5966 samples of this type
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...
As a tool of oppression, gender roles have been affecting the lives of women across the globe. The problem of rigid gender roles and the suffocating effect they produce on women and girls has been studied from various perspectives, including artistic and, particularly, literary works. In her seminal short story,...
The Important Scene One of the most significant scenes in the first act was the conversation between Lyle, his wife Jo, and Parnell. Jo is worried that her husband Lyle may be sentenced for committing transgression long ago. She considers it an unfortunate mistake that Richard was dead, and Lyle...
The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house is Audre Lorde’s provocative admonishment, and it is a warning that Black and other academics of color should heed. Lorde uses dismantling the master’s house as a metaphor for intersectional systems and structures of oppression that produced and perpetuated health inequality...
Kindred is a fictional novel written by Octavia Butler, which touches upon the topic of the value of human life, referring to the horrifying antebellum South events. The female protagonist Dana suddenly experiences the time-traveling to the past and meets her ancestor Rufus, the antagonist of this story. Dana has...
Introduction Poetry is an art that many individuals use to pass information. From politics to liberation movements and racial awareness rallies, poetry enables communication that conveys crucial messages to the public. Poetry can influence decision-making among people as it can give the truth to the public and also manipulates some...
Tennessee Williams’ play The Glass Menagerie portrays a world of illusion to the reader as an escape from the difficulties of reality. Amanda, Laura, and Tom suffer from alienation and the inability to find their place in society, which forces them to focus on their own inner world. Despite being...
Introduction The works of Shirley Jackson are well-known in literary society. Even though the issues addressed by the author appear to be diverse, special attention is drawn to the subject of conformity. In “The Lottery,” the writer delivers her unique understanding of the dangers of excessive conservatism. In this essay,...
The poem “Song of Myself” is an epic work of literature as the poet dedicates it to celebrating himself. An interesting aspect of the poem is its length and its free verse nature. It is divided into fifty-two sections, with each part introducing a slightly new concept about celebrating oneself...
Introduction One of the primary purposes of literature is to deliver meaningful messages through artful images and plots. While some literary works may have a mostly entertaining function, some pieces prove to be seminal in the broader context of topical issues of society. Toni Morrison is one of the authors...
The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz is a satirical novel written by Canadian writer Mordecai Richler, which describes Duddy Kravitz’s life. The main character, a Jew from Montreal, Quebec, tries his best to become rich, not paying attention to all the sacrifices made for this purpose. The author of the novel...
“For There is Nothing Either Good or Bad, Thinking Makes it So.” William Shakespeare’s statement is partially wrong as it contradicts the possibility of either good or bad occurrences happening. There cannot be a dispute that good or bad exists because a human being can experience that they feel happy...
Introduction Scholars and writers rely on different literary styles to complete their works and deliver the intended messages to their readers. The works Trifles and A Raisin in the Sun offer powerful insights and analyses of most of the challenges different members of the selected societies encounter. The books provide...
Outlaws of the Marsh or Water Margin is a classic 14th-century Chinese novel written by Shi Nai’an. The plot of the story, which has four volumes and from 100 to 120 chapters, tells about the adventures of 108 demons that incarnated in the form of people and became noble robbers...
Art has always been one of the tools used for different purposes. Creating various artworks, individuals acquired an opportunity to show things that were important to them and make other persons think about the ideas vital for them. A masterpiece belonging to a particular era can highlight the moods, attitudes,...
Different people may subscribe to different types and levels of beliefs due to cultural-religious or social factors. Some of these beliefs may not be straightforward altogether in terms of the meaning and truth they carry, but people may tend to stick to them. What exactly this means is that a...
The spirit of renaissance stirs through many literary works from the last quarter of the 20th century, rejuvenating African American’s will to defy an oppressive system. One such invigorating creation is Maya Angelou’s Still I Rise. This paper analyses how Angelou’s poem criticizes racism and marginalized conditions that have perpetually...
The story of the Millers presents fascinating attributes of families in contemporary societies. In many instances, people tend to copy what their fellows are doing with a perception that these other individuals have a better life, just like the Millers admired the Stones. Although Bill is portrayed as an outgoing...
The poem “The Bitter River”, written by Langston Hughes, may be regarded from different angles. This ambiguity is rooted in a meaningful metaphor of a river, which is the poem’s foundation. One of the themes disclosed in “Bitter River” is restrictions on art, creativity, and imagination. The author examines the...
The Story of the Stone is a classic and outstanding example of the Chinese literature of the end of the eighteenth century that has marked a significant period in the country’s cultural development. The literary work is a composition of multiple social, religious, moral, and psychological issues that reflect the...
Introduction Young adult literature is a genre of fiction explicitly aimed at adolescent readers. The target audience for this category of literary works is between 12 and 18 years of age, and the novels focus on problems and issues relevant to the teenagers facing new challenges of adult life. Thus,...
In Hemingway’s “A Soldier’s Home,” the main character experiences apathy for a multitude of reasons. Harold Krebs was trained in a way that made him void of any empathy. The disinterest towards maintaining normal relationships or any mundane hobbies settled in after the return to civilian life (Hemingway 2). This...
The Camel and His Friends is a short story, which was written as one of the five chapters of beast fables from India called Panchatantra. The story is attributed to a sage named Bidpai, who is thought to be the original narrator. In India, Bidpai is a legendary figure and...
The Misfits depicts a group of friends rejected by others, known as the Gang of Five, despite having only four members. They are Bobby, Joe, Skeezie, and Addie, the only girl in the circle. Each has a distinct personality and certain reasons for being ostracized, and later the quarter joins...
All O. Henry’s works are imbued with attention to imperceptible “little” people, whose troubles and joys are vividly portrayed in his stories. The author aims to draw attention to the genuine human values. As a result, the most seemingly deplorable finals of his short stories begin to be perceived as...
An antagonist is a character who opposes the main one on the way to achieve goals. The antagonist-protagonist opposition is one of the possible driving forces of the central conflict of literature work. The actions of the antagonist not only create obstacles that the protagonist must overcome but can also...
Introduction Guy De Maupassant’s story, The Necklace is an example of how a writer uses various characters to develop the plot of the story leaving an everlasting memory on the reader. This essay will focus and determine Mathilde’s character as portrayed in the story The Necklace by Guy De Maupassant....
Summary The poem, “My Last Duchess” was written by Robert Browning in 1842. The work can be described as one that’s the prime example of a dramatic monologue in the form of a poem. The dramatic monologue, as a genre is a self-conversation that is presented from a particular character’s...
Introduction Flannery O’Connor was known as a devout Catholic, and much of her work reflects this part of her identity. “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” one of her most well-known stories, is an example, as it features religious themes throughout the encounter with the Misfit. Initially, the grandmother...
The protagonist of the story The Devil’s Drool, Roberto Michel, a Chilean living in Paris, accidentally takes a strange picture, depicting a woman seducing an inexperienced youth. The appearance of the photographer gives the guy the opportunity to escape, but the card begins to live its own life, and a...
1958 in Truman Capote’s work was marked by the publication of the novel Breakfast at Tiffany’s, in which he described the world of Holiday (Holly) Golightly and her friend – the writer whose name is unknown. It is full of various symbols represented in literary devices. In 1961, the novel...
Identity encompasses the unique signature that differentiates different works of literature. Essentially, this identity can be utilized to differentiate different works originating from different authors. Jack Turner is an author that has created an identity for himself, by not only writing interactive works on wildlife but also incorporating various figures...
Introduction Shirley Jackson’s story “The Lottery” was published in 1948 during the rebuilding of the world after World War II. Almost all the post-war period literature is, to one degree or another, devoted to understanding the consequences of what happened during 1939-1945. One of the cruelest and most inhumane episodes...
The short story written by Kate Chopin in 1894 raises essential feminist issues. Despite the short form of the literary work, it successfully and powerfully conveys the deprivations American women of the end of the nineteenth century experienced due to the dominantly patriarchal society in which they lived. Meticulously using...
Introduction This play was written by playwright Lorraine Hansberry in 1959. It talks about a young family with a mama Lena Younger, her son Walter Lee, Ruth the wife of Walter, Travis their son and Benetha the young sister to Walter. One of the themes of this play is dreams...
Beowulf is an old English story drawn from their native oral literature. Though the author is anonymous, its influence is still felt up to today in many of the works of contemporary writers. The protagonist exhibits all the character traits of a tragic hero as defined by Aristotle. According to...
Closing Statement: The Prosecutor Your Honor, the life of a person, no matter what his or her body may look like, is sacred, which is why the Samsa Family must answer for their actions. There is clear evidence that, despite his transformation, Gregor Samsa still possessed the ability to feel,...
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...
Any literary work raises an issue related to a political or social problem in society. An examination of a narrative’s historical context, its literary features, and plot helps identify and understand such societal issues. The poem “Ballad of Birmingham” by Dudley Randall, the poem “The Star-Spangled Banner” by Francis Scott...
Woody Guthrie composed “This Land Is Your Land” in 1940 with the hope of proving the Americans to diverse views. The poem is well known, and it is considered the nation’s patriotic anthem. While the composition is supposed to promote patriotism, some of the song’s stanzas contradict the tune’s intended...
In the play And the Soul Shall Dance, Yamauchi provides an overview of the life of Japanese-immigrants in the United States. The author presents the conflict between the American and Japanese cultures as the immigrants long for their home country. The characters struggle to assimilate into the American culture as...
Belonging to entirely different cultures and addressing quite different social and psychological issues, “Oedipus, the King” and “Hamlet” might seem quite distant from each other. However, with the advent of psychoanalysis and the development of the psychoanalytical theory, parallels can be drawn between the emotions by which Hamlet and Oedipus...
The Cask of Amontillado is one of Poe’s most transparent short stories, every aspect of which in the background adds to the ultimate ironic effect. The unity of the short story and the plot is very straightforward. Montresor seeks vengeance on Fortunato for unspecified provocation by including him in his...
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...
We all have a friend who yells during a movie that this moment was shown differently in the book. At the same time, another friend says that he or she is bored with reading and would rather wait for the movie adaptation. Both of these friends can be right, since...
Introduction The sea is frequently the central theme of many authors’ compositions. The poem “On the Sea” by John Keats (1800) illustrates the incredible power and subtlety of the waves, as well as their capacity to treat troubled eyes and torn ears. It demonstrates freedom and solace that can be...
Today, an Akkadian epic poem, the Epic of Gilgamesh is regarded as the earliest surviving great literary work. The poem describes the life of Gilgamesh who was an actual historical king of an ancient Sumerian city-state of Uruk, deified post-mortem by its citizens. Of special interest for scholars is the...
The Europeans’ conquest is one illustration of how people’s desire for power and ownership can subject others to suffering. The results of such actions are oppression and loss of identity since the conquered often have to obey the policies and rules that the conquerors impose on them. These perspectives help...
The themes of oppression, alienation, and identity often permeate the well-known pieces of modern and classic literature. Conflicts that are understood on an instinct level are often engaging for the reader and broad with possible meanings. The basic issue at the core of a story can be expanded and turned...
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...
Notwithstanding that both William Golding and Mary Shelley created hypothetical situations to explore the nature of humans, their approaches and motives significantly differ. However, the given paper will prove that simultaneously they share the research on how the environment influences people and on what the inner nature of these creatures...
Introduction Poetry about nature and its features occupies a significant part of the world’s poetic heritage. At the same time, in addition to describing the world, many poets resort to the analysis of such a phenomenon as human nature that conveys aspects of people’s characters and their outlook on life....
Shakespeare’s Othello is a play about secrets, plotting and revenge. It tells the tragic story of Othello, who is secretly married to Desdemona and how the people around them plot to end the relationship (Shakespeare 6). Rodrigo’s business with Iago involves the latter helping him to woo Desdemona. Roderigo is...
“Blindness” is an essay written by Jorge Luis Borges in 1977. In this work, much attention was paid to self-referentiality because the author’s experience is extremely important to support his writing (Block de Behar, A Rhetoric of Silence 279-281). To understand the purpose of this essay, it is critical to...
The play Trifles depicts a profound disagreement between two types of attitude and performance. The play’s research exposes a significant contrast between female and male actions, based on a different perception of the environment. As Holstein claims in her paper, “the difference in initial perception ultimately leads to the creation...
Autobiographic works do not only help understand the author’s writing better but also do it credibly and convincingly. The Glass Menagerie is a memory play by Tennessee Williams, in which he recollects life challenges his family had to face. This paper aims to prove that the social environment, rather than...
The Things They Carried is a book that consists of fictional stories about soldiers’ experience during the war in Vietnam. The writer reflects on his participation in the military conflict by using a fictional hero – Tim O’Brien. Through storytelling, the author manages to explore his own feelings to convey...
Modern American poetry is characterized by a variety of themes and issues that capture poets’ minds and become continuously addressed in their works. Elizabeth Bishop’s poetry is particularly marked by the heterogeneity and complexity of intersecting themes. The poem entitled “The Fish” is one such works, where the themes of...
The purpose of this work is to compare journeys of the main characters of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story “Young Goodman Brown” and Washington Irving’s short story “Rip Van Winkle.” The first story takes place in Puritan New England at the end of the 17th century. A young man named Brown...
Belief in Gods was part of the culture and religion of Ancient Greece, which was reflected in sculpture, art, architecture, literature, and traditions of the population. Nevertheless, often the images of the Gods in the art are the representation of the author but not of the entire people, since rituals...
Introduction William Shakespeare’s play, Othello, the Moor of Venice, describes tragedy using Othello as the protagonist. Othello is a Moorish soldier in the Venetian army who is highly qualified and respected. In the play, he finds himself in several tragedies resulting from racial discrimination, envy, love, and infidelity. Other characters...
Edmund Spenser firstly published sonnet 75 in 1595, and it was devoted to his second wife, Elizabeth Boyle. The verse was a part of the book Amoretti and Epithalamion, which included love poems and a wedding song. In his work, Spenser presents a straightforward idea that love is immortal and...
Introduction Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 was published in 1953, however, the reader can encounter relevant themes and conflicts existing in modern society. The novel accurately describes the twenty-first century as a world of technological advancement, social media, and the power it holds over people. Dictionaries define an anti-intellectual as a...
Introduction King Lear is one of the most famous plays written by William Shakespeare. It is thought to be written in 1605-1606 and focuses on the character of King Lear developing madness after deciding to retire from the throne and dividing the land of Britain among two of his daughters....
“Lusus Naturae” by Margaret Atwood describes an unknown creature that everyone renounces at first glance. It is a girl with specific congenital syndromes that make her appearance strange and intimidating. The author uses Point of View (PV) to describe characters and set up a plot in which the main character...
Introduction William Shakespeare is one of the most significant figures of the United Kingdom and the whole world. His contribution to the development of culture and literary and theatrical art is priceless, and the fact that this ingenious writer lived and created literary works is a gift for all humankind....
Opening the essay with personal experience proves to be an efficient introduction. The author starts the novel with the story of his first favorite sports teams at the age of two or three. He then jumps to the description of his high school games and the first time paying attention...
Invisible Cities is a novel that invites the reader to active cooperation and provides erroneous interpretations. It seems that the development of an adaptive metanarrative for this text should not be too difficult since the emblematic nature of its constituent elements presupposes its presence. However, the complexity of perception is...
The concept of the point of view in the narrative is useful in evaluating and critiquing stories. Each author selects it depending on different factors. This essay seeks to use the point of view to evaluate the story Lusus Naturae by Margaret Atwood, a tale of an outcast with whom...
Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote this first-person poem inspired by the Chamonix Valley landscapes near Geneva. The Romantic style of William Wordsworth significantly influenced Shelley’s poetry. The former applied a similar writing style by describing feelings and emotions with physical objects. The young Englishman visited the Arve Valley by Mont Blanc,...
The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is a research done by Rebecca Skloot to unravel the story of Henrietta and her family to know what she underwent because of her cells. Skloot reveals a scenario of one of the most significant inputs to the field of medicine in her book....
The catastrophe that destroyed millions of lives Elie Wiesel’s literary work Night touches upon one of the most disastrous catastrophes in the history of Jews that is known as the Holocaust. It is difficult to understand why the most religious nation in the world has become the victims of the...
In “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin, the house of the protagonist, Mrs. Mallard, has a symbolic meaning. It is connected to the main character’s circumstances and the condition of mind, representing her state of being bound, lacking personal freedom. However, she does not realize it until the...
Central Idea of the Story The central idea of the story is to determine why different people carry items that they do. The narrator notes physical objects and metaphysical ideas that the soldiers bring with them. For instance, Lt. Cross carries a tangible picture of Martha and his ephemeral feelings...
Introduction It is natural that the relationship between parents and their children is usually composed throughout the period of early childhood. Special attention often has to be paid to the father-son relationship because these two male figures may be both prone to covering their emotions. The deep connection between sons...
Minor History Defined by Branden Joseph Branden W. Joseph introduces the concept of minor history in the first chapter of his book Beyond the Dream Syndicate: Tony Conrad and the Arts After Cage (Joseph, 2011). He uses this concept to place Conrad’s art in a theoretical perspective grasping his endeavors...
In the world of the 21st century, people seem to have forgotten about the cruelty of being deprived of freedom. With the impression of living as a free man, they have now become more focused on the notions of respect and equality. Only few, however, realize that every human being...
Introduction “Recitatif” is a short story written by Tony Morrisson, which depicts the experience of Twyla and Roberta. The story uncovers many themes, including child neglect and racial tensions of the era. The plot development allows seeing the relationship between two childhood friends and the different life experiences and views...
The encounter between Gilgamesh and Uta-Utnapishtim teaches the protagonist to accept death’s inevitability and stop searching for eternal life. Afflicted by Enkidu’s death, Gilgamesh immerses into thoughts about his mortality and seeks Uta-Utnapishtim, who was granted everlasting life after the Deluge. Uta-Utnapishtim advises Gilgamesh to abandon the idea and demonstrates...
Introduction Contrary to popular belief, childhood is definitely not an easy period in human life. This time is characterized by many qualitative changes in the child’s physiology and consciousness, and their worldview’s serious reconstruction. In other words, in late childhood, the individual unconsciously prepares for adult life to become part...
Every person, as a member of society, faces daily choices either confirmed by the culture or against it. The history of humankind is built upon social systems where each person’s individual decisions affect those around them. “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas” unravels the paradoxical social interaction, personal and...
The poetry of the Romanticism era shares quite a few characteristics defined by the time in which it was produced, yet each author also left their own unique imprint on the poems created at the time. Three of the most prolific Romantic poets of the time, namely, Byron, Keats, and...
Published in 2000, a winner of Pulitzer Prize and multiple awards, Proof by David Auburn is a profound masterly written play that examines the issues of identity, the borderlines of genius and madness, sanity and instability, a correlation between logical mathematical proof and the emotional proof of human relationships, love,...
Lisa Lutz’s The Spellman Files is a novel with disordered episodes which combine some genres. It combines literary work with comedy and mystery in a 300-plus-page book. Despite the problems found in the structure of the book, Lutz’s choice of characters, humor and adept narration makes the book an interesting...
Introduction The manner in which Eliezer struggles with his faith in God is portrayed throughout the novel. In the beginning, the faith he has in God is strong. This is evident when he asks himself, “Why did I live? Why did I breathe?” (Wiesel). This shows how absolute his faith...
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’...
The first two poems are good pieces written by Carl Sandburg. The First poem is titled “A Fence” and the second one “Onion Days”. The third poem is a very interesting piece by Robert Frost titled “Mending Wall”. The three poems have apt language of metaphorical compositions. The themes in...
“Disgrace” is one of the most significant works of J. M. Coetzee, which brought him the Booker Prize and worldwide recognition. The action takes place in post-apartheid South Africa. In “Disgrace,” J.M. Coetzee’s creates a complex character, Lucy Lurie, which faces the shameful and disgraceful acts of her father, the...
Annotation The writer speaks of a force that has tried to limit her ability to write in prose and compares this to a time when she was young and they tried to lock her up in a closet in a bid to silence her and make her still. She goes...
Published in 1922, “Mother to Son” was one of Langston Hughes’ early poems. Simple language and a powerful message created by the author make it accessible and meaningful to all readers. While Hughes captures the inspiring persistence of an aging mother, he also represents the struggle of African-Americans inherent in...
Wiesel’s intention in writing the novel ‘Night’ was to give a testimony of the horrors that took place during the Holocaust; consequently, the themes from the book reflect these intentions. Themes in the night When Elie was a young boy, he grew up in a sheltered environment where he assumed...
The majority of people view other cultures from the perspective of their own one, which can partially be referred to as ethnocentrism. When it comes to such cultures as the Lebanese one, ethnocentrism is peculiar to almost all the people who regard modern society as equal and non-discriminatory. Sitt Marie...
Early English literature flourished after the Anglo-Saxons had settled in England between the 5th and the 12th centuries, a long period of migration, and conflicts over the supremacy, where kings could only rely on the loyalty of their men. Almost ineluctably, first literary compositions exalted the figure of the hero,...
Emily Elizabeth Dickinson is known as one of the most famous poets of the XIX century. One of the most important causes of her popularity is her manner of writing that was new for the period, during which she has been working, and the main themes of her literature. So,...
Introduction Seamus Heaney and Sinéad Morrissey are prominent modern Irish authors who address the past and the present in their poetry; they combine personal experiences, historical events, and stylistic devices to bring the reader closer to the themes they explore. Both of them focus on emotional experience as the mirror...
Introduction Christian is the main character of the story The Pilgrim’s Progress written by John Bunyan. This young man is searching for a way to Heaven; this journey of a soul is presented as a physical journey from his native city of Destruction to the Celestial City under which the...
As the title shows, “The Red Convertible” is the main fulcrum of the story and the entire plot is built around it. It is used as a symbol of happiness with its color ‘red’ denoting passion and life. At the beginning of the story, the car belongs to both Lyman...
Introduction Raymond Carver is considered one of the very few contemporary writers who concentrated mainly on short stories and poems. According to many, Raymond revived a dying profession of literature. His literary works are mainly characterized by middle-class characters. Because he mainly wrote on love and loneliness, Raymond was believed...
Perhaps, the fear is one the most widely spread vices of society, as it provokes the intense and negative emotions. The fear and horror is usually generated when people face the Ugly as a social and aesthetic opposition to the Beautiful. Provoked by social prejudices and vices, social fears are...
National Enterprise Reporter Timothy Egan is a Pulitzer Prize-winning writer and the author of five successful books. His books include masterpieces such as The Good Rain and Lasso the Wind. The worst hard time is a story that centers on the people who were present in America’s high plains in...
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...
Ed McBain’s “Sadie When She Died” is one of the stories from the 87th Precinct series which he started writing in the mid-1950s. It presents the story about the officer, Steve Carella, who knew from the beginning the identity of the real murderer but lacked proof to accuse him of...
Have you ever thought where the works of imaginative literature come from? The writers create them when inspired, but what is inspiration? It is nothing less than the genius that enables people to commit their thoughts to paper in such a way that these thoughts are embodied in words in...
Almost every joke contains a hint of truth. For this reason, comedy can be the perfect medium to effect social reform. Clearly, Aristophanes understood this concept quite well when he penned his farcical-humored play Lysistrata. Lysistrata focuses on the story of a young woman of the same name who attempted...
Introduction A short story collection “Everything that Rises Must Converge” is written by Flannery O’Connor, an outstanding and well known writer. The book is considered to be a special one and combines philosophical and social issues; it is necessary to underline the fact that it was written during the author’s...
Introduction The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People was published in 1989 and is one of the most wonderful books that I have ever come across in my life. It is a self-help book written by Stephen R. Covey. This book has allowed me to look into myself and bring...
Lord Byron is a romantic poet and Browning is a Victorian poet. Byron is a nihilist and pessimist. Browning, on the other hand, is known for his robust optimism. However, both are very great as poets. Their poems deal with various aspects of love, and their capacity to depict the...
Jamie Whyte is considered to be the author of the book Crimes against Logic reflecting the bogus arguments of journalists, politicians, priests, and many other offenders. The author tried to represent a number of logical fallacies faced in everyday life; he managed to provide a cutting and witty guide to...
Things Fall Apart written by Chinua Achebe is considered to be an English-language novel written in 1958. The author managed to disclose several important themes such as social rituals, marriage customs, honor symbols, and human values. It is necessary to underline the fact that this work demonstrates the balance between...
Biography Ghassan Kanafani (1936-1972) was a Palestinian writer and a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). While studying Arabic literature in Damascus he became a member of the left-wing Arab Nationalist Movement (ANM) but moved to Kuwait before completing his degree to edit an ANM...
“In 1834 poet and critic Samuel Taylor Coleridge described this play as one of three works of literature with perfect plots; in 1900 Freud plucked out the name Oedipus for his theory of a son’s unconscious sexual longing for his mother; in 1974 lyrics to a song in the film...
The story of the Iliad is a famous one. When the cruel Trojan prince Paris abducts the queen of Agamemnon, Helen, war ensues between the two countries across the seas. Many heroes and gods take sides and fight the war. It is the first famous book written in Europe, written...
Supplication or petitioning can be considered a kind of prayer where a person asking his superior for something. This prayer can be for himself or for someone else. The person who is making the supplication is referred to as a supplicant. Normally the supplicant is the inferior of the person...
Introduction Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery” is a short story which reveals the dark side of human nature. It depicts the collective unconscious of the people of a village, of about three hundred people. The author brings them together to take part in an annual rite in the form of a...
Flannery O’Connor is best known for her obscure, but thought-provoking short stories unlike most of the other 20th century American writers. She makes use of tragedy and brutality in her works to create an atmosphere of terror to deal with the subject of spirituality. The theme of ‘A Good Man...
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, Fundamental in this play is the fact that Miller does not mask the analysis of social values and low...
Introduction To begin with, I should pay attention on Francis Scott Fitzgerald as one of the greatest American writers of the last century. Also we should admit his many-faceted talent in depicting the Post-World-War I society of the United States in his outstanding novel “The Great Gatsby”. This one is...
In contrast to other characters in The Great Gatsby, Nick goes through a number of changes from the beginning to the end of the novel. The entire novel depicts flashbacks made by Nick in revealing a detailed account of the mysteries surrounding Gatsby. Nick is the character who puts together...
Sophocles, the great Greek tragedian, presented one of the most delightful literary works, the tragedy “Oedipus Rex” or Oedipus the King. Sophocles reveals before the reader a question of a universal scale: who decides the destiny of the person – Gods do, or the person does? In search of the...
The novel “The Confessions of Nat Turner” was written by an outstanding American writer William Styron. The most eloquent fact about this book is that it was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1967, but it would be just to state, that the response of the audience to the novel appeared...
Introduction In most cases our backgrounds characterize us, for instance, where we grew up, our beliefs as well as traditions, the forms of education we acquire and the friends we make. It only becomes a problem when your background clash and as a result we are left torn between the...
The problem of the behavior of the teenagers is the problem of the schools and their teachers, who should follow and correct this behavior. The book “Nothing but the Truth” by Avi is a good example of the conflict between teenager, whose behavior was awful, and a teacher who wanted...
The book ‘The Complete Pompeii’ by Joanne Berry brings to light the different archeological treasures of the city in terms of its civilization, and antiquities which have been left preserved for us to see. While many a research has been conducted on the city and the lives of the people...
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...
It is hard to think of two poets whose lives are more different from each other’s than Langston Hughes and Sylvia Plath. Hughes was born in 1902 in Joplin, Missouri of mixed-race parents, and was mostly raised by his grandmother in Lawrence, Kansas. He worked odd jobs, including a six-month...
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 LaBute’s play The Mercy Seat was one of the first key theatrical rejoinders to the September 11, 2001 assaults. Set on September 12, it disquiets a man who worked at the World Trade Center but was absent in the office while the attack took place – with his love...
Introduction Lanval, TheWife of Bath’s Tale, and The Wedding of Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnel have much in common in the plots and the ideas they suggest. In the current paper, I will look at how satire is used in the works to disclose the problem of gender and chivalry....
Introduction “The Secret Agent” by Joseph Conrad is based on the Greenwich Bomb Outrage of 1894 when a man named Martial Bourdi, had, like Stevie Verloc, the main protagonist of “The Secret Agent”, killed himself setting off a bomb in Greenwich Park near the Royal Observatory. Thus, the terrorists in...
The short story Happy Endings written by Margaret Atwood is considered to be a selection of possible human relationships experienced between loving people. Margaret Atwood managed to create a story in which the readers are the mover of the plot. John and Mary, the protagonists of the tale, experience various...
Introduction Jonathan Swift was popularly known as a satirical writer during his era. Aside from being a poet, essayist, and a political pamphleteer, he became the dean of Saint Patrick’s in Dublin. Swift was born on the 30th of November, 1667 and died on the year 1745. Most of his...
Introduction If there is a novel that can be closer to haiku, in terms of deep meanings that can be extracted from descriptions and short ordinary phrases, this would be “Snow Country” – a novel by Yasunari Kawabata that tells the story of love between a man visiting hot springs...
Introduction If we are going to compare Victor Frankenstein from the famous and the most disturbing horror novels by Mary Shelley to God, then we will probably suggest that God is ashamed, scared, horrified, and full hatred towards us, just like Victor towards his own creation. Looking at God, just...
In the twelve books of John Milton’s Paradise Lost, the poet not only weaves an elegant story depicting the Biblical story of the fall from Eden and the nature of hell but presents his readers with a concept of God that remains somewhat ambiguous. Depending upon the way in which...
“Story of an Hour” was written by Kate Chopin in the late 18th century, and is much different as compared to other short stories. It is a dramatic example of a woman who suddenly finds herself blessed with the long-desired freedom that she internally sought from a repressive marriage. The...
Introduction The issue of insanity has often been uncomfortable, for the average human being as well as for the writer. It often provides a fascinating subject for drama, as has been demonstrated brilliantly by William Shakespeare as insanity plays a key role in Shakespeare’s tragedy Hamlet. In this play, the...
Introduction The American Civil War, also known as the War Between the States started at 1861 and ended in 1865. It was a civil war in the United States of America when the Southern slave states declared about their desire to get separated from the United States and formed the...
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....
Introduction Shakespeare is a master craftsman who depicted almost all aspects of human life and psyche in his great tragedies. Hamlet is one of his all-time great tragedies that have a carefully drafted plot, characterization, development of conflicts, dramatic ironies, and a setting conducive to the development of pity and...
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...
Ibsen’s drama ‘A Doll’s House’ appears to be influential literary work, as it revises and reconsiders traditional male and female roles and reveals the threats underlying gender discrimination. The author definitely portrays courageous and goal-oriented women, who struggle with the challenges of the androcentric society and find their niche in...
Introduction Bravery – Beowulf is the most famous poem among the works of the Old English literature. It is the epic creation telling the readers about the strongest and the bravest of the English warriors of all times. The plot of the poem is concentrated around the life and the...
Sublimity Anne Carson, one of the most famous writers and poets of the modern world, is famous for her gift of incorporating different literary styles in her masterpieces. Her works are full of creative inspiration combined with deep analysis of ideas and thoughts expressed by the prominent writers and theorists...
The essay focus on the poem “Ode to the west wind”, by Percy Bysshe Shelley, who was born in 1792, educated at Eton and University College, Oxford. In 1811 he was expelled from Oxford for circulating a pamphlet, “The necessity of Atheism”. In same year he married the under-aged Harriet...
The Hollow Men is a soliloquy by one of the hollow men, representing a modern generation of rootless, faithless, lonely, and aimless wanderers. The hollow men are bewailing their lot in the modern Waste Land. They are in Death’s dream kingdom from which they cannot cross to Death’s other kingdom...
More than any modern genre of fiction, science fiction is predominantly written with a social purpose. Such a goal is rarely to explicitly to predict the future, especially since in many cases the predictive features of science fiction are at best mediocre. While in hindsight, it is easy to select...
Looking into the history of the cultures at large, it becomes evident that all human societies, from the most primitive to the most modern, have been divided into different groups, communities and strata. This stratification is on the basis of caste, class, clan, community, race, region, religion, ethnicity, gender, age...
It is generally agreed that different symbols tend to be used as the way of the author’s ideas’ interpretation. In case of Faulkner’s “Barn Burning”, blood might be one of the metaphors which is reclaimed as a reference for either genetic relationships or committed crimes and their consequences. That is...
The Prentice Hall Literature’s The British Tradition is a volume that chronicles the various timeless themes and classics that have been a part and parcel of the journey of British literature. Used as a textbook, it has a number of stories that help the learner understand the nuances attached with...
Introducion An epic is a long, narrative poem written in a noble, dignified style and telling of exploits perfumed by great heroes. It differs from other narrative poems in that it has greater dignity and sweep and presents more lifelike characters, Beowulf, the national epic of the Anglo-Saxons, relates how...
