Newest Literature Essays

Think all the way back to the Stone Age. Food variety started and ended at whichever animal you were able to hunt that day. Today we live in an age where the food choices are virtually endless. You have your choice of fast food, processed food,...

Jane Austen ’s Northanger Abbey has been widely analyzed as satire of the gothic novel and, at first glance, it seems there is more than enough textual evidence to support this claim. Throughout the novel, Austen employs a sarcastic narrative...

War is widely regarded as a time of devastation, death, and destruction. Many times, the brave souls that go nobly into war come out completely different, scarred and changed by the horrific events they have witnessed, if they survive. In All...

Washington Irving lived throughout the late 18th - early 19th century and was an American short story writer, essayist, historian, and diplomat. His piece of work, “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” can be considered as a classic in today’s American...

“Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t,” is inherently Shakespearean in nature, and translates to the well known contemporary idiom “There’s a method to my madness.”(2.2. 223). While the structure of nuclear diplomacy ventures far...

In “The Sound of Waves”, the possibility that individuals must break social norms and stay true to themselves in order to reach true happiness is explored across two distinct classes. Shinji and Hatsue, who belong to different classes, fall in...

In Charlotte Brontë’s novel, Jane Eyre the protagonist paints four pictures during the plot. These paintings carry meanings in themselves. In addition, the act of painting is important for the main character, since it means her a way of escaping...

Truman Capote’s ‘In Cold Blood’, highly contested for its scathing depiction of 1960’s American society is renowned for its portrayal and characterization of the permeating theme; The American Dream. It seeps into all facets of society and impedes...

In stressful situations, people use connections with things to help them overcome the horrors in the situations. In the Military, many soldiers experience very stressful and intense situations. They use connections with cigarettes, fellow soldiers...

It is moments of wrongdoing and subsequent atonement that constitute every child’s coming of age. Within his autobiographical narrative, A Summer’s Life, Gary Soto recreates his fall from innocence as his guilty six-year-old self steals a...

Though pride can have a negative connotation and is often thought of as a synonym for being full of one’s self, it can also be an honest and healthy feeling of genuine satisfaction with one’s own achievements. In other instances, pride can also...

A carefully chosen title of a literary work can go a long way in selling that work to the common reader. Ambrose Bierce's well-thought-out title reveals little, yet just enough to gain our attention and to have us dwelling on the meaning of the...

Mass incarceration has not only emerged as a racialized form of social control fueled by politician’s strategies to gain political status, but has perpetuated a national epidemic characterized by unequal civil liberties and an endless cycle of...

During the 20th century, the work of nineteenth-century female American writers was often described as “sentimental,” “domestic,” “feminine” and “frivolous,” and considered lacking depth and seriousness. However, more recent critics such as Judith...

Tan begins by sharing a story of how she didn’t want to accept herself and her Chinese culture all because a nice-looking guy and his family came over for Christmas Eve dinner. In this story, she explains her thoughts and feelings before, during,...

People take freedom for granted, on many levels, but have they ever questioned whether freedom is bliss, or a curse? The Lamp at Noon illustrates the protagonist, Ellen’s internal conflicts about fleeing the dust-ridden, barren, prairie farm...

According to 18th-century feminist writer Mary Montagu, “Men, biased by custom, prejudice, and interest, have presumed boldly to pronounce sentence in their own favor, because possession empowered them to make violence take place of justice.” Over...

The House on Mango Street written by Sandra Cisneros is a novel which raises many issues worth mentioning. This essay, however, discusses the importance of adapting to the new surroundings, especially to the use of language. Throughout the book...

From the earliest days of Colonial America, to the end of the Civil War, slavery was an established practice. This brutal, amoral, and dehumanizing system prompted nineteenth-century American writers, black and white alike, to advocate for its end...

Feminine deviance, or the failure to adhere to societal standards set for women of the time, is a concept displayed by characters across many genres and eras, from William Shakespeare’s Lady Macbeth to Ernest Hemingway’s Lady Brett Ashley, but...

In her short story, “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” Flannery O’Connor narrates the journey of a complex family and the encounters they face while traveling. While there are many aspects of the story that make it notorious in literature, one concept...

In Old English Literature, the Anglo-Saxon society portrayed is built upon military achievement in battle and one’s respect for their Lord. Despite this focus, heroic action also occurs in other forms and in contexts outside the battlefield. ‘The...

The Greek minstrel Homer’s epic poem, The Iliad, is one of the most popular works of literature in history, and for good reason. In it, and its companion poem, The Odyssey, the happenings of the legendary Trojan War as well as certain events...

Since colonists arrived in Canada, there has been discourse between Indigenous people and the rest of Canada. Colonizers forced their way onto Indigenous land, took ownership of it, and tried to take ownership of the people too. Their attempts at...