Ghost stories and supernatural fiction have entertained readers for centuries. Margaret Oliphant wrote a short story, “The Library Window” about a young woman who sees a man working in a room through his window, but the room does not exist. J. M. Barrie’s story Farewell Miss Julie Logan is about a young minister who sees a young woman and falls in love with her, but no one else can see her. In “The Watcher by the Threshold”, John Buchan writes the story of a man who has an illness, believes he is being haunted by the Devil, and forms a connection with Justinian as a form of relief. Some supernatural fiction, however, can do more than simply entertain. It can also be used to reveal truths about humanity and the conditions of the mind. Buchan, Oliphant, and Barrie use a supernatural plot to explore the mental state of characters who are isolated from human interactions and the consequences of isolation.
In the short story “The Library Window”, Margaret Oliphant writes about a young woman who is isolated from the people around her. One reason for this isolation is that she is the only young person in a house with an elderly aunt and her friends (1, 3). Almost every time her aunt or her aunt’s friends are mentioned, they are referred to as being “old” (1,3, 6). She feels “unconsciously the contrast of [her] youngness to their oldness” (3). She passes the majority of her time sitting in “the deep recess of the drawing-room window” (1). From this situation she is able to watch the street below her, the windows across from her, listen in on the conversations in the room, or read her books. (1, 5). As a result she is merely a spectator of the world around her, and the elderly friends of her aunt recognize that there is something odd abo...
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...rrie, J. M.. “Farewell Miss Julie Logan” Farewell Miss Julie Logan: A J. M. Barrie Omnibus. Ed. Andrew Nash. Edinburgh, Hewer Text Ltd, 2000. 248-330. Print.
Buchan, John. “The Watcher by the Threshold.” The University of Adelaide. 1900. Web. 27 Oct, 2013.
Calder, Jenni. “Through Mrs Oliphant’s Library Window.” Women’s Writing 10.3 (2003): 485-502. Print.
Hynd, Hzel. “Celtic Rivals: John Davidson and W. B. Yeats.” Irish Studies Review. 10.3 (2013). 277-288. Print.
“J. M. Barrie Biography” BBC Two: Writing Scotland. British Broadcasting Corporation, 2013. Web. 2 Dec. 2013.
“John Buchan Biography” BBC Two: Writing Scotland. British Broadcasting Corporation, 2013. Web. 2 Dec. 2013.
“Margaret Oliphant Biography” BBC Two: Writing Scotland. British Broadcasting Corporation, 2013. Web. 2 Dec. 2013.
Oliphant, Margaret. “The Library Window.” Gaslight, 1896. Web. 13 Oct. 2013.
The following is a list of explications pointing towards British and Celtic myths and figures. While pursuing the Celtic influences of Middleton's novel, I found myself searching for the meaning of other present mysteries. This author's twist of two cultures creates a spectrum for possible explication. It seems that the Celtic material melds into British society throughout this novel. In search of specific markers I found myself concentrating mostly on Haydn Middleton's use of names.
Keats, John. “The Eve of St. Agnes”. The Norton Anthology of English Literature: The Romantic
"John Keats." British Literature 1780-1830. Comp. Anne K. Mellor and Richard E. Matlak. Boston: Heinle & Heinle, 1996. 1254-56. Print.
William Yeats is deliberated to be among the best bards in the 20th era. He was an Anglo-Irish protestant, the group that had control over the every life aspect of Ireland for almost the whole of the seventeenth era. Associates of this group deliberated themselves to be the English menfolk but sired in Ireland. However, Yeats was a loyal affirmer of his Irish ethnicity, and in all his deeds, he had to respect it. Even after living in America for almost fourteen years, he still had a home back in Ireland, and most of his poems maintained an Irish culture, legends and heroes. Therefore, Yeats gained a significant praise for writing some of the most exemplary poetry in modern history
Macbeth's tragic downfall into insanity could be diagnosed as the mental disorder schizophrenia. Many of Macbeth’s actions during the play can make the reader to believe that Macbeth is crazy. However, by today's medical standards, Macbeth falls into several of the categories under the diagnosis of schizophrenia.This is a severe brain disorder in which people interpret reality abnormally. Schizophrenia may result in some combination of hallucinations, delusions, and extremely disordered thinking and behavior. Even though Macbeth shows various characteristics of other mental disorders, the symptoms he presents of schizophrenia are dominant in comparison.
Research, 1980. Dictionary of Literary Biography Vol. 5. Literature Resource Center. Web. 26 Feb. 2014.
“…one could not be certain witness to anything: Miriam, so vividly there – and yet, where was she? Where, where?” In the fictional short story Miriam by Truman Capote, Miriam is a queer, mysterious little girl who haunts Mrs. H. T. Miller, a widow who lives alone and isolated in an apartment. Throughout the short story, Miriam remains strange and mysterious, and the story ends inconclusively, with the question “who is Miriam?” unanswered. But through evidence found throughout the text, readers are able to speculate who, or what, Miriam is. From my perspective and the evidence gathered, I believe Miriam is a supernatural being; a mischievous Angel of Death who likes to ‘play’ with her victims for a while before she takes them away to the realm of Death.
Council, British. "Ian McEwan." Contemporary Writers in the UK - Contemporary Writers. Web. 05 May
Gerald of Wales’ was most likely never in Ireland, and his writing is not an accurate portrayal of the Irish, but a chance to discuss hybridity and turn his readers against it while also the Irish.
Ward, Susan. "Morag Gunn in Fictional Context: The Career Woman Theme in The Diviners." New Perspectives on Margaret Laurence: Poetic Narrative, Multiculturalism, and Feminism. Ed. Greta M. K. McCormick Coger. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1996. 179-184.
It seems as though Joyce Carol Oates clearly understands the effects of trauma since she writes about several harsh and eerie realities in her “tales of mystery and suspense” from her collection entitled Give Me Your Heart that visibly distinguish her from other writers. In this collection, Oates leaves readers' minds in turmoil and suspense as she releases her emotions by turning what we might think is the norm into something far more insane—perhaps far beyond our understanding. Oates has an obsessive and violent need for love that chills the soul as she takes her readers on an unpredictable ride through her haunted thoughts. She punches readers in the gut by using gothic and sardonic language in her stories while subtly adding a twist of her own eerie ambiguity to portray unrealistic scenarios that we, looking at the bigger picture, may indeed be able to relate to.
Ronsley, Joseph, ed., Myth and Reality in Irish Literature, Wilfrid Laurier University Press, Canada, 1977
More than a few elements of the supernatural can be discovered within the action and dialogue of Shakespeare's plays. However, the extent and nature of those elements differs to a large degree. There are traces of it to be found in Henry V, "Pardon, gentles all,/The flat unraised spirit that hath dar'd...to bring forth/So great and object" (Lucy 1). There are also elements of it apparent in Winter's Tale, "What I did not well I meant well" (Lucy 1). The supernatural is used most fearsomely in Hamlet, with the ghost of Hamlet's father representing the most frightening apparition in all of the Bard's plays. However, the supernatural is used to an almost whimsical degree in A Midsummer's Night Dream and The Tempest. In both of these plays the supernatural does not assume an evil demeanor, though it does wreak havoc on the lives of those in its midst. Yet, the supernatural is connected more with a generic nature of chance than one that is pure evil as in Macbeth or pure "foul and most unnatural" as it is in Hamlet (Shakespeare 1078).
The supernatural has always fascinated and continues to intrigue mankind. In many of Shakespeare’s plays, he uses the supernatural to strengthen a particular scene or to influence the impression the audience has about someone or something. This was not strange or uncommon in Shakespeare’s time. In fact, during the 1500s, many people still believed in witches and witchcraft. Even in today’s society, with such advanced science and technology, many people are still influenced, if not dictated by the supernatural. For example, religious people have the belief that their saviour, Jesus Christ was a man of many miracles; one of which was he turned water into wine. Despite the fact that it does not obey the laws of science, millions of people hold the fact to be true. In Macbeth, his pursuit of procuring the crown and keeping it leads to his eventually downfall. However, his pursuit of the crown, his actions trying to keep the crown and his eventual downfall are all affected by the supernatural. Therefore, the dynamic effect of the supernatural sets the dark atmosphere of the play; it alters the readers’ perception of Macbeth, and it foreshadows his ultimate downfall.
The supernatural is arguably one of the most prominent things that fuels Macbeth’s unchecked ambition throughout the play. In fact, the very thing that began his journey into insanity was his conversation with the three witches and Banquo in Act 1, scene 3. The witches said “All hail, Macbeth, that shalt be king hereafter!”, and if he hadn’t of met or listened to the witches then his fate could’ve possibly been avoided altogether. Banquo in contrast didn’t listen to the witches, and if Macbeth had done the same then neither of them would have died. Of course Macbeth’s downfall can’t be entirely blamed on the witches or the supernatural in general. The supernatural wouldn’t have affected him in the first place if he hadn’t been too prideful and gullible to begin with.