Literature Essay Examples and Topics. Page 19

8,575 samples

Critical Approach Analysis of “The Scarlet Letter”

Generally, such important themes as legalism, guilt, immorality, and sin related in the novel may be discussed through the prism of historicism, and even the very title of the novel featuring the word "scarlet" or [...]
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 5
  • Words: 1389

Shakespeare’s Romeo as a Tragic Hero

Romeo and Juliet's love, no matter how strong, was not able to break the bounds of the rigid social order in the 13th-century Verona. In Romeo and Juliet, a slim chance to live and to [...]
  • Subjects: Romantic Literature
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 597

“The Guide” by R. K. Narayan

Marco's and Raju's mother's characters are to be considered further in order to research the differences in western modernity and Indian traditional values.
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1123

Saki “The Mouse” and “The Storyteller” Differences

As the author observes in his own words, most of the remarks from the aunt's side would be fraught with the authoritative term 'Do not' while nearly all the remarks by the children countered with [...]
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 690

Gender Roles in ‘Mr. Green’ by Robert Olen Butler

Green Butler uses the character of the grandfather to develop the theme of gender roles within the culture. The character of the grandfather is extremely sound for the cultural beliefs the author conveyed through all [...]
  • Subjects: Gender in Literature
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 564

Samuel Beckett’s “Endgame”

Life is both a scene of nothingness and one of infinity, and it is this duality that drives the characters in Beckett to desperation: "Endgame is a despairing study of despair".
  • Subjects: World Philosophy Literature
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 837

‘Lies My Teacher Told Me’ by Loewen

According to Loewen, it is the presentation of the subject that does not illuminate the past with the present, hence the past loses its relevance for the present situation, as far as the students are [...]
  • Subjects: Historical Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1110

Shakespeare’s Influence on Arts

The impact of his work is sometimes direct although in most cases, the impact is indirect but whichever the case; the impact of his work is felt in the arts all around us.
  • Subjects: Writers
  • Pages: 5
  • Words: 1465

Psychological Strategies to Understand Literature

This approach explores the motivations of a writer, his characters, and that of the audience, drawing on Sigmund Freud's theories and other psychoanalytic theories to understand fully the meaning conveyed in such text. The characters [...]
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 568

“Henry IV” by Shakespeare

In this particular part of the series of plays he wrote on the history surrounding Henry IV, Shakespeare introduces the audience to the Henry IV as a King who has acquired the throne through unjust [...]
  • Subjects: Plays
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 904

“A Scandal in Bohemia” by Conan Doyle

Adler had threatened to send the picture on the public announcement of the mutual intention of the King and his fiancee to marry.
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 848

Perception of Female Beauty in Literature

The current age has seen an acute upsurge in the value placed on the beauty of women; where the stigmatization, low esteem, and shame associated with being bad looking among women is leading to high [...]
  • Subjects: Poems
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 683

How Story Telling Impacts Ishmael Beah’s Life

He dared to make this dangerous travel in order not to be swallowed by an insatiable mouth of war when it knocked on Ishmael's door for the second time."They had run so far away from [...]
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 1026

“The Principles of Newspeak” by George Orwell

Newspeak proponents are members of the Party who are determined to remove all words and phrases that have anything to do with freedom, rebellion and oppression among other afflictions of the regime.
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 552

Little Red Riding Hood: Breaking Gender Stereotypes

On refusing marriage to the Roman prefect of the province, she was fed to Satan who came in the form of a dragon. By the time the wolf arrives, he cannot of course convince the [...]
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 10
  • Words: 2990

“Superiority” by Arthur Clarke

The reading of Arthur Clarke's short story "Superiority" had brought me to the following set of conclusions, in regards to how story's motifs relate to particulars of my professional affiliation: The implementation of groundbreaking technologies [...]
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 5
  • Words: 1349

The Short Story “Quan Loi” by Larry Burke

The main message of the author is that the emotional problems are caused by a silence which is crucial for understanding one facet of the soldiers' role conflict.
  • Subjects: Historical Literature
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 605

“The Stranger” by Albert Camus

The central concept of the novel is dedicated to the symbolization of 'absurd' as the key element accompanying a person's life and impacting the formation of human behavior and actions in society.
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 845

Hills Like White Elephants Analysis

Hemingway wrote 'Hills like White Elephants' in the third-person perspective that restricts the tale to the words and actions of the characters.
  • Subjects: American Literature
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 1106

“Growing Old” by Matthew Arnold

The language in which the poem has been written is quite commendable and I really have a passion for the words that have been used in the poem.
  • Subjects: Poems
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 847

The Life of Langston Hughes

The development of the Harlem Renaissance has led to the recognition of a considerable influence of the Negro culture on American culture.
  • Subjects: Writers
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1127

Desdemona as a Symbol of Christian Virtues

She chooses to stay patient when the very light of her life, Othello, accuses her of being a woman of foul character and strikes her.
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1256

Gothic Romanticism of Edgar Allen Poe

When the thought of today, the nineteenth-century writer Edgar Allan Poe is remembered as the master of the short story and the psychological thriller.
  • Subjects: American Novels Writing Style
  • Pages: 5
  • Words: 1717

Love in Modern and Postmodern American Literature

The story depicts lives of African American people at the beginning of the twentieth century and the author resorts to slang language to make the atmosphere as close as possible to the original: "Woman am [...]
  • Subjects: Romantic Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1126

Dual Consciousness in the Novel Life of Pi

In the novel, Life of Pi, by Yann Martel, the protagonist is found in a state where the realm of self-awareness and human consciousness fails to make the difference between reality and illusion.
  • Subjects: Aspects of American Novels
  • Pages: 6
  • Words: 1710

Greek Tragedy Vs Shakespeare Tragedy

In the play Antigone, it is an interesting fact that the actions taken by Creon, the King of Thebes, is unsolicited by the citizens of Thebes but hardly anyone has the courage to utter it.
  • Subjects: World Philosophy Literature
  • Pages: 6
  • Words: 1694

Edward P. Jones’ “Young Lions”

In that regard, such perceptions are found throughout the whole story, from a particular sequence of the events, such as the death of Caesar's mother, the flowers stolen by Angelo, being beaten and kicked out [...]
  • Subjects: American Literature
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 854

Romanticism and Victorian Literature Comparison

In this respect, literature can be proud of the Romanticism and Victorian literature, because of their gradual framework and applicable emergence due to the significant events, such as the French Revolution, American Revolution, the defeat [...]
  • Subjects: Poems
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 936

“Teenage Wasteland” Short Story by Anne Tyler

Despite the fact that, throughout story's entirety, Cal is being presented to us as "progressive" educator, who seriously believed that endowing Donny with strongly defined sense of self-respect could have helped Daisy's son to straighten [...]
  • Subjects: Themes in American Novels
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 970

Kesey’s “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”

It is clear from the beginning of the story that McMurphy successfully feigns insanity to escape the hard work at the Pendleton Work Farm, "Do not overlook the possibility that this man might be feigning [...]
  • Subjects: World Philosophy Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1308

Society: Turning Men Into Monsters

In this respect, it is of paramount importance for us to mention the symbol of the beast, or some sort of threat.
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 9
  • Words: 2754

“Nature” by Ralph Waldo Emerson

Nature is therefore described as the origin of language and the end of the same, where language is said to be born out of nature and to terminate in the same form, making nature a [...]
  • Subjects: Poems
  • Pages: 10
  • Words: 2869

“Theme for English B” by Angston Hughes

According to Hughes, his voice cannot be white because he is black, but his relationship with the instructor does not allow his voice to remain black either.
  • Subjects: Poems
  • Pages: 9
  • Words: 2596

Gary Nash’s Book “The Urban Crucible”

Gary Nash is incensed by the lack of focus on the colonial urban centers in American history and the lack of interest or discussion of the issue of the class by the past renown historians [...]
  • Subjects: Historical Literature
  • Pages: 6
  • Words: 1866

Lower-Class Life in Raymond Carver’s Works

As she tells her story, it becomes clear that she is in the lower class of workers because she is a waitress in a small diner and lives with the cook, Rudy.
  • Subjects: American Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1457

“Red Sorghum” by Mo Yan

The present paper is intended to discuss and compare the ideas of women's position in Republican China as illustrated in the novel "Red Sorghum" by Mo Yan and the corresponding gender attitudes in the traditional [...]
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1350

Anti-Franklinian Stance of Rip Van Winkle’s Character

Metamophically Rip's nagging wife is the British petticoat governor in the colonial era, and Rip's reunion with his family symbolizes the American Revolution. They both held to the belief that Rip's character was an antithesis [...]
  • Subjects: American Literature
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 555

Fairy Tales and the “Folklore of the Human Mind”

Since the characters and the basic events of what happens to them remain relatively constant, it is helpful to study the characters of fairy tales in terms of the archetypes they represent.
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 8
  • Words: 2480

“The Open Boat” Short Story by Stephen Crane

As they struggle to survive through rationing of food and water, fighting off the exhaustion of body and mind, and contend with the sharks that come to investigate the boat, they continuously think about nature [...]
  • Subjects: American Literature
  • Pages: 1
  • Words: 261

Irony in “The Cask of Amontillado” by Edgar Allan Poe

As the atmosphere of gaiety during the carnival changes to the horror from the catacombs beneath Montresor's palazzo the reader ascertains that the carnival was a prelude created by the author to admit the drastic [...]
  • Subjects: American Literature
  • Pages: 5
  • Words: 1437

Andre Dubus “The Fat Girl”

"The Fat Girl" written by Andre Dubus illustrates the main problem of modern civilization that is the problem of the overweight. Andre Dubus used a number of cognitive metaphors to show the liveliness and the [...]
  • Subjects: Themes in American Novels
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 928

Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich

Even should this be the case, the restrictive way in which she is instructed to clean would serve as a viable justification for this unhappiness, not necessarily the physical labor of the maids themselves.
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 1000

Golden Age Writers and Their Impact on Literature

The chief events of his life were his unfortunate love for Lesbia, the death of his dearly loved brother, his journey to Bithynia, and his hostility to Caesar and his henchmen. Salty and subversive, Catullus [...]
  • 1
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 13
  • Words: 3441

Analysis of “The Black Cat” by Edgar Allan Poe

After having lost his cat when a fire broke in his house, he felt a great need for another pet, same as that of Pluto, his pet cat."This, then, was the very creature of which [...]
  • Subjects: American Literature
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 624

“The Secret Life of Bees” by Sue Monk Kidd

In "Secret Life of Bees", the references to bees serve as "conceptual cement", because it is namely these references that entitle Kidd's novel with moral wholesomeness.
  • Subjects: American Literature
  • Pages: 12
  • Words: 3183

“On the Road” by Langston Hughes

First of all, it is necessary to mention, that the poem "on the road" by Langston Hughes is the narration of the periods of the Great Depression.
  • Subjects: Poems
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 536

“Fleur” by Louise Erdrich

The reader explores, again, that Fleur's character is surrounded with mystery, when she is violated by one of the players and Pauline is not able to help her even she knows what is happening.
  • Subjects: American Literature
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 621

“A Letter to America” by Margaret Atwood

Using allusions, Atwood underlines that these stereotypes account for the unique association between characteristics of the American history and values, and can be seen as a set of unified factors that builds American culture and [...]
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 569

Novels by Conrad and Forster Comparison

The current paper is aimed at comparison of the works through three perspectives: the symbolism of the titles of the two novels, the way colonialism and racism are represented by the authors, and the way [...]
  • Subjects: Comparative Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1479

‘I Heard the Owl Call My Name’ by Margaret Craven

The title of the book brings out the presence of death through superstition, an owl calling the name of a person, which is believed to mean the person will soon die. That is why the [...]
  • Subjects: American Novels Influences
  • Pages: 5
  • Words: 1640

Oedipus: A Complex Character

The pride of Oedipus is not unfounded, as he is very clever, but he fails to give credit to the gods and the people around him as if he is the only source of wisdom.
  • Subjects: Plays
  • Pages: 5
  • Words: 1620

Analysis of The Naked Citadel by Susan Faludi

The cadets insist that this is an integral part of the Citadel, that promotes the lifestyle that they want the cadets to follow one of trust in one's fellow man and the sense that everyone [...]
  • Subjects: American Literature
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 947

Medusa in Greek Mythology

So, it should be pointed out that Medusa was the great character of the Ancient mythology and remains to be the significant image in the world of modern literature and art.
  • Subjects: Mythology
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 813

“To Build a Fire” by Jack London

The protagonist of the story is the man who "was a newcomer in the land, a chechaquo, and this was his first winter" and he is the prime tool at the hands of the writer [...]
  • Subjects: American Literature
  • Pages: 2
  • Words: 701

Chaucer’s “The Canterbury Tales” Review

He had made expeditions in Lithuania and in Russia, no knight of his degree so often; and many a time in Prussia he had sat at the head of the table alone all the knights [...]
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1284

“Eveline” Short Story by James Joyce

Eveline's story is an irony, this is because at the beginning of the story Eveline seems to be having a flashback of the people who have already gone to the East, and inwardly she develops [...]
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 917

Deconstructing Elizabeth Bishop’s Poem ‘The Fish’

As she describes it, the reader gets the impression that this fish is quite ugly and undesirable. In the first line, the poet calls this fish "tremendous", and according to the experience of the reader, [...]
  • Subjects: Poems
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 1157

Use of Language in Susan Glaspell’s ‘Trifles’

The play begins as the County Attorney and the Sheriff have come to investigate the murder and find the motive. Irony helps Glaspell to unveil women's right to suffrage and dramatize the situation.in the play, [...]
  • Subjects: American Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1167

Shakespeare’s Othello: A Tragic Hero

When Alexander the Great died, Aristotle fled to Chalcis, where he died the following year at the age of about 62 William Shakespeare was a strong adherent of Aristotle in his writings.
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 7
  • Words: 2137

“Liberty’s Daughters” by Mary Beth Norton

Only in recent decades have U.S.historians begun seriously to evaluate the mobilization of women and to consider the ways in which relations between men and women changed in the era of the American Revolution.
  • Subjects: Gender in Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1270

“Lord Jim” by Joseph Conrad

The life of Lord Jim seems to be surrounded by certain signs and symbols; in particular, colors have a deep and important meaning in the understanding of the nature of every character.
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 5
  • Words: 1678

The Concept of Shakespeare’s Creativity

Shakespeare's creativity is the top of the English Renaissance and the maximum synthesis of traditions of the all-European culture. The variety of Shakespearian works is worth paying attention to.
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 8
  • Words: 1865

“The Rape of the Lock” by Alexander Pope Review

Here Pope states the epic question or the primary concern of the poem: how a "well -bread lord could assault a gentle belle?" and in return how a "gentle belle" could reject a lord?
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 7
  • Words: 1891

“Incident” by Countee Cullen

In 1923, he graduated from the New York University and published his first book of poetry, "Color". His works are in the tradition of Keats and Shelley, resistant to the techniques of modernism.
  • Subjects: Poems
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 904

Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll

In some ways, Alice resembles the ideal female character of the period, but there are also several ways in which she breaks the mold, such as in her willingness to assert herself and her ability [...]
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 6
  • Words: 1512

Poetry v. Prose: Their Differences and Overlaps

Fiction can possibly include the happenings of everyday life and is reliant on the person that narrates the happenings, the manner of its narration, and its composition.
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 903

Hesitation and Indeterminacy of Hamlet

There is no denying the importance of the fact that the whole fabric of Shakespeare's tragedy unfolds in Hamlet subjective perception and interpretation of his uncle and mother' treason.
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 920

Racial Discrimination in “A Raisin in the Sun”

Racial discrimination is the main theme of the book, strongly reflecting the situation that prevailed during the 1950s in the United States, a time when the story's Younger family lived in Chicago's South Side ghetto.
  • Subjects: Plays
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 818

The Idea of Insanity in “Hamlet”

He is maybe a bit spoiled and used to getting his own way, but he knows he has a duty to the state and to his family and he knows he is destined to someday [...]
  • Subjects: Plays
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1353

Shakespeare: A Feminist Writer

A careful analysis of Lady Macbeth's intensely complicated character and her role in the play proves that Shakespeare is actually a feminist writer.
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 968

“The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost: Advice for Life

As Bellah points out, the title of the poem is "The Road Not Taken" rather than "The Road Less Taken", which provides the first clue as to the author's original intentions and a different reading [...]
  • Subjects: American Novels Influences
  • Pages: 6
  • Words: 1961

Utopia by Sir Thomas More Review

The aim of the study is to relate the perennial appeal of the text to the particular point of view it presents on economics and political relations; on family life and social structure; on art [...]
  • Subjects: British Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1435

Wordsworth’s Romanticism in Tintern Abbey Poem

The tone of the poem is calm and meditative and Wordsworth describes the "landscape" and compares it to the "quiet" of the sky: "The landscape with the quiet of the sky"..
  • Subjects: Poems
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1051

Coincidences Led to Consequences

Still, Tess realizes the bitter irony of her situation and at a slight provocation from Alec she stabs him to death:
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 906

Shakespearean Sonnets from Critical Perspectives

The excellence of the sonnets is the excellence of parts. Although the sonnets proclaim his affection for the young man and his indulgence of him, they also disclose the attitudes which Shakespeare takes to both [...]
  • Subjects: Poems
  • Pages: 21
  • Words: 5734

Shakespeare’s Presentation of Henry V as a Hero

Thus, Henry is not a hero to everybody in the play including the French and Catherine. If at all, the women in the play offer a challenge to the values of Henry and his male [...]
  • Subjects: Plays
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 1043

The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka: Cause and Effect

Multiple causes are in force right in the first few paragraphs: the horrendous transformation that Gregor has undergone, the panic and anxiety that the family members feel when Gregor is not responding to urgent summons [...]
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1122

Thomas Mann’s “Death in Venice” Critical Reading

He becomes a slave to his love for the boy and no traces of the famous aristocratic author remains. Before Aschenbach traveled to Venice, he was a disciple of the god Apollo, god of reason [...]
  • Subjects: World Literature
  • Pages: 4
  • Words: 1147

Ernest Hemingway’s Masculine Dominance

However, he was dedicated to his craft and to the integrity of his stories; an integral aspect of this dedication was presenting experiences as realistically as possible.
  • Subjects: Writers
  • Pages: 5
  • Words: 1562

Gabriel Conroy’s Epiphany in “The Dead” by James Joyce

On the background of trivial worries, conversations, and desires, the main character acknowledges the relativeness of the meaning of life that is nothing more than a memory other people will have about an individual after [...]
  • Subjects: American Novels Influences
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 985

Poetry Comparison by Emily Dickinson and Langston Hughes

The general impression of Emily Dickinson's poems is that they are very economical with words and the message being conveyed. The general impression of these poems is that the writer feels oppressed and discriminated against [...]
  • Subjects: Comparative Literature
  • Pages: 3
  • Words: 861

Ritual Performance and Cosmology in the Rig Veda

Despite differences in the interpretation of features text as a whole, the data remained of the most ancient Indian religious texts allows restoring some elements of mythology and cosmology of the Vedic Indians. Altogether, it [...]
  • Subjects: World Philosophy Literature
  • Pages: 7
  • Words: 1730