Narrating Modernity: The structural dynamics in “The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie”
In this paper I intend to talk about Muriel Spark’s The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie as an example of the modernist movement and how certain features of the modernist period were incorporated in this literary text. With ingenious story-telling techniques and fascinating characters the novel becomes compelling and engrossing. Therefore any modern day reader will find it to be “the crème de la crème.” Spark have used certain modernist techniques such as the text loses chronology and hence time is circular. There is little description as modernists like more to allude to things. The stream of character’s consciousness is represented, that’s why the works are often fragmentary. And as a
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The way Chapter One ends with Mary MacGregor making a fool out of herself at Miss Brodie’s lesson and how suddenly Chapter Two begins with Mary’s death some years later is an example of this. The novel opens in 1936, goes back to 1930 and uses time shifts to indicate the rise of the Brodie set and the fall of Miss Brodie. Also, before the reader knows the reason for Jean’s downfall, the date of her death is given. Sometimes it is difficult for a reader to deal with such a method, because one is uncertain when, or even where something has happened. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie make full use of the combination of time-shifts and the reader himself must make logic out of the
Jane Eyre is presented as a fiction, encompassing the romance and gothic genre. Jacob’s text, on the other hand, is a narrative non-fiction and an autobiography of Harriet Jacobs herself as Linda Brent. At first glance, everything opposes Harriet Jacob’s Incidents in the life of a slave girl and Brontë’s Jane Eyre. However, if we dig a little further, we see that the two texts share some similarities. Both texts are based on the Bildungsroman genre, whereby we follow the lives of the main characters as they progress through their life.
Keir Nason AP English Literature and Composition Mrs. Schroeder January 3, 2018 Politics and literature are far from strange bedfellows. Social commentary and allegory have been tools in the literary toolbox since Ancient Greece, with Plato’s Allegory of The Cave being one of the earliest forms of the device. Science fiction is an entire genre that, at least to a degree, is based upon the premise of looking at the problems of today through the eyes of tomorrow. Oftentime, authors seek to tackle the issues of their time within their writing, and Kate Chopin was no different when she published her final work The Awakening in 1899. At the time of The Awakening’s release, many works strived to address the rights of women, with the Suffragette
In chapter 6, Jem, Dill, and Scout go over to the Radley house on Dill’s last night to try and see Boo Radley through a window. Instead, they see a shadowy figure in the yard and a gunshot goes off, scaring them and forcing them to run away from the property. While they are running away, Jem loses his pants and leaves them behind. Once they get back home, they join the group outside huddled near the Radley house. Jem is questioned about where his pants are and responds with how he lost them in a game of strip poker.
Introduction is a decisive part in a novel since it may introduce important key facts about the work to the reader. “Ceremony”, by Leslie Marmon Silko, opens with a compilation of poems, some larger than others, but all equally important for the novel. Poetry is found throughout the whole novel, however the introducing poems are the most powerful ones because they foreshadow what the novel is going to be about. They prepare the reader for what is coming next and introduce the major themes of the novel. This essay will analyze the first three poems and explain their importance in the novel’s foreshadowing.
To Kill a Mockingbird On a rainy day, a man at the bus stop asks for change. The two choices are walking past him avoiding eye contact, or giving him the change with a smile. Before even talking to this man, one may have already made the assumption that he is homeless or a drug addict wanting to buy his next high. But assumptions cannot accurately explain who he is or why he needs money.
To Kill A Mockingbird Literary Analysis Throughout To Kill A MockingBird, by Harper Lee there are many acts of courage. This is shown in Atticus Finch, Jem Finch, and Boo Radley. Atticus shows the most courage in the book but all three of these characters show true courage in some way, shape, or form. Boo Radley showed a lot of courage, but he was not in the storyline as much as Atticus. Throughout To Kill A Mockingbird, courage is defined as standing up for people and doing what’s right.
Suspense is what makes a book become an outstanding book. This is why Harper Lee, author of To Kill a Mockingbird, heaped suspense into the book. Interestingly, suspense is defined as a state or feeling of excited or anxious uncertainty about what may happen. Lee uses numerous literary techniques to develop suspense in the story. Two that she uses to employ suspense is cliffhangers and imagery.
In a novel where liberal ideals and forming one’s own morals is emphasized, Jean Louise, a young woman highlights these ideas. During this time period, there was a de facto filial piety, where the younger members of a generation followed their elders, this was even moreso for women, who still faced inequality everyday. Thus, by characterizing Jean Louise as a progressive, young woman, Harper Lee tactfully instills the theme upon readers, that questioning society and forming beliefs true to one’s self is key. This is further seen in how Jean Louise returns to Maycomb and uproots beliefs that had been underlying for decades, and she does so by questioning those she had once seen as role models, and forming her own
In the novel we follow the protagonist, a young Victorian woman who struggles to overcome the oppressive patriarchal society in which she is entrapped. It is a story of enclosure and escape, from the imprisonment of her childhood to the possible entrapment of her daunting marriage. Throughout the novel Jane must fight against her inevitable future that society has already chosen for her. We see her attempt to overcome the confinements of her given gender, background and status. She must prove her worth against the men she encounters throughout her life, showing her equality in intelligence and strength.
There is a myriad of examples to be seen of Jean Finch being disillusioned by Atticus. For example, in chapter 8 of Go Set a Watchman, Atticus says, "I especially liked the part where the Negroes, bless their hearts, couldn't help being inferior to the white race because their skulls are thicker and their brain-pans shallower—whatever that means—so we must all be very kind to them and not let them do anything to hurt themselves and keep them in their places. " This quote said by Atticus lists Negroes as an inferior race that needs to be supported and lead by white people. This shocks Jean by Atticus saying that he is far superior to the Negroes in all ways when in the past Atticus stood up for them and tried to give them equality. Another case of a racist comment from Atticus, in chapter 17, asks, "Do you want Negroes by the carload in our schools and churches and theaters?
Essay 1 Date Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird “To kill a Mockingbird” is a novel in which Harper Lee, the author, presents forth various themes among them the unheard theme of social molarity. Harper dramatically uses a distinctive language through Scout, who is the narrator of the story to bring out the difficulties faced by children living in the southern Alabama town of Maycomb. Harper has dramatically displayed use of bildungsroman throughout the story; this helped to give the story a unique touch of a child’s view to bring out a different type of humor and wit. It has also used to develop and thrive the theme of morality in the society.
To kill A MockingBird Essay/ Character analysis Although there multiple interesting characters in To Kill A Mockingbird there is one that is quite fascinating. Her name is Jean Louise Finch or Scout as she is often referred to as. She is the narrator of the story and most of it comes from her point of view. Scout is a small, caucasian girl living in Maycomb County, Alabama.
Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca has captivated audiences since its initial release in 1938. Upon its initial publication, the novel did not receive the kind of critical acclaim one might expect from a novel with the commercial success at the time of its first publication and with such lasting influence. Sally Beauman writes in the afterword to the novel that while “some critics acknowledged the book’s haunting power and its vice-like narrative grip, but — perhaps misled by the book’s presentation, or prejudiced by the gender of the author — they delved no deeper” (Beauman 431). The novel was not merely overlooked, however. With the novel following the “the archetypal scenario for all those mildly thrilling romantic encounters between a scowling Byronic hero (who owns a gloomy mansion) and a trembling heroine (who can’t quite figure out the mansion’s floorplan)” (Gilbert and Gubar 337), it was and often continues to be seen as a rewriting of Jane Eyre into a more modern timeframe.
1.4 Literature overview At the end of the nineteen century, was published a book, for the first time, concerning Jane Austen’s literary work. Exactly in 1890, the writer Godwin Smith gave for printing Life of Jane Austen, and from then he started a new era which values the author’s literary legacy, so others begun to write critics; thus, this moment marked the first step of the authorized criticism, focused on Austen’s writing style. In conformity with B.C. Southam Critical Heritage, the criticism attributed to Jane had increased after 1870 and became formal and organized. Therefore, “we see the novels praised for their elegance of form and their surface ‘finish’; for the realism of their fictional world, the variety and vitality of their characters;
Study wants to show that Virginia Woolf created two very different characters but with a very interesting and complex connection. The first one is Mrs. Ramsay, a woman still belonging to the Victorian age, the second, Lily Briscoe, here called a “New woman”. My intention is also to analyze the significance of Lily’s painting and how it symbolizes and represents her coming to terms with her homosexuality, and simultaneously her feelings towards Mrs. Ramsay. To the Lighthouse depends almost on the passing of time, it expands or contracts the sense of time very freely It is a book, with an ironical or wistful query and questions of life and reality.