Nowadays, authors and publishers assume different values when they aim to offer the audience this or that book. This tendency can be explored in some books’ characteristics. For example, books may be produced of different mediums, and according to varied standards of their quality. They may be of the hardcover or not, with many attractive and colorful illustrations or not, of high quality of paper or not…All of these books’ characteristics reflect on their manufacturers’ beliefs regarding their real value. It is well-known that authors and publishers of different times and different cultures had different purposes in their minds when they produced their pieces of the written word. To explore this phenomenon, I will address a few examples including “Beowulf’, Milton’s “Paradise Lost”, and Pope’s “Rape of the Lock”.
First of all, evaluating these pieces of literature, I should make an emphasis on “Beowulf” because it is a poem of real value. Its unknown creator or group of creators aimed to realize their deep thoughts and the vision of the world for their generation and all the generations to follow (Damrosch, Alliston, Brown, Dubois, and Hafez 11). Secondly, a similar conclusion can be made regarding Milton’s “Paradise Lost” as in this work, the author shares his religious beliefs and the world vision that he considers to be true and right for eternity. However, such a conclusion cannot be made regarding Pope’s “Rape of the Lock”. This piece of literature is not a work of so to say, an eternal value that can be explained by the transient nature of the life experience addressed in it.
Works Cited
Damrosch, David, April Alliston, Marshall Brown, Page duBois, and Sabry Hafez.
Longman Anthology of World Literature, vol. 1. The United Kingdom: Longman, 2004. Print.