'Black like me' by John Howard Griffin
Thesis - 5 pages - Literature
'Black Like Me' is the account of the experiences of a white man, the author, who considered himself an expert in ‘race relations', but who had no real experience of how black people lived, so decided to change his skin pigmentation and travel in the South as a black man. This book...
Thomas Nagel on death
Book review - 3 pages - Literature
Let us assume for the time being that you believe cake to be a good, and find cake-eating emphatically positive. Now imagine that one day, when you go to your local bakery to eat your daily serving of cake, you find that cake no longer exists. They are out of cake indefinitely, they tell you,...
'Invisible Man' by Ralph Ellison: A comment
Book review - 5 pages - Literature
'Invisible Man' by Ralph Ellison is a novel detailing an unnamed African-American's journey from the south to the streets of Harlem. The reader sees the main character attempt to find his place within the world, as well as within himself. In this novel written in 1947, there exists a...
The Writer and Nietzsche
Essay - 4 pages - Literature
Throughout both 'The Birth of Tragedy' and 'The Genealogy of Morals', Friedrich Nietzsche explains the role and power of the artist. The artist, in particular, the writer, is a creator of illusions. Due to the increase in electronics and technology in the modern area, illusions...
Waiting for a Miracle: Waiting and its many forms portrayed in 'Largo Desolato', 'The Polish Complex', and, 'Waiting for the Dark, Waiting for the Light'
Essay - 6 pages - Literature
“The typically human act of trying to see oneself is always fascinating, agonizing, comical, for we can never turn fast enough to see all sides at once in the mirror. And the greatest trick remains seeing how we see” ('The Polish Complex' Intro, page V). Throughout 'The...
Themes throughout 'The Wasteland'
Essay - 5 pages - Literature
Within 'The Wasteland' by T.S Eliot, there exists a vast array of literary elements used to turn this poem into something more than just a jumble of mixed up phrases and quotes. While this jumble builds the poem, it also makes it hard to identify a single meaning or purpose that lingers...
Why we need the system: Hobbes, Locke, and 'State of Nature'
Essay - 3 pages - Literature
Thomas Hobbes and John Locke have each compiled an elaborate explanation of society, as they believe it ought to be. Hobbes in 'Leviathan' and Locke in 'Second Treatise of Government', have recorded their differing interpretations of the state of nature, the logic behind...
The homes of Catherine in 'Washington Square' and Frado of 'Our Nig'
Essay - 2 pages - Literature
The homes of Catherine in 'Washington Square' and Frado of 'Our Nig' are essential to the development and understanding of these heroines. Each novel places emphasis on different aspects of the homes as they relate to the most involved characters of the novel, particularly...
The Underrated Backstory: Backstory as it 'Effects Our Nig' and 'Washington Square'
Book review - 2 pages - Literature
The information provided in a backstory is often integral to the development of characters and plot within a narrative. In both 'Our Nig' and 'Washington Square', an account of the events prior to those of the central plot provide necessary context for a clear and cohesive tale....
A Close Reading of "Trifles"
Essay - 2 pages - Literature
When reading any work of literature, one can miss many of the work's underlying aspects simply by not reading it carefully enough. A thorough and close reading of a work should yield much more satisfying results—the reader should understand themes and ideas that were important to the...
Parent/Child relations in American Literature
Essay - 3 pages - Literature
Throughout American Literature, one can notice many writings focus on either mother/daughter relationships or father/son relationships. These relationships are described in various ways, but one very common way involves parental love towards sometimes unappreciative children. This parental love...
Mission: Character analysis of Raskolnikov
Essay - 3 pages - Literature
Should the character of Raskolnikov be considered a madman or a mentally disturbed person? Throughout the novel, Raskolnikov displays many symptoms that can be considered crazy. On the other hand, there are several mental defects that fit with Raskolnikov's behavior. Analyzing Raskolnikov...
The Gardens of Oxbridge and Fernham in the first chapter of 'A Room of One's Own'
Thesis - 2 pages - Literature
This paper analyzes the first chapter of 'A Room of One's Own', and specifically the gardens of Oxbridge and Fernham. Virginia Woolf uses these two gardens to support her comparison between the status of men 'and women. In effect, they symbolize order versus chaos, rigidity versus...
Willful Monsters: Differences in attraction to Short Story Writing
Thesis - 3 pages - Literature
As storytellers, Kelly Link and Aimee Bender each bring a distinctive sense of punch and personality to their writing. Both tackling short stories, they are able to create unique worlds within a few pages that draw in their readers and deliver fresh perspectives through the strangest of stories....
The Destruction of Responsibility: Cromwell vs. Charles II
Thesis - 4 pages - Literature
With England left as a leaderless country following the trial and beheading of King Charles I, the country was eagerly searching for a resolution to its problems. Oliver Cromwell emerged as England's leader from the Revolution and strove to have a close, relatable relationship with the English...
Oscar Wilde & the Unwritten Melodrama
Thesis - 4 pages - Literature
Victorian melodrama not only served as a literary genre, but it was used to define and reflect on the values of society. Oscar Wilde's Lady Windermere's Fan takes the expectation of contemporary melodrama, as defined by Peter Brooks. Though the play is based on melodrama and, at times, overly...
'Night' at the Core of Elie Wiesel
Essay - 4 pages - Literature
Elie Wiesel is an internationally renowned writer and Holocaust survivor. His expansive collection of work is all derived from his first book, which is called 'Night'. It is the foundation for all of Wiesel's works and shared ideas. His ideas, which centralize around a bluntly honest look...
Night: An open minded perception
Essay - 5 pages - Literature
Elie Wiesel is a Jewish American author and Holocaust survivor. Wiesel's first book, 'Night', is an account of his experience in the concentration camp Auschwitz. This personal and vivid account launches a stream of consciousness, enlightening the reader to a new perception of various...
Dickinson's 'Meditation on the Future'
Essay - 4 pages - Literature
The belief in any sort of prophecy is contingent on the idea that the human psyche holds the potential to, at any degree, know the future. 'This World is not Conclusion', a poem by Emily Dickinson, promotes the impermanence of our state of being. Rather than predicting a specific future,...
'The Cult of True Womanhood Disassembled' by Kate Chopin and Mary E. Wilkins Freeman: A review
Book review - 5 pages - Literature
Through the oppressive times when women were meant to be no more than homemakers and pawns to their bread-winning men, the 'Cult of True Womanhood' symbolized everything that the females of America were supposed to be. It stated that they must be pure in mind, body, heart, and soul; for a...
Thus Spoke Zarathustra: Book review
Essay - 8 pages - Literature
In the book 'Thus Spoke Zarathustra', Nietzsche provides the reader with a fictional account of a Persian prophet named Zarathustra. He takes this historical figure and turns him into a libratory prophet for the modern world. Nietzsche argues that Zarathustra is the first individual to...
Differences and Similarities between two Creation Myths
Thesis - 3 pages - Literature
As its title suggests, a creation myth is the lavish story that lays the groundwork for the life of an epic figure, as manifest through history. The creation myth commonly establishes a trend that becomes commonplace for the subject throughout his or her life, a trend that is based upon and...
The Aesthetics of Comics - 'Transfiguration of the Commonplace'
Thesis - 6 pages - Literature
In his work 'Transfiguration of the Commonplace', Danto asserts that philosophy, as a system of thought, is a unique subject-matter in which not everything is appropriate to its nature of inquiry (Danto, Section 3, p. 54). Art, however, he contends, has proven, throughout the ages, to be...
Angela Carter's 'The Bloody Chamber': A revision of social fictions
Essay - 4 pages - Literature
Angela Carter's 'The Bloody Chamber' comprises a collection of short stories, all of which, in some sense or another, exemplify a variation or reworking of popularized fairy tales. Her writing style, rather than taking the form of any one genre, crosses the boundaries of all of them;...
'The Stranger' by Camus - A review
Thesis - 2 pages - Literature
In 'The Stranger', Camus expresses his philosophy of the absurd. 'The Stranger' was Camus's first novel, depicting the story of an emotionally detached, unaffected, and seemingly amoral man, Meursault. When first reading the novel, Meursault may seem like an amoral character,...
The neo-Romanticist underpinnings of Roberts's 'Tantramar Revisited' and Lampman's 'Heat'
Essay - 4 pages - Literature
Canadian poets Roberts and Lampman, both affiliated with the school of Confederation poetry, found themselves writing amidst a “new world” full of beauty and prosperity and were thus eager to capture this essence of the Canadian landscape. Hence, their turn towards the Romantic poets of...
'Rebecca' as a Gothic Romance: Far from the classic Cinderella story
Book review - 5 pages - Literature
Daphne Du Maurier's novel 'Rebecca' can be interpreted in various lights; for instance, for many, it is commonly held to follow the form of a fairy tale. While there is, no doubt, adequate ground for this interpretation, the novel's characteristics seem to embody more the elements of the...
Hejinian's 'My Life': A Poetic Autobiography of Multiplicity
Book review - 5 pages - Literature
Lyn Hejinian's poetic autobiography 'My Life' crosses over the boundaries of genre and into an indefinable realm of its own. It contains elements of poetry, autobiography, personal narrative, and women's fiction, while simultaneously entering into a continuous dialogue with the nature of...
'Siddhartha', by Herman Hesse, and the 'Metamorphosis', by Franz Kafka: A review
Thesis - 3 pages - Literature
'Siddhartha' by Herman Hesse, and the 'Metamorphosis' by Franz Kafka, are both novels which portray the protagonists, Siddhartha and Gregor, as obedient members of society who undergo momentous, life altering transformations. Both transformations considerably affect the...
Madness Redefined: Plath's Demystification of Insanity in 'The Bell Jar'
Thesis - 8 pages - Literature
Sylvia Plath's 'The Bell Jar' depicts the mental-breakdown of a privileged and educated young woman in 1950s American society. To this day, the literary merit of the novel remains a topic of intense debate. The majority of critics seem to take the stance that its overall worth lies in the...
