Newest Literature Essays

Revolution was a key idea to the philosophy of the Romantic writers, whether it be social, cultural or aesthetic. It is in the poetry of Percy Bysshe Shelley, however, that the most overt revolutionary political statements are made while ...

Fairy tales serve as important tools in history by allowing countries and societies throughout time to share their cultural beliefs and values. As fairy tales circulate around the world, cultures adopt and adapt the basic story lines that may stem...

Freud’s introduction to the concept of psychoanalysis was one that provided an explanation as well as a potential solution to an issue that was otherwise untreated: hysteria. Although Freud’s theory was met with heavy skepticism, it is a theory...

Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d'Arthur presents an intent focus on the ill effects of anything not in accordance with Christian morality and teaching. Malory portrays these elements of his story negatively—showcasing how they alter the mind and...

Hughes is well-known for his nature poetry and use of animal symbolism. In both “The Jaguar” and “Hawk Roosting”, the animals symbolize different human characteristics while remaining, on the surface, an in-depth, fantastic poem about the animal...

Daisy’s Ghost: A Feminist Reading of Daisy Miller

The novel Daisy Miller is set in the late 18th century, within high class European society. In that time period, feminism was misunderstood and even unrecognized by both genders and varying...

The message of “Leda and the Swan” is often interpreted in drastically different ways due to the ambiguity of the text. Much of this ambiguity can be attributed to intentional contradiction by the author, William Butler Yeats. This contradiction...

Environmental determinism claims that a society’s physical environment predetermines its social and cultural development. Naturally, environmental determinists would argue that Mexico’s appreciation of nature and agricultural roots influence its...

One Johns Hopkins Study determined that 81% of young adults have been exposed to a traumatic event, while 8% of those exposed have developed Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (“Blog”). The symptoms of PTSD can be divided into three groups: intrusive,...

Winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2007, Doris Lessing crafted fiction that is deeply infused with autobiographical touches, especially from her experiences in Africa. All of her works center around modern themes such as the clash of...

In the novel Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, characters develop and change considerably; in particular, the character of Mr. Rochester demonstrates this clear character development. Mr. Rochester initially appears to be a profoundly unlikable...

For Emerson and Whitman, nature is more than just the trees that line the street, or even the flowers that rest beautifully within the vase. Both men find such a deeper harmony and value within nature, in a way that is very relevant to the...

Culture and language have always been, by their very nature, intertwined. Neither can exist without the other. As the world shifts perspectives and culture evolves, so must language evolve with it. Old tales become wordy and dated, hardly seeming...

Although she only lived to forty-one years of age and published a mere six works, Jane Austen was one of the most profound authors of the nineteenth century. Her first published work, penned when she was but nineteen years old, was Sense and...

William Shakespeare’s play Antony and Cleopatra and Samuel Johnson’s exploration of Shakespeare’s techniques and his verity within theatre in ‘The Plays of William Shakespeare' both engage the topic of the representation of reality. The play...

Despite the fact that Kurt Vonnegut ends the novel Slaughterhouse Five in a manner that provokes the reader to believe it shows that the conflict has reached closure, the very end of the novel represents a new beginning. The author uses the last...

In the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave, Douglass documents his life as a slave and eventual escape. Although he does not offer a timeline or name the people involved in his escape, he describes his feelings regarding...

The famous philosopher Aristotle formally defined the parameters of the tragic hero in his work On Poetics (335 B.C.). Aristotle based his tragic hero model on Oedipus, a king from Greek mythology. He defined the tragic hero as a man of noble...

In the 1950's and 1960's, the concept of the nuclear family was a personification of the American dream, the illusion of the perfect life, the perfect wife and the perfect children, all living in a model community. With four staccato shotgun...

The Criminal Psychology of Mrs. Wright Murder in human history dates back to the biblical story of Cain and Abel, the first descendants of Adam and Eve. Cain killed Abel out of jealousy, and since then countless amounts of feuds have lead to the...

When tyrannical governments are in charge of societies, they must eradicate possible threats to their power at all costs in order to remain in power. Underlying dangers to the power of such governments can be as common as the relationship between...

The Irish Literary Revival has been about promoting a National consciousness, leaving the recurring English stereotypes of Ireland behind, and striving for new beginnings with a free Irish State. Ireland had oftentimes been subjected to two...

Not many Literary Figures have retained notoriety quite as splendidly as Oscar Wilde has. His illustrious body of work continues to be heavily debated to this day. Although renown for his plays and sole novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, Wilde...