Dammed Beliefs

The texts ‘Sonnets from the Portuguese’ (1845) by Elizabeth Barrett Browning and F. Scott Fitzgerald’s ‘The Great Gatsby’ (1926). Both explore the universal values of idealised love, limitation of time and hope of restoration. As such inherently reflected through their relevant contexts of the Victorian Era and 1920’s Jazz age value systems. Even though the text share similar themes their interpretation completely differ influenced by diverse historical context, personal experiences and human values.

As Ralph Emerson said, “Nothing can bring you peace but yourself. Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of principles” (last sentence of book). Remaining true to himself, McCandless was able to achieve what he considered to be meaningful in life. From the start of his journey, it is seen that being true to oneself is challenging, as others are living in a world that demands them to alter their identity. However, one must stay true and authentic and understand the desires and needs, in order to attain an adequate living, just like Chris McCandless. In today’s society, self-reliance and non-conformity is an annotation on the tenets that people still value. Some people in today’s world have seemed to forgotten the ability to be content in isolation and individuality. Being true to oneself takes bravery and it compels one to be pensive and unbiased. Like Chris McCandless, he was pensive and unbiased without being thoughtless or impertinent to others. Chris McCandless was also self-reliant and did not conform, which led him to define himself of who he truly

In Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, Mr. Collins’ marriage proposal to Elizabeth Bennet is instigated by society’s impetus for him to do so. Irony and satire are weaved within the proposal, ridiculing the litany of reasons given of why such an action is prompted because superficial reasons are presented as the basis of Mr. Collins’ rationale.

How do we establish virtue? For most of us, the answer is not so easily encountered, and nuance and ambiguity persistently muddy our paths to righteousness. In The Romance of the Forest, however, Ann Radcliffe explicitly crafts her characters’ morality, inventing a limited spectrum upon which most of her characters fall. On the side of uncomplicated wholesomeness exists Adeline and the La Luc family, whose introductions inform their goodness in plain terms. Conversely, the novel’s main antagonist, the Marquis de Montalt, inhabits the side of primarily uncomplicated evil (or at least, expressing a privation of righteousness). Although a convincing argument might be made that Radcliffe’s characters are all, at different moments, sympathetic and morally

In the award winning article, “Passages in Mary Shelly's Frankenstein: Towards a Feminist Figure of Humanity?” Cynthia Pon addresses masculinity and feminism in terms of conventions, ideals, and practices (Pon, 33). She focused on whether Mary Shelly's work as a writer opened the way to a feminist figure of humanity like Donna Haraway argued. The article has a pre-notion that the audience has read Frankenstein and Haraway's article. Pon has a slight bias, due to her passion as a feminist writer. It may skew her thinking and at times be subjective. The intended audience is someone who is studying literature and interested in how women are portrayed in novels in the 19th century. The organization of the article allows anyone to be capable of reading it.

In Virginia Woolf’s essays, entitled “The Professions for Women” and “Virginia Woolf”, she describes women’s domestic lives in the early 20th century. Woolf’s writing also sets the scene for a period when women’s place existed in the private sphere, while men’s place was the public. The aim of this paper is to explore the domestic lives of women through the lens of marriage, social class and domesticity by reviewing the writings of Virginia Woolf, Alice Wood’s essay, “Made for Measure”, Susan Glaspell’s play, “Trifles”, and Alice Dunbar-Nelson’s poem, “I Sit and Sew”. The common themes described in the writing of all four authors are the subordination and oppression of women in a society controlled

Margret Atwood’s short story “Lusus Naturae” is known as a work of fiction in which a monster uncommonly plays the role of the protagonist. Discussing character dynamics, it is interesting to examine the symbolic meaning behind the girl as a monster in this story. Is this text simply a fantasy created with the goal to serve solely as a horror story with a typical ending, or does this tale have a deeper meaning encompassing the treatment of women and their sexuality throughout history. Through close reading of “Lusus Naturae,” I plan to use evidence from the text to illustrate symbolic parallels between the unusual protagonist and the known historical role women held in society.

In literature, an author’s life experiences are often reflected in their writing. Likewise, the environment and time period of an author, plays a crucial role in the development of their stories. Many cultural, historical and political references are made in literary works. In her short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper,” Charlotte Perkins Gilman reflects upon her own struggles, along with the struggles that women faced in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century.

At the start of both A Thousand Splendid Suns and Pride and Prejudice, the novels’ protagonists hold a great deal of respect for their fathers. Mariam, born out of wedlock, lives with her mother and only sees her father Jalil once every week. Despite this, Jalil is Mariam’s hero for most of her adolescence, his visits being “all smiles and gifts and endearments…and, for this, Mariam loved Jalil.” (Hosseini, Khaled. "Chapter 1." A Thousand Splendid Suns. New York: Riverhead, 2007. 4-6. Print.) This depiction of Jalil as a type of savior in the beginning of the novel juxtaposed with his real disposition as a selfish man showcases the change in Mariam’s perception of the world. In a similar fashion, Mr. Bennet of Pride and Prejudice is held in high esteem though his shortcomings,

Charlotte Bronte’s classic heartfelt novel entitled “Jane Eyre” depicts how an unloved orphan constantly wishes for affection and acceptance throughout her life. Even at an early age in life, she never truly understood what it meant to be “loved” and what it means to “love” others. With this, maturing into a young lady definitely opened her eyes to the realities of life. Moreover, the novel also depicts a patriarchal society where women aren’t respected with dignity and equality. In this coming of age novel, discover how a young woman courageously faced her fears and triumphed with love in the end. Unraveling the acclaimed novel definitely showcased how in the end “Love conquers all”. Truly, Jane Eyre will forever remain as a masterpiece of art due to its dynamic characters, insightful themes and exquisitely crafted sense of style and writing.

Perhaps the most misunderstood term, Blessed Be has many myths and misconceptions surrounding it as well.

Living in the 17th century was much different than the 21st century for women. Over three hundred years ago, there were certain traditions and standards that were in place for women. These standards were the norm for women; it was expected of them to uphold these standards. In the 17th century, it was very common for a woman’s identity and property to be connected to her father or her husband. These women were also responsible for maintaining a proper image of herself to her society. If a woman chose to break these rules, she would be subject to public ridicule. In Hannah Webster Foster’s novel The Coquette, the main character, Eliza Wharton, roams from these standards that she must follow. Because she does not follow the norms of the society, she is faced with ridicule from her friends, and fall tragically to an undesirable death. This novel portrays a true

In the nineteenth century, American writers became obsessed with the Realism movement. They started to focus on problems of that century such as wife abuse, child neglect and women’s freedom. They wrote about the middle class that suffers from different social problems especially women who act against their social norms and traditions. Realistic writers try to represent the events and social conditions as they really are without idealism. They show the harsh and cruel reality of the surrounding environment that women live in without framing that reality in beautiful frame. This is obvious in William Dean Howells’s “Editha” and Henry James’s “Daisy Miller”. Both Editha and Daisy share the same characteristic of the New Woman. These two women redefine the feminine ideology of women who suffer from following the social norms of their culture. They believe that women should have freedom as well as men, and they are responsible for making decisions in their lives without under

Artificial intelligence represents the two qualities that distinguish man from machine: emotional realism and relatability. However, the closest modern society has come to recreating the human form has been through literature; a book is nothing without syntax and diction, but it is meaningless without a developed character. In The Woman Warrior, Maxine Hong Kingston develops her character through the use of personal commentary, self-perceptions, and interaction with a silent Chinese student.

In 1880s, women in America were trapped by their family because of the culture that they were living in. They loved their family and husband, but meanwhile, they had hard time suffering in same patterns that women in United States always had. With their limited rights, women hoped liberation from their family because they were entirely complaisant to their husband. Therefore, women were in conflicting directions by two compelling forces, their responsibility and pressure. In A Doll’s House, Ibsen uses metaphors of a doll’s house and irony conversation between Nora and Torvald to emphasize reality versus appearance in order to convey that the Victorian Era women were discriminated because of gender and forced to make irrational decision by inequity society.