5522 samples of this type
Introduction Every book ever published was written for a reason – to convey a specific idea to the readers. However, most published works do not state their central topics on the first page, opting for a more allegorical presentation. This review will examine Anthony Burgess’s most infamous novel, A Clockwork...
Coming of age stories have been prominent in many literary works. Aging and crossing a line between being a child and moving into adulthood is a topic that every single person can relate to. However, growing up is different for everyone and depends on their gender, socioeconomic, and cultural background....
Young Goodman Brown is among the best-known stories by Nathaniel Hawthorne, in large part because of its in-depth exploration of religion. It tells the story of a young man who leaves his wife, Faith, for a night and meets with the devil, is then convinced by him to attend a...
Introduction Attitudes to life and death vary depending on time, culture, and society. History knows many transformations in how people saw old age, illness, and dying. These perspectives find their reflections in a culture’s products. Therefore, analyzing the literature of a certain historical period of a particular country allows a...
Saint Augustine and Boethius, the medieval authors, are famous for the great works City of God and Consolation of Philosophy, where they reflected on philosophy, religion, and fundamental issues of being. This paper aims to analyze the two literary works, their spiritual nature, the writers’ worldview, the direction proposed, and...
Marriage is a complex institutional system in which relationships between partners can be destructive. “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin is a feminist short story in which a woman reveals the subconscious desire to be free from her spouse’s pressure. A husband’s tragic death initially upsets Louise Mallard,...
Introduction Alice Walker is a writer who focuses her stories on the place of women of color in American society. In her works, the author raises themes of life of the African American community in the country, race, racism, as well as those of culture, heritage, and belonging. This essay...
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...
Relationships The affair between the Wife of Bath and different spouses greatly influenced the development of her character. Of her five husbands, she admits that the first three were good mainly because they were rich, old, and submissive. Being the dominant partner in these relationships, she happily recounts how torments...
Thomas More’s Utopia, written in 1516, gave the name to the corresponding genre in literature. The influence of this book in the following centuries cannot be overestimated. A whole series of works dedicated to the image of a perfect society followed Utopia (Wilde 27). Its legacy can be traced in...
Introduction William Cuthbert Faulkner was an accomplished novelist, poet, screenwriter from Oxford, Mississippi. Faulkner’s development as an artist was largely influenced by his family, in particular, by his mother, grandmother, and the African American nanny who cared for him from infancy. The women were voracious readers as well as painters...
As plays are meant to be performed rather than read, there is a great variety of plays from which one can choose. For the assignment, it was chosen to view The Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare as a classic interpretation. The full video of the performance is available...
Introduction of the novel The novel “Night” written by Eliezer Wiesel, based on his true experience of surviving the Holocaust, keeps making strong impressions on people of all generations. When Wiesel has just finished his work on the book, and tried to find a publisher for it, no one would...
The lecture of Matthew Restall called “When Cortés Met Malinche, and Montezuma Met Cortés: Alternative Facts and Disturbing Truths” is another example of history being written by the victors. The main idea is centered around unveiling the truth regarding the “surrender” of Aztec through its leader Montezuma. Restall focuses on...
Magniloquence tells a story of Faustus Macelovich, an elderly English professor who recently lost his wife and now suffers from her absence. In a short episode of his life, Faustus presented by the author, along with other professors from different departments, had to attend a lecture delivered by a Nobel...
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...
Individual ancient literary texts reveal specific stories in detail and serve as useful guidelines to interpret other works. As an example, one can discuss the role of Livy’s The History of Rome as an epic that contains important historical notes. Comparing his individual ideas with those of Aeschylus in Prometheus...
Thesis statement This work aims to study such an aspect of human experience as heroism in Odyssey by Homer and Inferno by Dante Alighieri. Introduction Authors may research and analyze one or several different topics in their literary works. One of the most common themes in the literature is heroism....
Perseus has been highly popular in the later mythological tradition, where one can pinpoint various movies and cartoons with the given central character. The main reason is the fact that he is a demigod, which means that Perseus is a half-human (“Perseus,” 2020). In other words, it makes him a...
The given analysis will primarily focus on Ernest Hemingway’s “Hills Like White Elephants.” It is a short story about a man and a woman who are having a conversation at a Spanish train station and waiting for their train to Madrid. The key theme abortion, where a male character wants...
The author of this writing found both texts suggested for discussion interesting and thought-provoking. A story by Flannery O’Connor, in which the grandmother struggles to soften the heart of the escaped convict but fails, is saturated with religious symbols and may be regarded as a parable. Curiously, the story starts...
Oedipus Rex and Hamlet are prominent literary characters who constitute the example of brave men under challenging circumstances, they experience tragic events in their lives concerning their family members, which eventually leads to their fall. Oedipus is the man whose life is in the hands of fate, he murders his...
The play by Taylor Only Drunks and Children Tell the Truth conveys the journey of a lady with Indian roots who was adopted into a white family. Several characters help in the development of the story and define the genre. Tonto is the crucial character in the work who plays...
In the play “A Raisin in the Sun,” several important themes are explored. George Murchison strives towards assimilationism as a way of addressing consistent racial discrimination, while Beneatha sees assimilation as a manifestation of George’s fear of his heritage. Moreover, George sees heritage as “raggedy-assed spirituals and some grass huts!”...
Désirée’s Baby is a short story written by Kate Chopin, one of her most famous pieces. It was written in 1892, a little less than thirty years after the abolition of slavery in the United States. Kate Chopin’s family came from St. Louis, Missouri, where having slaves was considered to...
Scene 1: The Beach (ROMEO and JULIET find themselves trapped on a tropical island. The sun is shining brightly, and the weather is scorching and humid compared to summers in Verona). ROMEO: (Worried). Where are we? And what happened to the boat? JULIET: (Calmly). I’m not sure about the boat,...
The Hazy London and Its Dwellers The small excerpt depicts the scenery of London in the 19th century. The central streets are small, quiet, and clean from dust. Nonetheless, it is just an illusion of a prosperous city. The text suggests that people are unhappy and unsatisfied with the situation...
Introduction The eternal struggle between good and evil living in the same person is a vital theme of literature. Thus, writers usually create literary doubles to introduce the same ideas and make them more apparent to readers by using unique figures incorporating various qualities and showing readers how they affect...
Analyzing the concept of plagiarism is often neglected as it is, by definition, considered a copyright violation. However, James E. Porter challenges this opinion in the article “Intertextuality and the Discourse Community.” The author declares that any text, regardless of academic level, is a synthesis of other writers’ existing opinions....
Introduction Montley Fool Money Guide is a book that has been authored by Selena Maranjian and a foreward by David Gardner. It is an educative book that gives an insight about saving, spending and investing. The author tries to bring out the foolish things people do with their money and...
In Meditations on First Philosophy, Rene Descartes presents a metaphysical system in which he expands his philosophical view of doubt. Descartes notes that he has been mistaken all along, even on matters he presumed to be certain. The author resolves to abandon his pre-conceptions acquired through the senses in a...
Introduction Miss Emily, the main character of Faulkner’s story “A Rose for Emily,” is a controversial figure who evokes rather mixed feelings, but pity prevails in this plethora of emotions. On the one hand, she is a mentally ill murderer who kept the body of her victim in her house...
Ancient Greek plots and motives are commonly reflected in the European literature of the New Age, which makes the heritage of different epochs comparable. One of the plotlines – discovering the reason for the death of a protagonist’s father. One of the aspects frequently discussed in this context is resilience....
Contrary to expectations, life does not always give positive emotions — there are moments when it seems that everything around is destroyed, and nothing can be fixed. The streak of tragedies has a substantial impact on adults, but for children with a more developed fantasy and a naive view of...
“O, Captain! My Captain!” was written by American poet Walt Whitman and was first published in 1865. The poem is created as an elegy in honor of Abraham Lincoln, whom the poet admired. Therefore, the work has a particular value from the historical context perspective as it refers to the...
For centuries, poets have been addressing The Iliad as a source for inspiration. Through poems inspired by the events and characters of the ancient Greek work, they present the acute problems of their time. In the piece “Spoken by the Sentry at Achilles’s Tent”, Doug Anderson, by using situations and...
Introduction The paper focuses on singling out the similarities between two famous short story characters: Washington Irving’s Rip Van Winkle from “Rip Van Winkle” and Willa Cather’s Anton Rosicky from “Neighbour Rosicky.” The main emphasis is made on such features pertaining to the two men as independence, intelligence, and life...
Introduction The two main manifestations of human existence or two of its forms are life and death. These issues bother people during centuries because they are too complicated to understand them entirely. That is why the most intent contemplators of the world, poets, cannot ignore these categories. Reflecting life in...
The notion of gender has always been a subject for a continuous discussion, formerly claiming a distinct line between the roles of each gender. With this concept considerably expanding its semantic paradigm, people’s perception of gender started to fade. However, while gender roles in the context of society had their...
Scott Fitzgerald is a famous American writer, and most of his works are devoted to the jazz era. He elaborated this term, which means a happy decade between the end of World War I and the beginning of the Depression. This era involves the rebellion of the young generation against...
Introduction In her essay “Is a Tree Worth a life”, Sally Christensen illuminates the debate that has arisen regarding the value of environment in comparison to that of human life. Christensen makes a persuasive argument that the yew tree found in the tropical forests of Alaska, Idaho, Washington, Oregon and...
Introduction Animals often have a prominent role in the world’s mythologies and folklore. The fox is a common figure in many traditions, representing a cunning trickster or, sometimes, messenger, figure (Ashkenazi 148; Lihui and An 239). This figure is not necessarily negative or malevolent but is often described as dangerous...
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...
Neighbour Rosicky is a short story written in 1928 by an American author Willa Cather. As an immigrant herself, the writer explores the experience of people who devoted their lives to this country. The story of Anton Rosicky is not an exception as he emigrated from the region of Bohemia,...
The novel The Best Laid Plans is a satirical book about the Canadian political system written by Terry Fallis in 2008. It has won the Stephen Leacock Award for humor and is well-known all around the world. What is precisely lovely about this novel is its language and perfect choice...
The play opened on Broadway in 1959 was a success. Despite the mixed reviews it had received before the opening, the primarily white audiences enjoyed it. “A Raisin in the Sun” was the first play by a black female author performed on Broadway and also the first one there directed...
The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano is an autobiography by a former slave Olaudah Equiano first published in 1789 by abolitionists who wanted to end slavery. It is also one of the first slave narratives to reach a wide audience and be translated to German and Dutch....
As the Director The play “Fences” by August Wilson has a plethora of messages that the author wanted to share with the audience. The play was released in 1986, and it is possible that at the time, its presentation of racial inequality issues was appropriate. However, in 2020, the younger...
The phenomenon of allegory can be defined as that one of a hidden meaning within a certain concept. In the movie under analysis, the idea of an allegory is hidden beneath a series of oats since the main character appears to be quite transparent in their general intention, as well...
Introduction In his article The Philosopher Stoned, Adam Kirsch describes Walter Benjamin, his way of life, views, ambitions, and the influence of drugs on his mentality. The author explores certain life periods of Benjamin, observes the progression of his character, and also tries to emphasize his book On Hashish. Kirsch...
Addressing a crucial part of the biblical narrative, Go Down, Moses bears a crucial cultural meaning apart from its doubtless artistic merit. However, since the song has been popular for multiple decades, its novelty may have gradually faded, which, in turn, has led to people taking a range of unique...
The Charge of the Light Brigade is a heroic but catastrophic attack that was conducted by the British cavalry under the command of Lord Cardigan. The attack was targeted at the Russian army and occurred during the Battle of Balaclava in the Crimean War on October 25, 1854. This event...
Shakespeare’s “Midsummer’s Night Dream” is a story about the complex relationships between people. Moreover, in this story, the author shows the sophisticated love and challenges one has to face to finally be with their loved ones. The couples Shapespear depicts are Hermia and Lysander and Demetrius and Helena. When portraying...
If there is one universal quality that describes humans, it is the unwillingness to confront or accept harsh realities like death, terminal illness, and loss. This human nature is seen in humankind’s attempt to downplay the seriousness of issues through the use of euphemisms, ignoring painful truths, and the use...
Introduction Kate Chopin was a well-known American novelist and short story writer who was born in the late 1800s. She is considered one of the founders of feminist ideas. Even though at the end of the nineteenth century, this movement was only in a state of formation and was widely...
Shirley Jackson’s Lottery is one of the jewels of classic American literature of the twentieth century. This work made a massive contribution to the development of the genre of mysticism. Although the Lottery is a short story, it contains an amazingly detailed and colorful description of the American hinterland. Even...
Sunny’s magical journey is closely related to the Harry Potter books’ plot and its character regarding the heroes and the action. However, the author excellently opens up about African ideas of magic, creating an engaging plot story, and educating on a rich cultural heritage; the following essay will discuss the...
Known as a Land of Opportunities, the US allows some people to become successful, leaving the rest to survive by themselves and support the few fortunate ones. As a model of capitalism, the country may ignore the needs of those who do not contribute much to money and resource circulation....
Art Creation It is impossible to overestimate the necessity of inspirational poems for people of all ages. Thanks to the works of the greatest writers of all times, persons can find meaning in their lives, strength to hold on, and motivation to continue whatever they are doing. After reading such...
The character of Blanche is not as one-sided as one might think. While the real-life stereotype on which she is based could be, the play’s representation of the Belle is nuanced. Thus, it is difficult to state whether I sympathize with her or agree that she deserves her tragic fate,...
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...
“Stop All the Clocks, Cut Off the Telephone” This poem was written in 1938 by Wystan Hugh Auden, an Anglo-American poet. “Stop All the Clocks, Cut off the Telephone” is about the fact that the death of a loved person can deprive one of all the joys, hopes, and desire...
Flannery O’Connor created a significant piece of writing that might be considered as one of her most famous works. A Good Man is Hard to Find is a short story that aims to address the never-ending issue of redemption – what it takes to become a good person. O’Connor might...
On the surface, it is most likely that a reader may understand ‘The Interpreter of Maladies” as one of the simplest stories about a family of five on vacation in a foreign country. However, the introduction of Mr. Kapasi, who is portrayed as a lonely tour guide, makes the short...
Despite all the government’s measures to combat drug addiction, this problem remains relevant to this day. Unfortunately, at the moment, it is not possible to cure every drug-addicted person. There is a significant amount of research on this topic. They are dedicated to the effects of various drugs, discuss remedies,...
The “Lesson” by Toni Bambara is a short story narrated in the first person voice of a young American girl called Sylvia. The short story uncovers the racial divide in this particular community and the social justice aspect as seen in the 1960s and 70s, when the civil rights movement...
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...
About Patriotism Who is a real patriot in your eyes? The one who loves his country With all his soul, Or the one who willingly arises When the anthem is playing loudly To prove his role? You can be proud of your nationality. But can you cross that thin line...
Cheating generally refers to unfair practices in whatever activity one chooses to perform. Most of the time, it would include making the work easier or faster without following the rules and laws associated with the deed. While plagiarism means using someone else’s work or ideas without proper referencing, self-plagiarism refers...
Introduction Shakespeare and Sophocles present the audience with two complex main characters who share a particular passion for discovering the truth, which ultimately brings them to their doom. Shakespeare’s tragic hero in Hamlet has an eye-opening encounter with a ghost that leads him to seek vengeance. Oedipus prides himself on...
The Old Man and the Sea is the last complete work published by Ernest Hemingway, a genius author who won both the Pulitzer Prize and the Nobel Prize in a matter of a couple of years. His novella about an old fisherman named Santiago is an example of the masterful...
The most actively discussed topics that are related to The Handmaid’s Tale include power, freedom, identity, rebellion, gender, and the role of language among others. However, little attention is paid to analyzing the concept of enjoyment and its representation in this dystopian novel (Ostendorf, p. 59). In addition to understanding...
I agree with the quote by Vaclav Havel, who outlines the tragedy of a modern man. After reading the quote written by Havel over and over, I have concluded that a person who knows less about the meaning of their own life lacks the ability to understand the general worldview...
Introduction The hardships of settling in another state are not known to many people. Most of the population does not have to immigrate and adapt to new conditions; hence, it is informative to learn about the process from the perspective of a person who had to. The paragraph from the...
Paul Laurence Dunbar was born into a family of former slaves. He is considered the first African-American writer in the United States to be widely known. His poems written in dialect, a folk speech of the American South, were most popular. They reflect all the ambivalence, torment, and contradictions that...
Introduction Both the poem “Do not Go Gentle into That Good Night” by Thomas (1951) and the song “Tears in Heaven” by Clapton (1992) are imbued with the theme of death and reasoning on this topic. However, the authors use different contexts and take distinctive approaches in their messages. Clapton...
The play “NEW MA” by Dora Dee Hunter is a modern performance covering some of the most crucial aspects of people’s lives in the current world. The play may be roughly divided into six acts, each of them including a new twist in the plot. The main characters are a...
Introduction The analysis of the literary works and writing styles of representatives of two different eras is a unique experience that allows comparing individual authors’ approaches and identifying the key factors that influence their creative manners. As an example of comparison, the achievements of two prominent representatives of American literature...
Literature is an essential means of delivering critical ideas regarding the surrounding world and the distinguishing features of society. Authors do not only aim at entertaining their readers but also focus on sharing personal views and opinions on various issues and processes happening in the communities. For instance, a philosophical...
Homer’s work The Odyssey has a vast number of features, which are studied from the literature point to this day. This epic poem tells about the return of Odyssey to Ithaca after the Trojan War. The analysis of Odysseus’ books allows readers to recognize the temper and change the perceptions...
Introduction Writers and artists employ different tools, techniques, and literary devices to pass the intended message to the readers. Individuals should follow such works in an effort to acquire additional insights and relate them to some of the challenges they might encounter in their lives. While analysts and scholars will...
Introduction This paper summarizes the plot of The Four Voyages of Christopher Columbus. It also briefly describes the main character and analyzes the main ideas of the story. The book is written from a historical point of view, so it does not focus on a specific issue. Nevertheless, this essay...
Introduction Human destiny has been one of the central subjects in literature at all times, and this theme can be tracked in literary pieces written in different centuries. The novel “Lives of the Saints” by Nino Ricci and the play “Othello” by William Shakespeare share a recurring idea: the destructive...
The plays of Moliere’s Tartuffe and Henrik Ibsen A Doll’s House are some of the most famous literary works. Both plays explore the all-consuming topic of money and the obsession with money, which are still relevant in modern society. A Doll’s House and Tartuffe depict the influence of money on...
“The Birth-Mark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne The main symbol around which the story develops is certainly the birthmark on Georgiana’s left cheek. Initially, the girl seems to be the perfect creation of nature – she is smart, kind, and gorgeous but the mark becomes a trouble for her husband. The birthmark...
A Raisin in the Sun is a highly controversial but critically appraised play written by Lorraine Hansberry and performed for the first time in 1959. It tells the story of a struggling African American family living in the poverty of Southside Chicago and looking for a better future. The play...
The adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain is a classic bildungsroman that can be relevant for people of all ages. The main theme of the topic is a moral and social maturation that the main character, Tom, goes through. Being away from society as a child who did not...
“Skylark,” written by an outstanding Hungarian author Dezso Kosztolanyi, is a novel about the change of one senior couple’s life during the impermanent absence of their unattractive and unmarried daughter. At the same time, this work provides essential information about Hungary, especially its political environment, at the end of the...
The Triptych of Dorian Gray (1890–91): Reading Wilde’s Novel as Three Print Objects This article provides the differences between the original version of The Portrait of Dorian Gray and the censored ones. The author analyzes three sources – the typescript, the magazine version, and the first edition of the novel....
The plot of Cormac McCarthy’s novel focuses on two people, the father and his son having a challenging journey across the post-apocalyptic continent. Throughout the novel, there is an idea of carrying the fire. Even in the end, the boy asks a stranger, whether he has been carrying it as...
Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics is centered on the concept of virtue ethics, which can be approached from different perspectives depending on one’s philosophical precepts. Aristotle advances the view that ethics should be contextualized based on whether an action is informed by the pursuit of excellence. The judgment on whether one acted...
Introduction Anyone who seeks knowledge of historical reality draws this knowledge from sources. The primary source is the subject, with the help of which one can learn certain information about the time it was created. However, in order to establish which fact a historian can obtain from a given source,...
The Kite Runner is a novel written by Khaled Hosseini in 2003 about the fall of the Afghanistan monarchy because of the Soviet Union’s intervention. Amir, a Pashtun boy who moved to the United States, is the protagonist of the book. This story reveals such themes as family affairs, friendship,...
Opportunities to convey one’s ideas to society through literature are effective tools that allow not only leaving a personal mark on history but also indicating an individual position on a specific topic or issue. However, when taking into account modern social norms and foundations, not all the categories of the...
One of the most effective learning approaches is through fictional and real-life narratives. Short stories have been used in the history of humanity to offer studying materials that allow students to connect emotionally with the texts and relate them with their experiences. The Egg and Bernice Bobs Her Hair are...
Introduction Kafka’s The Metamorphosis is oftentimes seen as an allegorical, psychological, and quintessential exploration of the author’s inner state. However, despite the core of the story centering on the physical transformation of Gregor Samsa, the real metamorphosis occurs in his family which demonstrate a dramatic shift in attitudes at his...
The literary concept of poetry is one of the most challenging aspects in terms of encoding the writer’s intentions and ideas behind the lines, especially when analyzed decades after their first publications. A prime example of such a challenge would be the poems written by Robert Frost, an American poet...
Introduction One of the most mysterious concepts that has been a topic of interest for numerous poets is death. The fascination with it is explained by the desire of people to grasp the inevitable and view life through the lens of mystery (Daghamin, 2017). One of the poets known for...
The concept of otherness is one of the central issues in James McBride’s autobiographical book The Color of Water and Nadine Gordimer’s story Country Lovers. However, while there are many similarities in how otherness functions in these works, some aspects are fundamentally different. This short essay argues that two authors...
“A Worn Path” is a story about the self-sacrifice and courage of vulnerable people in the name of a loved one. Written almost 80 years ago, the narrative remains relevant until now. The current paper claims that “A Worn Path” describes a feat that is minor in the context of...
“The Scarlet Letter” was written by American author Nathaniel Hawthorne at the end of the nineteenth century. An enormously popular work of fiction, it has been reproduced numerous times as a movie, an opera, and other forms of entertainment. Probably the most famous screen adaptation is “The Scarlet Letter” by...
Introduction Alien presents a short science fiction regarding a strange individual being returned to Earth after supposed abduction by a UFO. Told from the perspective of a blogger that encounters and connects with the man by accident, the short story offers a lighthearted but also tragic narrative of someone being...
Introduction The theme of patriotism and honor is a crucial element in understanding the literature and film created to depict World War I. The poem “The Absorption” in particular focuses on the ideas of patriotism because Sassoon contrasts the horrors of wartime with the soldier’s changing attitudes towards the battlefield...
Biography Burns’ family was relatively poor, and he had to work at the farm as a child. His father, William Burnes, taught him writing, reading, and arithmetic at home (Crawford 50). Later, he received lessons in French, Latin, and mathematics from John Murdoch, a student hired by his father (Carswell...
Oedipus the King by Sophocles and Hamlet by William Shakespeare belong to the most famous tragedies in the world. Even though the creations belong to different historical periods, they have a few common concepts. The ground for this is that both works explore human feelings, actions, and desires and the...
Flannery O’Connor’s essay discussing her own literary piece “A good man is hard to find” is a unique case. She insists as an author that people should not try to dissect stories, trying to analyze every single detail. Rather they should truly enjoy them first, find their own meaning in...
Introduction One of the most amazing things about literature is the possibility of introducing a new world and taking a person out of reality, at least for a moment. Some stories make people change their opinions and discover alternatives to improve their lives. In the majority of cases, literary works...
“The Open Boat” by Stephen Crane is a story about the victim of a shipwreck who spent 30 days stranded at sea. The central theme of the story is the idea that nature is unforgiving, which contrasts with the sentiments of Romanticism writers. For instance, poets from the Romanticism era...
Various literary works were published to enlarge the pool of knowledge connected to literary narrative techniques in epics. The work by Altes called Ethos and Narrative Interpretation: The Negotiation of Values in Fiction explores the interplay of ethos, character, and narrative. The book also covers literary conventions and how they...
The world described by Orwell in his novel Nineteen Eighty-four seems cruel and unfair. With its totalitarian regime, full devotion to the Party, and Big Brother constantly watching everyone, the existence of such a society seems impossible in the modern world. Nowadays, although many countries are tolerant and respectful of...
The discussion of the history of Mexican identity in the US is not possible without the mentioning of the Chicano movement. A series “Chicano! A History of the Mexican American Civil Rights Movement” provides an extensive overview of the movement, and the current paper will address the first episode of...
Rome and Greece are strongly identified with a culture, which credits heroes. The dynasties in ancient times would create their brave men and make them leaders who they believe in. The gallant notion has been passed on to generations through the word of mouth, to a point where it is...
One of the most key characteristics of chapter eleven revolves around relationship dynamics between various characters. The first major event takes place when some boys, who surrounded Vivian as the center of their attention, show disrespect towards Park. At this moment, Kim observes such behavior and steps to defend him,...
Walker’s comparison of women to saints means that females have lost their natural form and meaning: they have acquired “shrines” instead of bodies and “temples” instead of minds (401). This description is bad since the writer presupposes that women cannot lead the lives they want, having to bear the status...
Introduction Both of the selected stories, Kawai Strong Washburn’s “What the Ocean Eats” and Bryan Stevenson’s “The High Road,” are interesting to read and focus on important topics resorting to one’s emotions and feelings. However, a detailed analysis of the two pieces allows noticing structural differences and making conclusions as...
Chapter 1: Nick Carraway decides to move from Minnesota to New York. He starts his story by mentioning that his father told him not to judge others because it leads to misunderstanding and wrong interpretations. According to Carraway’s description, Gatsby represents everything for which he had “an unaffected scorn” (Fitzgerald,...
Written by Eric Foner, The Fiery Trial is a historical nonfiction book with a major focus on the African Americans in the United States during the Civil War period. The author spans his story around Abraham Lincoln, the 16th President of the US, and his life at the height of...
The short story “The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien explores the emotional and psychological struggles which soldiers go through in the battlefield. This is evident from first person voice narration O’Brien, who relates the daily experiences of the soldiers in his Alpha Company in the jungles of Vietnam. Even...
Narrator’s View of Her Mother in Jamaica Kincaid’s Girl Girl by Jamaica Kincaid is a poem that depicts tough conversations and lessons between a Kincaid and her mother. The narrator describes the mother as a harsh person by the way the literal work is presented. The dramatic monologue provides an...
Introduction Nowadays, more and more poets are starting to experiment with the possibilities of language. For example, some of them mix prose and poetry or create new genres in literature. Undoubtedly, the genre diversity and the formation of new departments of literature is a significant part of modern writing, but...
Introduction The poem “If” by Rudyard Kipling develops the theme of resilience, manhood, and middle path utilizing devices of rhythm, rhyme, repetition, and symbolism. This didactic poem presents the author’s advice to his son John and consists of one compound sentence. In this sentence, Rudyard Kipling describes paradoxical life situations...
This review dwells upon David Farber’s Crack: Rock Cocaine, Street Capitalism, and the Decade of Greed. The book sheds light on diverse aspects of the war on drugs and the crack market in the USA in the twentieth century. The author attempts to identify the major causes of the problem...
The world, where humans will coexist with machines, is coming closer every day. The fast development of artificial intelligence that was almost a miracle a hundred years ago now is considered to be a usual thing. Attempts of science to understand how the human brain works and improve the fragile...
In the current essay, two short stories will be compared and contrasted: “A rose for Emily” by William Faulkner and “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkin. Both stories are focused on female protagonists who experience some form of life-changing isolation. However, two authors use different literary elements in order to...
Mary Shelley’s novel about Frankenstein and his Creature reveals many human vices and cruelty. There is also a place in the story for love and remorse, which opens in both characters in its strange way. However, the complex interweaving of feelings, actions, and the conditions, in which they were committed,...
“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...
Postcolonial Theory and Its Benefits for Society The past and ongoing historic processes present invaluable information for future generations allowing them to navigate the world without repeating the mistakes of their ancestors. The combination of such processes is considered under a unified concept of postcolonial theory, which contributes to the...
War is an essential topic in A Farewell to Arms due to the novel’s setting at the time of World War I. While reading the book, it is particularly interesting to monitor the growth of the main character and the change in his attitudes towards war. In this essay, I...
Antigone by Sophocles describes the aftermath of a war in which two brothers, Polyneices and Eteocles, murder each other. The author centers the main conflict on individual conscience and the obligations to the state. The play depicts the clash between human and divine law in which Antigone and Creon deny...
The story “Everyday Use,” written by Alice Walker, is a complex narrative covering a variety of psychological and cultural issues. One of the most prominent aspects of it is the attitude of the main characters, Maggie and Dee, to their family heritage. The sisters are different in their views regarding...
The poem Richard Cory by Edwin Arlington Robinson is one of these works which overthrow readers’ expectations. At the very beginning, the main character is presented as a successful and wealthy man who can afford anything he wants. Richard is envied by people he meets every day in the streets...
Edgar Allan Poe is famous for his striking stories that shed light on the darkest aspects of the human mind and soul. “The Tell-Tale Heart” is one of such works that make the reader think of important topics such as the good and the bad, sanity and insanity, crime and...
Literature has always been a tool used by authors to attract people’s attention to a particular aspect of their lives of problems topical for society. At the same time, some issues have always been topical for communities because of their universal character. These include love, relations, faith, morals, and values...
Introduction As well as the theme of love, the theme of life and death is frequently preferred by many poets for their great works. The main challenge is the impossibility to avoid death or prolong life, and authors try to find out additional ways to calm down, motivate, and support...
In 2020, the world faced a new virus, which appeared to be a health threat to the population. The disease received the name “COVID-19”, and caused a catastrophic reaction of people, despite the deadly outcomes. Many sources refer to this phenomenon as the “social absurdity” (Banerjee et al., 2020, para....
The issue of finding the right balance between personal freedoms and the need for social stability and development has been a pressing one for a long time. Its urgency has further been increased by the spread of terrorism, which resulted in certain measures intended to control and protect citizens and...
“Frankenstein,” the book by Anna Meriano, is a fancy, captivating retelling of the worldwide known legend. The story of a creature seeking love began in the writings of Mary Shelly in the 19th century. Masterful illustrations by Katy Wu make the book look like a personal diary. Victor, the main...
Among the many concepts explored in Fitzgeralds’s The Great Gatsby, American Dream is one of the most notable ones. The titular character, with his extravagant lifestyle, acts like its embodiment and manifestation in the hedonistic, consumerist atmosphere of the Roaring Twenties. Yet the author questions this interpretation of the American...
The story of young Kimberly Chang and her mother emigrating to New York from Hong Kong told in Girl in Translation crystallizes hardships that immigrants undergo. The family experiences financial troubles, exploitation, and discrimination on its way to prosperity. At first, Kimberly lives in a crummy Brooklyn flat without heating...
In Fences, the character of Troy Maxon initially seems like a representation of a hardworking man, a breadwinner, who gives up on his ideas of happiness and well-being to ensure that his family has financial security. However, Troy had dreams previously, with society pushing him into that niche once the...
Trifles by Susan Glaspell highlights perceptions, thought processes, labels, and stereotypes surrounding the inferior perception of women during the early 19th century. The play illustrates repeated neglect and alienation of three females by male colleagues, symbolizing their suffrage at the time of the play. Although the female gender was regarded...
Introduction Even though many readers consider the American Dream as one of the core ideas in Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, there is always a chance to find some new interpretation. In his article, Majid Salem Mgamis explains the American Dream as a part of social values “that...
The theme of the formation of the young hero personality is not new in world literature. Most of the major writers have turned to it in their work. A real artist always seeks to penetrate the secrets of the human soul, to find motives that push a person to certain...
A striking example of the struggle between a human and society is the story “Desirée’s Baby”, written by Kate Chopin. The main character, Desirée, is presented to the reader as a beautiful, gentle, and graceful lady. In particular, this is expressed in her love story with her husband, who at...
Crack: Rock Cocaine, Street Capitalism, and the Decade of Greed, written by David Farber, is a history of destructing poor communities of the United States by cocaine. It tells the reader about the roots of crack cocaine and the political response to the drug. It also gives examples from the...
The novel The Old Man and the Sea by Hemmingway is among his most significant writings. The author explores plenty of themes that are still relevant nowadays. Hemmingway forces his reader to reflect throughout the whole narrative, making him or her emphatic with aspirations, struggles, and achievements of the protagonist....
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,...
“A Good Man Is Hard to Find,” written by Flannery O’Connor, quickly became one of the author’s most prominent pieces due to its many definitions and perceptions. First published in 1953, the writing is centered around the themes of good and evil, portraying the writer’s typical style. The following essay...
Introduction The Sweat transitions enormously when Bertha is introduced in the story. Sykes is committed to having her put up with Della as a concubine. Delia is not ready to allow another woman to have the resources she has labored to buy. She resists, and in the event, the two...
