Newest Literature Essays

<blockquote>“Regardless of what we might think of our gender, we can only live that gender through the body we have.”</blockquote>

Throughout Sharon Pollock’s play <i>Blood Relations</i>, the plotline focuses on the life of...

In his poem “A Hymn to God the Father,” John Donne addresses God directly through a series of questions intended to reaffirm his faith. He prays for forgiveness for his transgressions in an inquisitive and almost intimate tone; it seems that he is...

With regard to his own work, David Mamet admits that “What I write about is what I think is missing from our society. And that’s communication on a basic level.” In his play <i>Glengarry Glen Ross</i>, Mamet uses an ironic technique to...

Much has been written about the religion and politics of <i>Gulliver’s Travels</i>, specifically in relation to Part I, A Voyage to Lilliput. Of all of the voyages and peoples that Gulliver, the protagonist of the novel, meets during...

Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony is a multidimensional novel full of Laguna symbols and themes that are easily overlooked in a superficial reading. Like many of the elements in this work, Josiah's spotted cattle can be interpreted in multiple ways:...

In Animal Dreams, Barbara Kingsolver reinvents the Western genre, riffing on a couple of common tropes and stock characters while simultaneously creating a female-centered story that rejects the violence and disconnected heroes of stereotypical...

Among the many themes explored in The Hours is the effect that certain pivotal moments have on our lives. The first and most obvious of these moments is described in the prologue: Virginia weighs herself down with stones and walks into the river....

Charles Dickens’ bildungsroman Great Expectations (1913) cannot help but impress upon the reader an overwhelming sense of guilt that permeates the novel at various levels. As the plot unfolds, the characters develop; the sense of guilt, however,...

Andrew Marvell’s poetry exemplifies an ancient literary genre known as the pastoral. This genre, which dates back to the third century B.C.E., represents the values of the shepherd and rustic life. Marvell’s poems “The Garden” and “The Nymph...

Alternatively dubbed that “despotic logician” and “the vortex and turning-point of so-called world history,” Socrates represents a radical departure point in the history of philosophy. To Friedrich Nietzsche, the father of rationalism puts forth a...

Nietzsche’s short work Homer’s Contest is part of his attempt to develop an axiology that reinstates morality within the realm of aesthetic existence, grounding lofty ideas like “good” and “evil” within a naturalistic framework. In this essay, he...

Readers of the Odyssey could certainly find frustration in crafting a judgment of Odysseus’ decision to depart from life alongside the goddess Kalypso. Some might point to a yearning for his day of homecoming. Others might argue precisely the...

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Jay Gatsby is an utterly American character: deviant and romantic idealist; tenacious yet sensitive; ostentatious yet nostalgic. At his core is a transcendental yearning, and for this reason as a character he never quite...

“That remark you just made: ‘Not to be so ashamed of myself, for that is the cause of everything’ – it’s as if you pierced me right through and read inside me. That is exactly how it all seems to me, when I walk into a room, that I’m lower than...

A liberal is someone who believes in the primacy of liberty as a socio-political value. Liberalism posits freedom a priori, and thus within its tradition the burden of proof rests on those who would limit or somehow restrict individual freedom....

In his oration, Pericles sheds new light on traditional Greek virtues by examining not only the accomplishments of the Athenian empire, but the particular qualities and institutions that have facilitated Athenian greatness. Pericles defies the...

“What good would it do me if truth stood before me, cold and naked, not caring if I recognized it or not?”

Soren Kierkegaard – “father of existentialism,” critic of both Hegelian idealism and its entire philosophical tradition – viewed his...

Whether enthusiastically placed on a pedestal or shoved in a dark corner, Georg Friedrich Hegel remains one of the most controversial and influential figures in modern philosophy. In perhaps his most famous work, Elements of the Philosophy of...

Friedrich Nietzsche’s On the Advantage and Disadvantage of History for Life reads as a polemic against German historicism, the prevailing attitude of his time with respect to the value of history. Originally published as the second of four...

This world is the will to power and nothing besides. And you yourself are also this will to power and nothing besides.

-- Friedrich Nietzsche

Human beings have struggled for centuries to explain their existence: some have thought it meaningless,...

In the Apology, Socrates tries to convince the jurors that, if they kill him, they will only be harming themselves. This argument is part of Socrates’ larger defense of his actions as he seeks to avoid drinking the hemlock. Socrates makes two...

The only proof capable of being given that an object is visible is that people actually see it. The only proof that a sound is audible is that people hear it: and so of the other sources of our experience. In like manner, I apprehend, the sole...

Renowned French writer and philosopher Francois-Marie Arouet (better known as “Voltaire”) once stated, “One merit of poetry few persons will deny: it says more and in fewer words than prose.” Indeed, his words could not ring truer when used to...

Sigmund Freud represents an extremely rare breed of literary genius. His ability to delve into the human subconscious and extrapolate meaning from the apparently nonsensical gives his works an exploratory, constantly twisting feel that finds its...