desire to achieve a goal. In this context, individuals will go to any length to achieve their ambition. However, in William Shakespeare’s Macbeth, too much ambition is depicted as a corruptor of good morals. Through the character...
This paper provides a descriptive analysis of a mash-up poem created by mixing lines of two poems by José Olivarez and a song by The Beatles. The poems’ names are River Oaks Mall and You Get Fat When You’re in Love, and the song’s name is All You Need Is...
In the poem “The Pied Piper,” Natasha Hooper uses various literary techniques to convey her emotions of anger and frustration to the audience. In this regard, most metaphors and symbols are related to the sphere of music, sometimes with specific references to R. Kelly’s works to deliver the main point...
The Stranger is an essay written by Georg Simmel in 1908 in which the author explores the sociological meaning behind the term and the concept of the stranger. In his explorations, the author studies the concept through different lenses of philosophy, economy, and through his relations and position in the...
Introduction A heart seeking love and burdened by traditions can open a doorway into madness. The given analysis focuses on a short story, “A Rose for Emily” by William Faulkner, written in 1930. The plot revolves around a town in the state of Mississippi with central characters Emily Grierson and...
Introduction In her memoir published in 2007, Edwidge Danticat tries to gather the whole picture of her broken family’s life: when Edwidge was four, her mother left the children with their uncle in Haiti to join her father in New York. At the age of twelve, Edwidge reunited with her...
Introduction It is important to note that Margaret Atwood’s book titled Oryx and Crake is a post-apocalyptic story with a heavy focus on the preceding events, which are deeply reflected in the current trends in areas, such as biotech, corporate power, and the erosion of democratic norms. The plot explores...
In Greek mythology, Oedipus, the king of the land of Thebes, portrays a king who brings disaster to himself and to the people he governs by killing his father and making his mother his wife. In search of the truth, Oedipus cares less about the danger his actions are about...
The Butcher’s Tale: Murder and Anti-Semitism in a German Town by Helmut Walser Smith is a 2002 book set in a Prussian town in the early 1900s. The novel begins with Smith outlining the details and history of a grisly murder that occurred in Konitz. While the town is now...
There are similarities and differences between the Cabuliwallah and Mini’s Father. The Cabuliwallah is from Afghanistan, while Mini’s father is from Calcutta in India. The Cabuliwallah has traveled from his country to Calcutta, India, to make a living by selling fruits, specifically grapes. He walks from door to door selling...
The idea of beauty has always been important to human society. People use specific standards to consider someone more attractive than others and provide them with privileged status. At the same time, failure to meet dominant standards might result in exclusion, isolation, and loneliness. Thus, beauty is one of the...
Dave Eggers’s The Circle is a novel about a same-name web organization that offers innovative products and services to ordinary citizens. Even though the literary piece considers the American context in the present time, it introduces some dystopian principles because the organization, the Circle, has a few features of a...
Introduction Prince Hamlet from Shakespeare’s Hamlet is considered one of literature’s most complex and intriguing characters. The depths of his emotion, the impact of psychological trauma, and the everbearing moral conflict within him contribute to a seemingly erratic but also highly philosophical character. In finishing Act one of the drama,...
Introduction A Rose for Emily by William Faulker is among the best 20th-century stories in American literature. It is his first published work in a magazine due to its influence on society. The author presents his story in a mid-20th century community in South America. The story occurs in a...
Aging and death are inevitable parts of life and, as such, have a significant representation in culture. Different societies place different meaning on those things, some viewing death as the ultimate end to one’s existence, while others believing that it is only a transition to a different state of being....
Literary fiction should never be regarded exclusively as a whim of a writer’s imagination. After all, any artist takes inspiration from their surroundings, which is why it is important to look deeper into a piece and decipher the true meaning of themes, characters, and settings integrated into the work. John...
“Next to of course god America i” is one of the greatest poems in the history of America, and every reader always defines different meanings of the story, making it multifaced and mesmerizing. It is important to read the poem several times to understand its main essence, get a different...
William Shakespeare’s Hamlet is deservedly regarded as one of the most essential tragedies in human history. The play is remarkable because it stays relevant and timeless, as evidenced by the fact that it has been staged in theaters all over the globe for more than 400 years. Shakespeare, however, was...
The narrative Hills like White Elephants by Ernest Hemingway commences in a valley in Spain. The story is about a protagonist, the American, and the antagonist is the girlfriend, Jinn. The narrative revolves around the American man’s suggestion to the girlfriend to have an operation that she later agrees with...
Introduction Research that seeks to examine literary sources in-depth to identify hidden meanings, messages, and applied rhetorical tools is part of an effective strategy for the academic study of the literary sciences. A great variety of artistic and poetic works have traditionally been classified into works closely associated with the...
Shakespeare permeates his lyrics with amazing metaphors and comparisons to express love and feelings. The metaphors used in Sonnet 103 and Echo and Narcissus by Shakespeare also present the reader with an indirect description of the sublime romance. On the other hand, the romance in these two works is, in...
Jean Baptiste Moliere’s comedies have been called the “mirror of the mores” of the time. One of Moliere’s favorite techniques was hyperbolization as a technique for creating images-types. Characters were typified in the minds of viewers and readers and became common nouns. The situation prevailing in the country at that...
This poem dramatizes the conflict between the fight for women’s empowerment and rights. Rich’s oeuvre is characterized by the extended metaphor at the heart of this poem. She speaks about the struggle for women’s empowerment by using the image of a woman training for a deep-sea scuba dive and discovering...
Introduction “The Persian Letters” are detailed accounts of the European experiences of two young Persians named Rica and Usbek. The intellectual tourists explore French manners and morality while their people rebel against the tyrannical authorities that have been subjected to years of misery. The seraglio, as defined in the text,...
Poem – Back to my Arms In the dark of the midnight, Lay me, eyes open, lacking sleep in the night, Thinking, taxing my mind, wandering the valleys, You crisscross thoughts; within my thoughts are alleys, Wanting to see, hold, and have you again as I remember with nostalgia, The...
In Nadine Gordimer’s short story “A Company of Laughing Faces,” Kathy Hack’s dynamic character reflects many teenage girls’ lives in contemporary society. Kathy is provoked by the life around her; she seems lost in the struggle to tap fantasy while embracing reality. She reflects many young people blinded by ambitious...
A novel in Spain is an ancient and truly democratic literary genre, rooted in folklore. Therefore, it absorbs folk wisdom, cheerful mischief, and practical judgment. The novelistic tradition is still alive in Spain; evidence of this is the collections published annually and individual stories in newspapers and magazines. There are...
In Life in the Iron Mills by Davis (1861), the possible function of mixing two modes of fiction is to highlight the moral importance of the story for readers while making it very real to the audience. Being focused on the truthful representations of life, realism supports the author in...
The works of Edgar Allan Poe are famous for their gothic style, the penchant for depression and melancholy, as well as sinister motives of imminent death and evil fate. So, in the “Black Cat,” the story of alcoholism, madness, and movement towards destruction unfolds. The cat is the main symbol...
Interpreter of Maladies is included in the collection of short stories of the same name. The plot of the story is built around the trip of the couple Das and their children – Indian immigrants of the second and third generation, who grew up in America – to the Sun...
The rhythmic picture of the poem aims to convey the words of a little black boy as if it were a direct speech. For this purpose, William Blake constructed the stanzas of the poem as quatrains with the rhyme pattern “ABAB,” and most importantly, used the iambic pentameter. According to...
In the poem After great pain, a formal feeling comes from Emily Dickinson describes the innermost experiences of a person who has gone through a tragic loss. It focuses on mental anguish and sorrow. Emily Dickinson wrote many poems that described pain, grief, and death. Her shyness and sensitivity made...
Some of the key questions a first-time reader of William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily” would ask involve why a sane person would consider sleeping or speaking with the dead and mete violence to their lover. Specifically, in the present-day society, a reader would refer to cognitive psychology to explain...
Composed by William Shakespeare, Macbeth is a mental and shocking story of visually impaired aspiration and dangerous, all-expending power. This is a play brimming with detestable goals and horrifying killings. Fabulously coordinated by Dan Hodge and enlivened by the Ghost accounts of Edgar Allen Po, this creation, with its intriguing...
Introduction Earlier Asian immigration to the United States was driven by dreams of a better life espoused in the American dream. Even today, America is among the most preferred destination countries by potential immigrants. For most people, the desire to migrate is to escape extreme poverty locally and build a...
Introduction John Updike’s short story “A&P” is narrated from the perspective of a teenager Sammy, who belongs to a working-class family but strives to join the privileged part of society. The work is built around the three main motives: division of social classes, conservatism versus liberalism, and consumerism versus romanticism....
A Raisin in the Sun is a story about an African American family trying to overcome poverty and find a place in the middle class written by Lorraine Hansberry. The main plot which the reader can identify in the first half of the work is the conflict between the sixty-year-old...
The topic of mental health is not only studied by psychologists but is also widely used by authors in fiction. Psychological problems and mental disorders are complicated and understood differently by various authors. The following essay will examine and explain the differences and similarities in “A Rose for Emily” by...
Introduction Flannery O’Connor wrote probably the cruelest and piercing stories in American literature. They addressed a wide range of social topics and revealed peoples hidden tools and behavioral motivation. In “A Good Man Is Hard to Find”, the development of characters is described adequately through the prism of communication to...
The Box Man is a short but impressive story written by Barbara Ascher, who is known for her prominent essays. It deliberately has a simple plot telling about one evening spent by a homeless man. The essay includes the narrator’s memories and comparisons made to contrast the lifestyles of others....
The “Salvation,” a short story by Langston Hughes, describes a young boy’s journey of searching for religion and redemption, which eventually ends unachievable. The boy abandons his pursuit for religion after realizing that the physical deliverance which he is looking for cannot be apprehended easily. The narrator loses hope after...
Introduction In the short story “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings”, Gabriel Garcia Marquez describes the life of Pelayo who discovers an old man with large wings. He accommodates him in a chicken coop and capitalizes on his condition to amass wealth from villagers who come to see him....
“Go Down, Moses” is a poem that became a folk song, calling for the freedom of slaves in the US back in the nineteenth century. It links the story from the Bible with the situation happening in South America before the Civil War. The work constitutes of several poetic form...
Night by Elie Wiesel is one such book where the main character is forced to go through hardships in order to become a different person. It describes the difficult life of a Jewish boy who had to experience a horrifying experience of hunger, violence and losing someone he loves. Since...
American fiction has a plethora of notable representatives whose works left a significant mark in the genre. It would be reasonable to claim that Carl Hiaasen is among these writers. Hence, his books might always be considered as a relevant and pertinent theme to discuss. Plenty of scholars have recognized...
Introduction Little attention has been devoted to the captured Africans’ experiences during the Middle Passage when they were shipped across the Atlantic to be sold into slavery. More importantly, few texts have attempted to capture the African spirit of resistance during the long journey from the shores of West Africa...
The environment plays an essential role in dictating the traits of a person. However, despite the hostility of the surrounding, the individuals who are determined to achieve their life goals always embrace success. The surrounding can make people develop fear even of their closest friends, hence seeing them as enemies....
Introduction The Handmaid’s Tale is a dystopian novel where Margaret Atwood pictures a scenario of one way in which the world could develop. The story is set in a fantasy version of a near-future New England, in a regime resembling totalitarian theocracy. In this world, women have no rights or...
The European colonists dominated over the Africans by disempowering them by introducing religious ideas that openly challenged their beliefs from an outside perspective. These white settlers managed to cause conflicts between those who are learned and then plant in those new Christian ideas. They also established a government that harassed...
A Worn Path is a short story laden with meaning and symbolism wrote by Eudora Welty. The narrative is about an old African American woman, Phoenix Johnson, walking a familiar path in the rural areas of Natchez, Mississippi, seeking to get medicine for her ailing grandson. The story is written...
Authors use animal characters to bring out themes that affect people in their daily life. The exploit of familiar objects or animals helps readers to understand the ideas that a writer wishes to put across. One of the authors that have used animals is George Orwell, in his novel titled...
The Dispossessed by Ursula Le Guin belongs to the number of the most popular science fiction novels by writers from the United States. Thanks to her skillful writing and attention to tiny details, Le Guin creates a unique world with its own conflicting cultures and the various social norms. However,...
The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother The whole story that is written by Gabriel Garcia Marcia Marquiz is a very interesting one that embraces three concepts, that is realism, naturalism, and magical realism. Realism Erendira who was fourteen years old was living with her...
Critical History The ‘Lais of Marie de France’ is an omnibus edition of works by a medieval female writer. The collection consists of twelve narrative poems, among which are Bisclavert, Cheverfoil, and Lanval. Glyn Burgess, who studied her works, notices, that ‘the theme of love is certainly the fundamental preoccupation’...
In the story Barn Burning by Faulkner, we first encounter Mr. Snopes in a courthouse. He is accused of burning Mr. Harris’ barn. The justice of the court tells Mr. Harris to prove his allegations but he is unable to do so because Mr. Snopes is cunning and does not...
Introduction In “Sing the Song of My Condo”, Evelyn Lau in an ironic tone tells a story of a would-be-homeowner, desperately searching for an appropriate flat for about 12 months. Although it needs to be admitted that the writing belongs to the category of fiction rather than argumentative articles, it...
Introduction “Paradise Lost” – John Milton’s epic poem, visually describing the risen Satan and his overthrow from heaven down to earth, in many respects popularized the representation of Satan as a personality. The live and vivid representation of Satan’s image, as well as other biblical characters drawn by Milton, strongly...
Introduction Every poem expresses a certain idea presented by the poet. It could be a personal thought or a story. Sometimes a poem describes a certain scene with certain events. In this case, the poet draws an image. Many poems have paintings to describe their events. The painting helps the...
To an eager reader works of literary fiction represent an inexhaustible source for exploring and deriving the senses encoded in the texts by writers. For the purpose of gaining a deeper understanding of the text, it is crucial to analyze such fundamental basics as the elements of fiction. In the...
Sylvia Plath’s biography provides several important clues as to the meaning of this poem. As a teenager she seemed perfect in every way, blonde, beautiful, intelligent and talented. After attending Smith College she studied at Cambridge, married the poet Ted Hughes and returned to the United States to teach at...
Introduction The issue of slavery was reaching crisis levels in 1800s America as the true cruelties of it were beginning to be realized. This ‘critical mass’ was the result of many voices, several of them black, revealing their experiences and having their words verified again and again as more and...
Henrik Ibsen’s play A Doll’s House was an influential and to a certain degree shocking literary work, as it challenged the traditional roles of men and women in society and depicted the poor outcomes of gender discrimination. The major female characters of the play are definitely bold and determined women,...
The play A Doll’s House was written in 1879 by Henrik Ibsen, a Norwegian writer born in 1828. It spread to the rest of Europe during the revolution period and sparked off a controversy because of his portrayal of women through the character Nora. The thesis of this essay is...
Homer is regarded in the Roman and Greek world as the father of rhetoric. This reputation of Homer is clearly evident from the 9th book of the Iliad, an embassy right from the leaders of the Greek towards Achilles, who is both sour and furious. The speeches framed by Homer...
Introduction The play “Death of a Salesman” by Arthur Miller depicts life and destiny of an American family which dreams about prosperity and high social position in society. in this play, Miller tries to escape social contradictions and economic situation in society but portrays psychological difficulties experienced by the family....
In the novel Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad fully explores the concept of imperialism and the effects it has on everyone who is involved with the process. He does this while employing a new modern means of characterization and expression. It is difficult to describe this new form of expression...
William Shakespeare is believed to have been born on 23rd April 1564 in Stratford near London. Though little is known about the life of this great actor and renowned writer, his parents John Shakespeare and Mary Arden are assumed to have taken him to a grammar school where he read...
In the poem by Anne Sexton When Man Enters Woman the theme of femininity is vividly described throughout its reciprocal attitude toward a male beginning. In this respect, the author implies too intimate a theme into an art form. A woman is intended by “Logos” to be a way for...
In his poem “Ithaka,” Constantine Cavafy encourages his readers to go off on a journey that will last most of their life. In the poem, he talks about how the journey needs to be full of adventure and discovery but he also warns against monsters like Laistrygonians and Cyclops, and...
The Swimmer tells the tale of Neddy Merrill, a rich socialite who has come upon hard times but has a narcissistic view of his condition and he begins to feel that he is young, athletic, and still good-looking. The real fact of the matter is that he is married with...
Introduction The ancient Greeks had a worldview that established a close relationship between the world of the gods and the world of mortals, typically expressed as a close relationship between the natural world and human activity. This was because it was felt the will of the gods was expressed through...
Introduction While analyzing any work of literature, especially prose, it is of the crucial importance to give extra attention to the role of the narrator, because, the reader perceives the events through the eyes of this person. As a rule literary critics single out several types of story telling, like...
Introduction Many people take pleasure from reading fairy tales, whose endings are normally happy and which depict the triumph of “the good” over “the evil”. Anne Sexton is among the writers, who have a non-traditional vision of fairy-tales, as she creates her own interpretations of fantasy narratives. As Sexton is...
Introduction The Handmaid’s Tale narrates about the events in the Republic of Gilead, a State, which was proclaimed on the territory of the contemporary USA after nuclear, biological, and chemical pollution, which made the most citizens infertile, and after the terrorists killed the president and all the members of Congress....
The history of writing this poem is not widely known, but it is stated, that it was written in the surroundings of the Egyptian oasis, as such clear and detailed images of the scenery may be attained only after immersion into the atmosphere of the Egyptian surrounding and feel the...
In her classical literary work, Wuthering Heights, Emily Brontë contemplates the topic of love and its importance in each person’s life by portraying the consequences that arise when somebody lacks it. The story continues attracting readers’ attention, as, without exaggeration, it covers an exceedingly crucial issue for contemporary citizens, considering...
Introduction The book “Life of Pi” by Canadian writer Yann Martel, winner of the 2002 Booker Prize narrates delightfully, the story of Piscine Patel, who shortens his name to Pi. An elderly man in Pondicherry, India, tells the author that he has a story that can make him believe in...
“Luis J. Rodriguez is a singular act in contemporary American literature. Poet, publisher, essayist, fiction and film writer, music producer, children’s author and youth advocate” in the autobiographical narrative Always Running La Vida Loca: Gang Days in L. A. gives a complete picture about his early life. (Jeff Biggers, Compassion...
Clothing in a literary work can serve as a detail that communicates certain information about the hero. Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales are replete with detailed depictions of various characters’ wardrobes. At the same time, Chaucer’s numerous descriptions of clothing are equipped with varying artistic functions, serving special expressive purposes. The...
Introduction The teachings of Confucius have influenced all types of relationships in Chinese society, and they have also affected the social position of women, their status, and their accepted roles. In spite of the fact that Confucius did not directly write specific teachings about women, his approach to treating female...
Introduction The epic poem, “The Odyssey” by Homer is a great work of literature that narrates the story of Odysseus as he returns to Ithaca from Troy. Due to the patriarchal nature of the Greek society, the reader observes that the relationship between father and son is a major subject...
Introduction The genre of a detective novel always attracted a large audience with its suspenseful premise and a satisfactory and often revelatory ending. One can argue that this genre has a set of traits that were established once and had not changed significantly since then (Rosenheim 81). Many short stories...
Lorraine Hansberry’s play titled A Raisin in the Sun demonstrates readiness to challenge typical representations of minority families in theatrical pieces. The play has connections with two poems by Hughes, “Mother to Son” and “Harlem.” In his poem titled “Mother to Son,” Hughes refers to the exchange of experiences between...
Introduction “Sweat” is a fictional short story in Southern American literature written by Zora Neale Hurston. Telling an unfortunate and dark story of domestic abuse, the focus of this fiction focuses on the struggles and perseverance of the hardworking protagonist Delia. “Sweat” demonstrates a feminist perspective of overcoming abuse and...
Introduction The Arabian Nights take its readers on an exciting, even though slightly morbid, journey of an endless tale that serves as the main salvation for a woman who faces the threat of constant impending doom. The cunning and resourcefulness of the main character, who also doubles as the narrator,...
Introduction/Thesis When it comes to writing a novel, authors must first make sure that the would-be produced literary work will have what it takes to prove discursively relevant. This, in turn, can only be accomplished if the novel’s themes and motifs are consistent with the prevailing socio-cultural climate, on the...
Introduction In this paper, I compare two prominent heroes in contemporary literature – Odysseus and Maximus. Based on the portrayal of the latter from the movie Gladiator and the representation of Odysseus in a book with the same title, I argue that both characters had more similarities than differences. In...
The problem of identity has perplexed great philosophers for many centuries and has resulted in differing philosophical views. Many philosophers hold that identity is an inherent characteristic that lies deep in the nature of human existence and attempts to unravel it calls for the understanding of other entities that intricately...
Introduction The term ‘author’ can be used to refer to someone who “…….originates or gives existence (or life) to something” (Hodges 2002). In the context of literature, an author can be described as an individual who originates or gives existence to a piece of text. This is for example a...
Introduction In Lawrence’s “Sons and Lovers”, when approaching the title of chapter eight, ‘Strife in love’, it is evident that we will encounter incidents of love in the chapter, that love will be dominant therein, but looking at strife in its independent contextual meaning, then, the kind of love in...
The book by the title The Plum in the Golden Vase is also known as Jin Ping Mei (JPM). It was originally written in Chinese but it has been translated into a number of languages for the purpose of readers to enjoy the plot and interesting characters. The Plum in...
