Facing the Elements:Comparing Stories from the Norton Anthology
Facing the Elements: Comparing Stories from the Norton Anthology Without a conclusion a story would become life as it is before death, it would keep going on, as each new page would become yet another story to tell. Fortunately, for the trees of our world, authors have come up with a way to find a place in the story to end their narrative. Many writers use the concept of close-ended stories, which normally wrap up the story with the "Good outwitting the Evil", and "the situation that was destabilized at the beginning becomes stable once again" (Beaty, 15). In open-ended stories the reader is left wondering about many aspects about the story, such as in "The Use of Force", where a little girl is left sitting on the lap on one of the three adults that have just finished assaulting her. Does she grow up fearing doctors and dentists? Does she even grow up, or does she succumb to the ravages of Diphtheria? Using the elements of theme, symbol and point of view in this essay I intend to compare "The Cask of Amontillado" and "The Use of Force", and state why I prefer one to the other. Both stories focus on the theme of society's fascination with life stories that are different and unique; they focus on things with a dark side. "The Cask of Amontillado", is an excellent tale of revenge, and of the evilness that lurks in a chosen few. Montressor, the protagonist and
In the beginning of the Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka Grete plays a very important role in the life of Gregor.
In the beginning of the Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka Grete plays a very important role in the life of Gregor. Grete is portrayed as a loving and devoted sister with an amazing musical talent. Her seemingly strong bond to her brother remains even after Gregor's transformation. She shows her devotion when she takes sole responsibility as Gregor's caretaker and only provider. She cleans up after him and assures he is fed each day. By doing this she still seems to care for her brother despite his condition. It is also Grete that comes up with the idea to move out all of Gregor's furniture so that he may have more space to move around his room more freely. However as the novel progresses Grete becomes more and more distant and begins to drift away from her brother. One can notice that Grete seems to have done all this work and cared for Gregor only out of family duty rather than for actual human relations. It is almost as though she has to pay back Gregor for all he has done but money is the only reason she is doing this. This shows us one noticeable theme in this novel: how money drives us as people. Our whole world is based around money just as the case for the Samsas. When Gregor becomes ill he hears his sister weeping in the room next to him and he reasons, thinking "why was she crying? Because he wouldn't get up and let the chief clerk in, because he was in danger of loosing
Dr Jekyll cannot be considered responsible for Mr Hyde's crimes. Do you agree?
Dr Jekyll cannot be considered responsible for Mr Hyde's crimes. Do you agree? Dr Jekyll cannot be considered for Mr Hyde's crimes. Dr Jekyll has kept Mr Hyde inside himself for a very long, time and it was his decision to let him out. Mr Hyde does the things that Dr Jekyll would like to do but he doesn't because they are not allowed in the Victorian times. Mr Hyde is the evil inside of Dr Jekyll. When Mr Hyde comes out he does what Dr Jekyll is telling him to do, he does not think about the crimes he is going to commit. Dr Jekyll lets Hyde out whenever he wants to, he is responsible for letting him out but that does not mean that he is responsible for the crimes Mr Hyde commits. Stevenson is trying to portray the point that everybody has a Mr Hyde inside themselves and he is just showing one of them. Stevenson uses the techniques of that they have different handwriting, same house and same memory. Stevenson is making their appearances different but inside they are the same person. Dr Jekyll has a mask on, he doesn't let Hyde out during the day, and he lets him out during the night. He only lets him out during the night because he doesn't want society to judge him, but neither can Hyde, society can. Also when Hyde is let out at night you know something scary is going to happen as all horror films occur during night time. Everybody has a Mr Hyde inside themselves. On page 7
Female Narrator. Within Daniel Defoes novel Moll Flanders, he expertly produces the voice of a woman. His ability to make the narrative one that is effortlessly female is aided by numerous factors.
Dr. Nigel Joseph English 2500 E 4 October 2008 Realism and Emotion: Creating the Female Narrator Within Daniel Defoe's novel Moll Flanders, he expertly produces the voice of a woman. His ability to make the narrative one that is effortlessly female is aided by numerous factors. The realism of the text, the factuality of the prose, and the uncensored emotions of the narrator lend a feminine persona to Defoe's protagonist. Despite having no direct experience, Defoe masterfully ventriloquizes the voice of a woman and thus makes the character of Moll Flanders believable and limitlessly interesting. Through his own personal experiences within seventeenth and eighteenth century England, Defoe acquires the necessary tools to create a believable female character and thus makes Moll Flanders an example of novel that brilliantly captures the emotions and experiences of a woman. Within Moll Flanders, the female voice becomes realistic because of the experiences of the author, Daniel Defoe. It is not what Moll, the protagonist, thinks or does that makes her a relatable character for all women. Rather, it is how she thinks and why she does what she does that makes her realistic. Defoe grew up in seventeenth and eighteenth century England within a lower class than many of his fellow writers did. His education was not extravagant and he had many aspirations to rise in the social
Of the vampire tales to date, Bram Stoker's Dracula has unquestionably become the most popular and the most critically examined.
Of the vampire tales to date, Bram Stoker's Dracula has unquestionably become the most popular and the most critically examined. It constitutes, however, the culmination of a series of nineteenth-century vampire tales that have been overshadowed by Stoker's 1897 novel. To be sure, many of the earlier tales provide little more than a collective history of the vampire lore Stoker incorporated in Dracula, but Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu's little known Carmilla (1872) is the original tale to which Stoker's Dracula served as a response. In Carmilla Le Fanu chronicles the development of a vampiric relationship between two women, in which it becomes increasingly clear that the lesbian relationship between Carmilla and Laura defies the traditional structures of kinship by which men regulate the exchange of women to promote male bonding. On the contrary, Le Fanu allows Laura and Carmilla to usurp male authority and to bestow themselves on whom they please, completely excluding male participation in the exchange of women, as discussed by Claude Levi-Strauss and Gayle Rubin. Stoker later responded to Le Fanu's narrative of female empowerment by reinstating male control in the exchange of women. In effect, Dracula seeks to repossess the female body for the purposes of male pleasure and exchange, and to correct the reckless unleashing of female desire in Le Fanu's Carmilla. In Victorian
Discuss Woolf's evocation of time and space in the captured 'moments' of art and consciousness.
Discuss Woolf's evocation of time and space in the captured 'moments' of art and consciousness. 'A match burning in a crocus' (Mrs. Dalloway) 'The white spaces that lie between hour and hour' (The Waves) Discuss Woolf's evocation of time and space in the captured 'moments' of art and consciousness. Forged from the duality between solitude and communion, Woolf's novels are rich in struggles for, and reflections on self-identification. This recurrent idea can take many forms. Social identification is one of the most obvious: take Mrs. Dalloway's party, or Jinny's affirmative: "This is my calling. This is my world."[1] A modification of that brings identification in regard to a tradition: Lady Bruton's Victorian past, or Mr. Ramsay's desire to be among those thinkers who reach the latter letters of the alphabet. Consider also familial identification, particularly James' hatred, or Elizabeth Dalloway's trip on the omnibus. Sexual identification (the latent homosexuality in Mrs. Dalloway, or the reverberating childhood kiss of The Waves) and emotional identification have a more personal edge. Yet underpinning all of these is a form of metaphysical self-identification, summed up in all its ineffable futility by Lily Briscoe; "The old question which traversed the sky of the soul perpetually, the vast, the general question, which was apt to particularise itself at such moments as
How viable is it to read Moll Flanders as a feminist text?
Charles Prichard Mr. Terrence Wright Moll Flanders How viable is it to read Moll Flanders as a feminist text? Daniel Defoe chose to write a book with a woman as the leading character of it. In fact, he writes it from the perspective of this woman. In order to do this and make the book seem more realistic, Defoe has to get into the psyche of the female mind and therefore adopt a persona that views the world the way a woman would see it. Of course, Defoe would have to use his own opinions of a woman's thoughts to influence his writing. By making this woman the leading character, it is essential for him to give her a strong character, one that will be able to carry the book and make it appealing to the reader, who at the time Defoe was writing was part of a male-dominated society. This puts Defoe in a position where he has to write about a woman who is going to be independent of herself and therefore does not see the male as the dominant sex. Has Defoe given himself no choice but to try to be feminist? Moll Flanders, which is a name given to her through her partners in crime, is surrounded by women from the start. Indeed, there is no real male influence in her life for her first few years. Born in a prison in Newgate, there is no real mention of her father and her mother gives her away almost immediately. After passing through the hands of a group of gypsies, she ends up in
Northanger Abbey - What are the novelistic conventions at which Austen pokes fun; how she gets her comic effects at the level of the individual sentence, and how this passage relates to the rest of the novel.
Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey Close textual analysis based on volume 2, chapter 6, from 'The night was stormy ...' to the end of the chapter ('... she unknowingly fell fast asleep.'). What are the novelistic conventions at which Austen pokes fun; how she gets her comic effects at the level of the individual sentence, and how this passage relates to the rest of the novel. ***** In Northanger Abbey, Austen pokes gentle fun at the Gothic genre and its readers, who would have had their own expectations of Northanger, stemming from the Gothic. Initially, the reader doesn't know quite where to find him or herself. On the one hand we know that Catherine is a silly girl, but we are drawn in by the language of the text. The feel is at once veritably Gothic but also comic. We laugh at Catherine because not to do so would be to admit that we are like her - wanting her to find something even though we know she will not. As a heroine, Catherine is somewhat lacking in the typical physical traits and practical and mental abilities. However, she does have many of the emotional attributes of a classic Gothic heroine - she is sensitive and thoughtful and she has aspirations - but all these qualities are satirised by Austen. Catherine's interpretation of events and situations is elevated beyond normal, sensible intuition. The roll of paper at the back of the cabinet, so clearly mislaid and
Pride and Prejudice and Jane Eyre are two of the books included in the list of love stories that have happy endings.
"...and they lived happily ever after." Pride and Prejudice and Jane Eyre are two of the books included in the list of love stories that have happy endings. How these happy endings come about varies from one book to another; some rely on physical attraction, others on the willing subservience of one person to the other. In Pride and Prejudice and Jane Eyre, however, the early love scenes describe the development of mutual respect based on intellect and the establishment of a balance of power. Both Jane and Elizabeth spark interest in their admirers shortly after the first acquaintance. Elizabeth, who is "somewhat quicker" than her sisters, first attracts Darcy's attention through her independent nature. In chapter seven, Elizabeth walks the three miles that separate her from Jane; she finds herself "with weary ankles, dirty stockings, and a face glowing with the warmth of exercise" (33) upon reaching the house. To appear in such a condition before newly formed acquaintances is a social blunder; however, Darcy is intrigued by her "indifference to decorum." He is "divided between admiration of the brilliancy which exercise had given to her complexion, and doubt as to the occasion's justifying her coming so far alone" (33). No dialogue takes place in this scene; and though Elizabeth is unaware of Darcy's musings, she has begun to captivate him with her personality.
Mary Shelley's Frankenstein: Some of the Medical, Ethical and Legal Issues Presented by the Novel Today.
Mary Shelley's Frankenstein: Some of the Medical, Ethical and Legal Issues Presented by the Novel Today Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay To mould me man? Did I solicit thee From darkness to promote me? - Paradise Lost1 A Brief Synopsis of Frankenstein Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus as Mary Shelley subtitled it, was first published in 1818. It tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a student in anatomy and physiology. He becomes set on finding the source of life, both for the personal acclaim it will bring him but also, he claims, to better the human race. Frankenstein secretly collected the body parts from which to build his creation, he then infused the creature with "the spark of being".2 Upon the creature's animation Frankenstein's triumph turned to terror, and he ran away and abandoned his hideous 'child'. We later learn that, despite his horrible appearance, the creature possessed an intelligence and benevolence that exceeded that of any of his human counterparts. Contextual Similarities Between 1818 and 2004 Shelley was writing during the Enlightenment, a movement which aimed to free the human race from superstition and the unexplainable through science. This faith in the power of science is reflected in the words of Victor Frankenstein's professor: "They [the scientists] have acquired new and almost unlimited powers; they can command the