Newest Literature Essays

As in his Hamlet, Shakespeare uses “reason in madness” throughout King Lear by using unexpected characters to help with his overall theme of recognition and realization. However, reason in madness can also refer to Shakespeare himself, because in...

Pat Barker’s Regeneration Trilogy is a series of novels that explore various marginalized subjects in WWI-era Britain. Originally set in a mental hospital, she is particularly interested in exploring concepts of madness – how a society decides...

When studying Restoration and early 18th century drama, a predominant theme that appears is the suppression of women. Plays from Vanbrugh’s The Relapse to Etherege’s The Man of Mode utilize humor, wit, and satire to criticize the imprudence and...

Sigmund Freud theorized that the primary motivating force for all human behavior is sexuality. Freudian theory greatly influenced the “lost generation” affected by World War I. Those who were coping with the effects of the war on society had begun...

Dario Fo, author of Accidental Death of an Anarchist, won the Nobel Prize for literature in 1997 and the Swedish Academy while awarding him the prize noted that Fo’s “works are open for creative additions, dislocations, continually encouraging...

Robert Browning wrote his poetry during the British Industrial Revolution, a tumultuous time in which society was going through major cultural and lifestyle changes. The modernization of England led to the distribution of newspapers and other...

Introduction

Giovanni Boccaccio’s medieval masterpiece “The Decameron” is a collection of stories, chronicled over ten days, which highlights the best and worst of human nature. Boccaccio’s tales deal with themes such as adultery, love, premarital...

In "The Raven," Edgar Allan Poe demonstrates his mastery of symbolism and repetition. He uses these devices to gradually build anticipation, climaxing at the third stanza from the end with the speaker entreating the bird whether there is word from...

In the poem “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer,” Walt Whitman writes of a speaker who is exposed to the knowledge of the stars in the sky and the Milky Way galaxies, but is restricted from fathoming a deeper understanding in those observed...

Homer said in The Iliad that “revenge is sweeter far than flowing honey.” In Eliza Haywood’s The City Jilt, vengeance stems from ruthless passion and unbridled drive. Glicera, the protagonist of The City Jilt, epitomizes one who feeds off...

In psychology, one of the most frequently debated topics deals with the issue of environmental and societal impact on one’s upbringing. It is commonly believed that society plays a tremendous role in how one behaves and how one readily conforms to...

America: a land of freedom, opportunity, and prosperity; a country that highly advocates the amalgamation of conglomerating cultures. Ironically, however, in Gary Shteyngart's novel Absurdistan, the Russians transcend Americans in their pursuit...

The relationship between the ideal and the reality is many times pictured in black and white. The ideal can be defined as a conception of something in its perfection, whereas reality is defined as something that exists independently of ideas...

In John Vanbrugh’s The Relapse; or Virtue in Danger, Act I, scene i. plays a crucial role in establishing the theme of appearance versus reality. Because this play is a continuation of Colley Cibber’s Love’s Last Shift, it is imperative that the...

George Etherege’s The Man of Mode is a play that utilizes humor, wit, and satire to criticize the foolishness and vulnerability of women. In this illustrative and vulgar play, Etherege examines the mannerisms, dialogues, and behaviors of different...

John Donne’s Holy Sonnet 7 is a poem that intertwines elements of allusions and wit to arouse emotions and to depict the dramatic conflict between holiness and sin. By specifically analyzing the rhyme scheme, the allusions, the tone, and the...

In his novel A Confederacy of Dunces, John Kennedy Toole casts Burma Jones in a stereotypical role in society. By hiding Jones’ face behind space-age sunglasses and a cloud of smoke, Toole maintains Jones’ ambiguity while gradually diverging from...

Many critics and theorists alike have studied William Shakespeare’s “Richard III” in the attempt explain the external and internal mismatch of character and physical appearance. Richard III is able to deceive those around him based on these...

In Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice, Mann explores the struggle between impulse and logic through the symbolism of luggage presented throughout. The luggage Aschenbach clings to represents the dominance of logic over his impulses, and the effects...

Both Rich and Shakespeare address the theme of true love in their respective poems Living in Sin and Let Me Not to the Marriage of True Minds. The subject matter of both poems deals with the nature of true love, various implications of which are...

Robert Louis Stevenson’s novel The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, investigates the effectuality of language as a means of rational and logical communication when confronted with situations that represent the intangible and supernatural....

In Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye, three young African American girls (among many others in their society) struggle against a culture that defines them as ugly and/or invisible. They are regularly contrasted with symbols of whiteness and white...

In the Old English poem Beowulf, the warrior culture is centered upon the heroic codes. Those who are members of Hrothgar’s court are ranked based upon the identities and reputations of their ancestors. It can be said that the armor of these...

In Socrates’ unnamed thought-experiment of a city, as described by Plato, none of the social classes hold as much intrigue as that of the guardians. Appointed by Socrates as either militaristic defenders or leaders upon birthing, depending on...