Newest Literature Essays

In explanation of Anglo-Saxon alliterative verse, J.R.R. Tolkien said “They depend on a balance and a weight and emotional content. They are more like masonry than music” (59). The original manuscript of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is written...

In both his poem ‘Kubla Khan’ and its accompanying prologue Samuel Taylor Coleridge presents two ideas: the variable nature of the imagination and the beauty of the foreign and exotic. Many scholars view the story behind the poem’s composition as...

Across Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte and ‘For My Lover, Returning to His Wife’ by Anne Sexton, jealousy is presented as both resulting in self-deprecation and anger. Whereas in ‘After the Lunch’ by Wendy Cope a form of love that does not contain...

Flannery O’Connor’s short story appears to be greatly influenced by the time and place in which she grew up, and thus, “A Good Man is Hard to Find” lends itself easily in examination through biographical criticism. Psychoanalytic criticism can be...

The short story “Sweat” by Zora Neale Hurston details the finer points of the abusive relationship and failing marriage of Delia and Sykes Jones. Hurston presents Delia as a hardworking woman and a faithful wife, but the same cannot be said of...

Samuel Pepys’s Diary is often studied for its first-hand account of important events in London’s history. Pepys records information on the Restoration of the Stuart Monarchy, the Plague, and the Great Fire of London, and readers are able to gain a...

Mary Astell is often attributed as being England’s first feminist because of her writing which questioned gender politics of the late seventeenth century and early eighteenth century. For the time period, Astell’s writing was groundbreaking. She...

Everyone has his or her own idea of literature and what separates a work of literary fiction from a work of popular fiction. Generally speaking, a work must adhere to literary traditions, convey a deeper meaning, and present conventional themes in...

The Sorrow of War is a unique war novel in that it places special attention on the different parts of the lives of its characters: before the war, and after. The main character, Kien, takes up most of the book with his life stories. However, there...

“All power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely” is echoed throughout the texts ‘Animal Farm’ (George Orwell, 1945) and Divergent (Neil Burger, 2014). Both texts demonstrate that the struggle for power is deep rooted in...

From the point of view of a reader, it is clear that Jamaica Kincaid is not satisfied with the way Antigua is now. By comparing pre-colonial Antigua with colonial and post-colonial Antigua, Kincaid creates a novel that is anti-tourist and...

There is a balance to ideals in individuality and truth, both at positive and negative extremes. The movie Dead Poets Society by Peter Weir captures the incredible role romanticism and embracement of truth on an individual's life, separating the...

Reader response criticism is a school of formal literary theory that focuses on the reader and their experience of literature. A prime thematic or style that can be found in many of Neil Gaiman’s novels is his manner of taking the unknown and...

Boldly forthright and bitterly candid, Junot Diaz’s "Drown" forges a sense of community culture that propels the development of several of the work’s major themes, foremost among them the retention of historically accepted implications of...

Author Mary Shelley uses the creature in her book Frankenstein to depict the dangers of humans creating artificial intelligence. Shelley presents these ideas through using Victor Frankenstein as a creator of a new species of life, and the creature...

The critic Joe Nutt writes that ‘it takes a bold man to taunt death’[1]. This observation was made in reference to John Donne’s Holy Sonnet X, ‘Death be not proud’, and accurately portrays both the tone and subject of the poem. Throughout the...

“For a moment [George] contemplated her, as one who had fallen out of heaven. He saw radiant joy in her face, he saw the flowers beat against her dress in blue waves. The bushes above them closed. He stepped quickly forward and kissed her”...

Throughout Antigone, Creon maintains complete confidence in his belief that, in order to prevent anarchy and chaos, the rule of a king must be obeyed even it contradicts proper morals and/or the will of the gods. The decisions that he makes in an...

Throughout the narrative of William Shakespeare’s play, The Tempest, the idea of loyalty is discussed in different scenarios and different situations that align with each separate facet of the plot. While this principle is regularly utilized...

Roy’s “God of Small Things” is a work of literary genius that commentates on the difficulties and divisions created by Colonialism and, more broadly, the impact of western influence on the entirety of eastern culture. In the narrative, the idea of...

Mute characters play a significant role in plays. They are the characters most people would ignore because they do not say anything; however, mute characters may be the characters who say the most in a play. Within Mother Courage and Her Children...

The 2007 movie Juno raises many ethical issues through the perspective of Juno, a sixteen-year-old girl who becomes pregnant in high school. The movie is based around the moral struggles she faces during the pregnancy, as well as how she handles...

The infant has always been a versatile and powerful symbol for a variety of themes; themes such as new life, innocence, potential, and even loss. While in both Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s "To a Friend, Who Asked How I Felt, When the Nurse First...