Anti-Semitism in Anthony Trollope's Palliser Novels Because Anthony Trollope belonged to the Liberal party, one would assume that he would be less concerned with the glorification of a specific social class to the neglect of any other. Yet, of the major novelists of the Victorian period, none was more infatuated with the code of the gentleman than Trollope. His political beliefs, which might seem to conflict with those of a Liberal, are best defined by his own description of himself as "an advanced
a person in the book who excites the reader's respect, and not one who fails to excite his interest. The morbid quickness of the author's perceptions of the selfish element, even in his few amiable characters, is a constant source of surprise. The novel not only has no hero, but implies the non-existence of heroism. Yet the fascination of the book is indisputable, and it is due to a variety of causes besides its mere exhibition of the worldly side of life.
Cynthia Ozick's The Shawl The plot of this story does not adhere to the conventional plot line. I feel that the Shawl’s plot came to early. Magda dies to early in the novel. I would have wanted her to be living just a little while longer so that we can build some sort of relationship with her. In my opinion, all we know of this fifteen-month-old baby is what Rosa tells of her daughter. Magda never lives long enough to see life through the eye of the reader. This takes away from a conventional
in Jane Austen's Novels Let’s think about the function of time in Jane Austen’s Emma. As it turns out, time is pretty important for Austen, but also quite problematic. For example, in Emma, Austen uses the word “time” 278 times within this 160,416 word novel. To make a random comparison, in Wuthering Heights 78,983 words, “time” is used 84 times, about half as often. Actually, that trend line is fairly representative of most of Austen’s novels. And certainly the novel Emma is fixed in
eventually is able to walk, speak, and make decisions, Genly Ai from the novel, The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula LeGuin and Neo from the movie, The Matrix were able to grow as characters in much the same way. Genly Ais name reveals his three narrative roles throughout the novel that clearly depict his growth and change as a character. His journey begins as the reader views him as I, just a regular human. Gradually as the novel proceeds the reader finds that Genly Ai is able to transform and grow
idea of learned or innate traits are the backbone for her novel. Knowing very well the nature vs. nurture perspective can be controversial to many, giving the reader an idea to ponder and debate. This novel is set in a time 300 years after a convulsion, a great war that was brought upon by men. It was men who were the diplomats and men who made the speeches about national pride and defenseand we died (pg. 301). The beginning of the novel starts out as a reflection and continues to be a reflection
The Semiotics of Covers I'm going to buy a book today - but not a school book, a real book - a bestseller. I walk past the harmonica man standing outside of the Brown Office Building, clamping my ears shut against the discordant melodies he's spewing out at me. I enter the Brown Bookstore - my Mecca, my Graceland. I strut past the tables near the door and walk toward the bestseller wall, my being allthewhile bombarded by hardcovers seeking my wandering eyes. Howard Stern in drag screams out
Characterization in Alias Grace, Their Eyes Were Watching God, and Fools Crow Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood is a novel where the main character Grace is a sort of mystery character. In the end she is at peace, but there are still many questions about her left unanswered. Because Atwood's style of writing is informative, yet unclear at the same time, the audience is left to put the pieces of the puzzle that is Grace together themselves. This leaves the reader guessing about her character
Themes of Life and Death in Anna Karenina The novel, Anna Karenina, parallels its heroine's, Anna Karenina, moral and social conflicts with Constantin Levin's internal struggle to find the meaning of life. There are many other underlying themes which links the novel as a whole, yet many critics at the time only looked upon its critical view of Russian life. Henry James called Tolstoy's novels as "loose and baggy monsters' of stylessness, but Tolstoy stated of Anna Karenina ".....I am very proud
Hero in A Farewell to Arms Ernest Hemingway is a renowned American author of the Twentieth century who centers his novels around personal experiences and affections. He is one of the authors named "The Lost Generation." He could not cope with post-war America, and therefore he introduced a new type of character in writing called the "code hero". Hemingway is known to focus his novels around code heroes who struggle with the mixture of their tragic faults and the surrounding environment. Traits of
Awakening Kate Chopin's novel The Awakening is full of symbolism. Symbols add meaning and depth to the text. Chopin underscores the expression "free as a bird" through the consistent use of aviary symbolism in The Awakening. Throughout the story she cleverly weaves images and descriptions of birds to express the psychological state of mind of her main character, Edna Pontellier. Perhaps the most obvious example of this symbolism is in the first spoken sentences of the novel, which, strangely enough
Religion and Its Effect on Stephen in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man Religion is an important and recurring theme in James Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Through his experiences with religion, Stephen Dedalus both matures and progressively becomes more individualistic as he grows. Though reared in a Catholic school, several key events lead Stephen to throw off the yoke of conformity and choose his own life, the life of an artist. Religion is central to the life
A Feminist Reading of The Last of the Mohicans While most often studied as a romance or adventure novel, the most dominant characteristic of The Last of the Mohicans is overlooked: phallicism. From this phallicism stems Cooper's patriarchal view of society. In the novel, men are symbolically set apart from women by the possession of weapons (the phallic symbol), and men are separated from one another by the size of their weapons. The more powerful the men are those bearing the larger, longer
Ideas of Progress in Naipaul's A Bend in the River In his novel A Bend in the River, V. S. Naipaul paints a picture of Salim, an Indian man living in an isolated African town at the beginning of independence. Salim, as an Indian, has something of a unique perspective on the events of the time - in some ways, he lives between two worlds. Having experienced the "civilizing" influence of British colonial rule, he comes from a culture that is more "advanced" than that of Africa but less so than
choosing the island setting for the novel, Lord of the Flies was to have the characters isolated, where the laws of their governments could not reach them. The boys on the island represented a microcosm of world society. Golding chose children because they have not yet been fully conditioned by society to understand right from wrong, and thus are guided by their instinct and what is inherent within them. Golding uses a great deal of symbolism throughout the novel. Different characters provide different
integrated more and more into our daily lives. People are slowly, but surely, being replaced my machines and artificial "workers." Kurt Vonnegut's foresaw this movement of mechanization in the 1950's and responds to the dehumanization of society in his novel Player Piano. In Vonnegut's fictional world, machines and computers have eliminated the need for industrial laborers after the Second Industrial Revolution. Society is thus split into two unequal classes which consist of the managers and engineers
Ordinary People - Impact of Characters on Conrad In the novel Ordinary People, by Judith Guest, many people affect Conrad. Three people that have an affect on him are his father, mother and therapist. Conrad goes through significant changes by the way he has been affected. In the beginning of the novel Con had just returned from the hospital for attempting suicide. Right off the bat Con finds it hard to wake up in the morning because he is afraid that anxiety and failure will be waiting for
lives of others and not by the quantity of worldly possessions that he has acquired. It is important to keep this in mind when considering Virginia Woolf’s novel, To The Lighthouse. Throughout the novel, it seems as though the characters, mainly Mr. And Mrs. Ramsay, are trying to find worth in their lives. As a first time reader of the novel, it immediately seemed clear to me that the eight children that Mr. And Mrs. Ramsay have bore and raised gives significant worth to their lives; however, they
Role of Speaker in Browning's Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister The speaker in any poem is significant because he enables the reader to aquire information necessary in order to enter the imaginary world of the work. In Browning's Soliloquy of the Spanish Cloister, the solitary speaker, who is a monk overwhelmed with hatred toward a fellow monk, plays an important role as the guide in the world of the poem. The diction, structure, and tone of the entire poem communicate the speaker's motives, perceptions
identity. The novel takes place on an island south of New Orleans and in New Orleans. Edna Pontellier is 28 years old when she "wakes up". Her husband Leonce Pontellier is much older than she - forty years old. The Awakening opens when Mr. Pontellier - a businessman- is disturbed by the noise some parrots are doing. They repeat "Allez vous-en!" which means go away. It sounds such as an invitation to Edna to leave her cage of marriage. This is what she is doing in steps throughout the novel. The "parrot"