Literary Criticism essays

1291 samples in this category

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2 Pages 913 Words
Director Matt Edgerton writes ‘Great plays provoke us they disturb and confront us’. Macbeth continues to have relevance to audiences today because … of the universal themes that are still relevant today. Two of the biggest themes in the plays are the corrupting power of the unchecked ambition and guilt and remorse. Both can be found widely across our current...
Critical ThinkingLiterary CriticismMacbeth Guilt
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4 Pages 1688 Words
John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath (1939) is a novel that explores and highlights modern gender roles of the decade and also portrays Steinbeck's modernized ideology towards the traditional patriarchal system during a time of great change. The proletarian novelist displayed his ability to perfectly portray the hardships faced during his experience of The Great Depression, allowing his readers to...
CharacterGrapes of WrathLiterary Criticism
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2 Pages 844 Words
Introduction Emily Brontë's novel, "Wuthering Heights," is replete with complex characters and intricate narrative structures. Among these, Mr. Lockwood serves as both a peripheral character and a crucial narrative device. His role as the initial narrator provides a lens through which readers first encounter the tumultuous world of Wuthering Heights. Lockwood's seemingly detached and often bewildered perspective is instrumental in...
CharacterLiterary CriticismWuthering Heights
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5 Pages 2082 Words
It could suggest that the past is not ‘dead’, due to its emphasis and depth of portrayal, as well as its common reoccurrence throughout both texts. Ishiguro and Williams both use their first-person narratives to explore themes and central character depictions, by creating a retrospective, backward-looking tone, reflecting the strong emotional attachment characters have to their past. ‘Never Let Me...
DystopiaLiterary CriticismNever Let Me Go
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2 Pages 903 Words
Identity is a fickle thing it could lead you in a straight path through life or lead you to your death. Shakespeare creates doubt in both his play Hamlet and the character Hamlet in regard to identity through a form of self-referentiality. Shakespeare, the author himself, struggles with his identity that ultimately affects the identity of the play. Hamlet’s hamartia...
HamletHamlet MadnessLiterary Criticism
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2 Pages 941 Words
The Awakening is a novel with the really helpful useful resource of Kate Chopin, first posted in 1822, set in New Orleans and the Southern Louisiana coast at the cease of the nineteenth Century. The plot amenities spherical Edna Pontellier and her struggle to reconcile her an growing vary of unorthodox view on femininity and motherhood with the prevailing social...
Kate ChopinLiterary CriticismThe Awakening
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2 Pages 1082 Words
Introduction In Lorraine Hansberry's seminal play, A Raisin in the Sun, the character of Beneatha Younger stands out as a multifaceted individual striving to define her identity amidst the socio-economic and racial challenges of mid-20th-century America. As the Younger family's younger daughter, Beneatha's journey is emblematic of the broader African American quest for self-actualization and cultural affirmation. Her character is...
A Raisin in the SunCharacterLiterary Criticism
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1 Page 640 Words
Introduction 'Revolutionary Road,' written by Richard Yates, is a thought-provoking novel that delves into the lives of Frank and April Wheeler, a young couple struggling with the realities of suburban life in the 1950s. The novel explores various themes, including the pursuit of personal fulfillment, societal expectations, and the complexities of marriage. One significant aspect of the story is the...
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2 Pages 1050 Words
Mary Shelley, with her splendid story of humanity's fixation on two restricting powers: creation and science, keeps on drawing perusers with Frankenstein's numerous implications and impact on society. Frankenstein has had a significant impact crosswise overwriting and popular culture and was one of the significant supporters of a new sort of ghastliness. Frankenstein is most celebrated for being viewed as...
FrankensteinLiterary CriticismNovel
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2 Pages 939 Words
A key theme of the short story is mental health. The narrator struggles with his sanity. He begins by asking the reader directly, 'How then am I mad? Hearken! and observe how healthily, how calmly, I can tell you the whole story.' this then leads into a paragraph that essentially says that he is going to kill an old man...
Literary CriticismShort StoryThe Tell Tale Heart
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4 Pages 1745 Words
Prometheus Unbound, a lyrical drama depicting the resistance of Prometheus against the supreme ruler of Jupiter, was published by Percy Bysshe Shelley in the early 1800s. This drama depicted the punishment Prometheus received on a mountaintop since he gave fire to humanity. Shelley published this story in 1820, which was during a period of great social upheaval in England due...
ForgivenessLiterary CriticismPerspective
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1 Page 561 Words
Another tool Geoffrey Chaucer includes in his fabliau tale centered around immorality is an engaging love story. The plot revolves around an unorthodox love triangle. Both men involved in this threesome attempt to win Alisoun’s hand by any means necessary, as discussed in the previous paragraph. This story about romance and courtship helps Chaucer in his purpose to uncover the...
CheatingLiterary CriticismThe Canterbury Tales
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1 Page 661 Words
Urban decay is the setting. Why is this important? Urban decay is very important as a setting in 1984, as it is another example of an unjust social system. The Inner Party doesn't care about the living conditions of the Outer Party and the Proles, it shows they don’t have their best interests at heart. If the people they govern...
1984Literary CriticismNovel
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1 Page 474 Words
“Is this a dagger I see before me, The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee. I have thee not, and yet I see thee still. Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible To feeling as to sight, or art thou but A dagger of the mind, a false creation, Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?” This is a reflection...
Literary CriticismMacbethWilliam Shakespeare
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3 Pages 1568 Words
The importance of this scene illustrates how truly innocent Desdemona is, innocent of the crime of adultery, which she has been wrongly accused, by her husband, Othello and innocent in regard to the ways of the world. If Desdemona doubts whether women are capable of cheating, this shows how distant she is from committing such an act. The whole scene...
CharacterLiterary CriticismOthello
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1 Page 406 Words
In a harsh future, a firefighter whose obligation is to demolish all books starts to scrutinize his assignment. Fellow Montag is a fireman who lives in a desolate, confined society where books have been banned by the government who are in fear of a freethinking society. In Fahrenheit 451, Bradbury uses weather to display character’s emotions and to foreshadow events...
Fahrenheit 451Literary CriticismRay Bradbury
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1 Page 516 Words
Satire is the use of humor, irony, or exaggeration to expose and criticize people’s immoral behavior, usually when it has to deal with politics or other controversial topics. It can also be described as any piece of writing or media that was designed to make the reader feel critical, whether it be of themselves, their peers, or their society. It...
Gulliver’s TravelsLiterary CriticismSatire
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3 Pages 1267 Words
Working hard and thoroughly planning is a necessary key to accomplishing the goals one will set in life, but what usually happens is that something will go wrong, and it’s usually something out of anyone’s control. Despite how stressful and discouraging it is to see plans and schedules get messed up, the only thing that can be done now is...
HopeLiterary CriticismMarriage
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2 Pages 727 Words
When the word “feminist” comes to mind, people typically tend to think of a strong independent female. However, historically speaking, women have been portrayed as emotionally, weak and inferior to men. Until recently, women have been unable to shake off the image of “a damsel in distress” who is only ever capable of caring and loving. Even though Mary Shelley’s...
CharacterFrankensteinLiterary Criticism
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3 Pages 1335 Words
There are many existential questions that modern philosophers still have yet to answer. Some of these questions follow the question of Who am I? What is my purpose in life? How do I know what to believe? Many philosophers have spent their entire lives trying to answer these questions but none have been able to truly answer those questions before...
CharacterHamletLiterary Criticism
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2 Pages 873 Words
Introduction Karen M. McManus's novel, One of Us Is Lying, presents a compelling exploration of adolescent turmoil, mystery, and identity. The story unfolds in a high school setting, where five students walk into detention, but only four leave alive. Each character in the narrative carries a unique role, contributing to a multifaceted storyline that captivates the reader's attention. This essay...
CharacterLiterary CriticismLying
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3 Pages 1141 Words
Development 'No [woman] can be esteemed accomplished who does not greatly surpass what is usually met with. A woman must have a thorough knowledge of music, singing, drawing, dancing, and the modern languages, to deserve the word; and besides all this, she must possess a certain something in her air and manner of walking, the tone of her voice, her...
CharacterJane AustenLiterary Criticism
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2 Pages 904 Words
'A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings' by Gabriel Garcia Marquez is a magnificent illustration of society’s deficiencies. The story primarily focuses on individuals’ lack of value, and judgements towards their neighbor and highlights the nature of human beings and inconsistency of faith by contrasting the community's reactions to the old man. When an angel comes into your house, what...
3 Pages 1287 Words
‘... a renewed sense of passion for the wild, the unfamiliar, the irregular, and the irrational’. (1317) This is how David Damrosch described the Romantic literary movement in ‘ The Longman Anthology of British Literature’. In this essay, I aim to prove that Emily Bronte’s ‘Wuthering Heights embodies these core concepts and as a result shows that this text is...
Literary CriticismRomanticismWuthering Heights
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1 Page 662 Words
The theme of good vs evil is practically the heart of this literary epic just like the heart of Te Fiti is the constant in the movie Moana. Each character in the story plays a role that allows for the development of the theme of good vs evil. Each character also has a background and motives that provide good reasoning...
BeowulfLiterary CriticismPoetry
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2 Pages 1047 Words
In the memoir, A Long Way Gone, by Ishmael Beah, He shares his experiences that we can learn more about and understand and he guides us through his daily life. For Beah, his childhood is not very pleasant and he encountered the horrors of war, loss of innocence, and how humans can change given the circumstances they endure. Throughout the...
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7 Pages 3117 Words
Christine de Pizan, a prominent moralist and political thinker, defends the excellence and good virtue of women in her book City of Ladies. It is through this book that she wants to underline the critical roles women play within society which are commonly forgotten or not acknowledged with the help of the three virtues: Reason, Rectitude, and Justice. Christine tackles...
AntigoneLiterary CriticismTragedy
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3 Pages 1236 Words
The American Dream has played a pivotal role in the aspirations of many Americans. Although the American Dream has been traditionally represented by the idealistic symbol of the “white picket fence”, the dream is perceived differently by different people. For many, this dream resides in the acquisition of money. However, for the characters in literary works such as A Raisin...
A Raisin in the SunCharacterLiterary Criticism
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5 Pages 2308 Words
In the 1872 novella Carmilla and the 1897 novel Dracula, both Le Fanu and Stoker bestow the treatment of women as a catalyst for exposing the dangers of gender stereotypes, to illuminate social concerns and injustices for the reader that were occurring at the time in Victorian. These injustices are mirrored in the above statement. Both authors allude to the...
DraculaGothic FictionLiterary Criticism
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3 Pages 1560 Words
Throughout the 1950s life was very limited for African American women. They were racially discriminated against and classified as second-class. African American people were afraid to stand up for their rights, and the limited freedoms they had were lost. In the 1950’s colored people were mistreated and abused by white people because of their lower status. 'A Raisin in the...
A Raisin in the SunCharacterLiterary Criticism
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