In Austen’s novel, the character of Marianne is an example of a younger, naïve women in the regency era; ‘she was sensible and clever; but eager in everything’. Marianne was bought up in an upper-class family, so she had a higher education and was ‘clever’. However, the adjective ‘eager’ indicates Marianne’s sense of urgency to … Read more
The publication of Jane Austen’s Emma in December 1815 presented the following memorable statement: No, Emma, your amiable young man can be amiable only in French, not in English. He may be very ‘amiable,’ have very good manners, and be very agreeable; but he can have no English delicacy towards the feelings of other people: … Read more
The motif of doubles is a central feature of Mary Shelley’s 1818 gothic Victorian novel Frankenstein as well as Arundhati Roy’s 1997 postcolonial Indian novel The God of Small Things. Doubling is used in the characterisation of Victor Frankenstein and his monster in Frankenstein, and of the twins Estha and Rahel in The God of … Read more
Mary Shelley’s novel, Frankenstein, contradicts ideas of monsters that we have imagined, such as monsters show or feel no emotion except for anger and the stereotypical idea that monsters are bad regardless of how they are inside and out. Frankenstein’s creature fits the description many would picture a monster with, “His yellow skin scarcely covered … Read more
Frankenstein’s creature made first appearance in chapter 5. It was described by Victor Frankenstein sarcastically as “Beautiful! Great God!” (p68). The use of exclamation and “God” could indicate how wrong Frankenstein feels to describe the creature as “beautiful”. The exclamation exaggerates his thoughts and also gives the reader a sense of wrongness in using the … Read more
Frankenstein Lit Circle #2 As the plot unfolds, we start to get more information about the monster. Does he have more than one mental function and how do they build him as a monster? Does his mental functions help him with individuation when he enters the wilderness? The monster starts off with the mental function … Read more
Frankenstein (1818) is a tale of a man with a colossal ambition who in the pursuit of elixir of life “bestows animation upon lifeless matter” (Shelley 34) only to create a wretched monster that he ends up abandoning; it is a tale of creation and abandonment. However, it cannot be reduced to be understood as … Read more
Shelley uses imagery relating to your senses to describes the creature’s awakening. Shelley compares this awakening to a baby who was just born. “A strange multiplicity of sensations seized me, and I saw, felt, heard, and smelt, at the same time…”(Shelley 90), this quote means that the monster just experienced the all the new senses. … Read more
Angela Carter’s, ‘The Bloody Chamber’ and Mary Shelley’s, ‘Frankenstein’, both challenge this ideal of ‘the perfect woman’ existing in the passive case. Through the medium of fairytale, Carter’s inversion and subversion of women being, ‘defined in the passive case’ generates agreement and rebuttal in line with the critical interpretation. Similarly, Shelley’s trauma of losing her … Read more
Introduction The Holocaust and Nazi period in Germany has always been looked upon as a time of trauma, horror and death. Over six million people were killed by the Nazi’s in the period between 1933 to 1945 with some predicting numbers a lot higher than that. The Holocaust was a genocide of innocent people. The … Read more
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, the author of Frankenstein, has written a novel about a character named Victor Frankenstein who is determined to create a source of human life. What he does not know is that his creation would soon be a huge mistake. Frankenstein’s creation turns out to be a monster and he is afraid of … Read more
The American Dream consists of an ideal that individuals make a bargain with life in America; so long as an individual works hard, America will present avenues to economic success and social respect. The American Dream represents an idealistic country where there is a lack of racism, sexism, and discrimination preventing an individual from actualizing … Read more
Death of a Salesman is a perfect example of Arthur Miller’s idea of ‘Tragedy and the Common Man’, in which the tragic protagonist doesn’t have to be powerful or influential in order to experience a downfall. Even the opening stage directions of the play- before any of the characters even speak- indicate tragedy, as the … Read more
Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller has been a controversial argument about whether or not this play is a tragedy or not. There are several arguments for and against this theory. Some arguments for tragedy include the fact that it displays the downfall of the main characters commitment towards a goal. Another argument towards … Read more
In Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, countless allusions are made to numerous topics, including the Bible. Fahrenheit 451 takes place in a dystopian society where books are not only frowned upon, but if found, disintegrated. Montag, the main character, starts as a firefighter where he burns books, but later realizes the potential unknown to most … Read more
