Newest Literature Essays

Before delving into the tense relationship between power, possession, and disease in Jonson’s Volpone, it is first necessary to sift through the forbearing tensions between “profit and pleasure” that Jonson mentioned in the Prologue of the play....

In The Namesake, Jhumpa Lahari explores the themes of identity, clash of culture, isolation, importance of names and family. Both of the Ganguli parents, especially Ashima, struggle with assimilating to this new culture that they are not...

The process of colonialism is the ongoing eradication of old practices and the exploitation of new practices, and often entails settlement into a foreign land, the introduction of new cultural practices, and the enforcement of religious practices....

Humanity is always engaged in an eternal power struggle between good and evil, and the well being of society often hangs in the balance when such forces collide. This presence of good and evil of humanity is a central theme in Markus Zusak’s The...

The traditional structure and approach to literature is challenged in If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino. For this idiosyncratic narrative, the main character is referred to as the reader, and the novel is told in the second...

In August Wilson’s Fences, Troy Maxson is a man of many flaws. He is human, and like any other human, his experiences throughout life have influenced his decisions and his outlook on life. If we were to have no context on Troy’s life, we would see...

In presenting the concept of the closed door, it advocates the very opposite idea that, once, the door was open. With this knowledge there comes a possibility that perhaps a closed door can be opened again, suggesting that there are two sides to a...

Ben Okri's The Famished Road (1991) captures the innocent perspective of a child caught in the turmoil of Nigeria's independence. Azaro, the young protagonist, grows up in an unnamed rural village in the midst of change [presumed to be Nigeria]....

Because Sandra Cisneros writes from a child’s point of view in her novel, The House on Mango Street, her audience gets a glimpse of what life is like for a child struggling with her identity as a Latina girl; Esperanza is a child who hopes that,...

In her anthology The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up In America (1650), Anne Bradstreet focuses on her most dominant concerns, the family and the woman’s roles as wife and mother. Based on Biblical authority, wifehood and motherhood are not only roles...

All mediums of poetry are specific and unique among each other. They have different attributes that can be mastered in order to deliver a perfect execution. However, when it comes to the ancient genre of lyrical poetry, these attributes are based...

Despite being faced with adverse conditions while growing up, humankind possesses resilience and the capacity to accept and forgive those responsible. In The Glass Castle (2005) by Jeannette Walls, Walls demonstrates a child’s ability to develop...

James Hoyle theorizes that the main sources for The Tempest revolves around the Bible story of Joseph and his Brothers in which the spirit of envy and consequent, reconciliation and pardon predominates. This storyline markedly contrasts with the...

The Taming of the Shrew gives the reflection of marriage in Shakespearean society. Ideas of patriarchy, female domestication and submission, economic interest, and the employment of noise and love all unite in the plot of the play according to the...

Miriam Toews’ A Complicated Kindness tells the story of a Mennonite teen, Nomi Nickels, and her response to the rise of conflict and tragedy in her family. This novel, however, explores not simply the life of a fictional coming-of-age young woman,...

In Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, Offred describes her life as a concubine in a dystopic and patriarchal world, where fertile women are forced to provide children to their corresponding commanders. Most notably, women are not permitted to...

“There was a dignity about her. She was not worldly, like Clarissa; not rich, like Clarissa. Was she, he wondered as she moved, respectable? Witty, with a lizard’s flickering tongue, he thought (for one must invent, must allow oneself a little...

Wake up, have a cup of coffee, and put on some makeup before walking out the door for the first time in twelve hours. The day ends with a phone call from a loved one as the makeup comes off and the sweatpants go on before sleeping in preparation...

Identity is an idiosyncratic definition of a person that can be constructed through many variables: race, gender, class and culture, to name but a few. The Turkish Embassy Letters, comes with a pre-constructed, orientalist ideal of the East, where...

Toni Morrison’s novel Song of Solomon tells the story of Macon “Milkman” Dead, a character completely alienated from his community, family and heritage. In the novel, readers follow his journey to the fictional town of Shalimar that he takes in...

The rationale of the Dalai Lama has been a concept passed down from many generations. Being a line of reincarnations, very rarely have the morals deviated from the original Dalai Lama. Said to embody compassion, the Dalai Lama defined his duty to...

In the play An Inspector Calls, the character of Gerald Croft is extremely significant, as he is the only perpetrator not to be a part of the Birling household. He is also the character who knew Eva Smith most intimately and has many significant...

Almost everyone, at some point in their life, deals with heartbreak and loneliness from a broken relationship. In “I Am Trying to Break Your Heart,” Kevin Young utilizes literary devices to depict the cruelty of a past relationship. The poem...

John Steinbeck’s East of Eden was published in the 1950’s, a time when having a large family was a virtue and a source of comfort. Given the devastating psychological effects of World Wars I and II and the growing fear of the Cold War, people...