A bildungsroman is a novel that focuses on a protagonist’s moral, intellectual, and spiritual growth. In contemporary literature, the coming-of-age stories can be equated with the bildungsroman theme as they often deal with the challenging transition to adulthood from childhood. Shelley’s is a nineteenth-century novel that depicts the theme of bildungsroman by tracing the outcome…
A bildungsroman is a novel that focuses on a protagonist’s moral, intellectual, and spiritual growth. In contemporary literature, the coming-of-age stories can be equated with the bildungsroman theme as they often deal with the challenging transition to adulthood from childhood. In Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte traces the intellectual, moral, and psychological development of a young woman…
Revenge is a significant part of being human and refers to the desire to inflict retribution or inflict harm and hurt on others for wrongs or injuries suffered at their hands. The theme of revenge is recurrent in many literary or artistic works and is mainly associated with grief, hatred, and anger, hence used by…
Chinua Achebe’s novel Things Fall Apart was published in 1958 and influenced Nigeria’s literary renaissance in the 1960s. As the title suggests, Things Fall Apart is about the tragic downfall of a community and culture as an indigenous way of life crumbles from being assailed by foreign forces they do not understand and are unprepared for. The novel’s first…
Chinua Achebe’s Dead Men’s Path is a short story published in 1953. Like Achebe’s other novel, Things Fall Apart, Dead Men’s Path confronts the clash between indigenous communities and colonialism. Michael Obi and his wife, Nancy, are enthusiastic about his posting as the new headmaster of Ndume Central School, a local school known for cultural backwardness and lack of progress.…
A narrative point of view refers to what the narrator or character telling the story can see. Authors choose who is to tell the story by determining the point of view as the voice through which to tell a story. Events in a narrative can be told by characters involved in the narrative or from…
Mrs. Johnson, or Mama, the African American woman in Everyday Use, is the story’s narrator. The story revolves around Mama and her two daughters, Dee and Maggie, as well as how differently she relates to each daughter. The difference in her relationship with her daughters results from conflicting perspectives about the family’s heritage, which depicts Mama…
The introduction of Charlotte Perkin’s short story The Yellow Wallpaper presents John (the antagonist) as a caring spouse and well-respected physician who strives to improve his wife’s mental health condition. The wife, who is an unnamed character, is diagnosed with a temporary nervous illness and John applies professional treatment and various medications among others the…
Stories and poems are enshrined in different environments, culture, place and time. Additionally, the character and relationship with others are closely linked to the setting to help the audience understand the atmosphere and the context of place and time. Specific actions and behaviour are likely to unfold in certain environments, which is essential for the…
Robert Frost’s poem Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening is a mysteriously impactful piece that goes beyond the literary meaning. Although written in simple language, Frost’s creative use of literary devices, including symbolism, personification, imagery, and foreshadowing throughout the poem, offers a deep meaning. Moreover, through these devices, Frost communicates significant themes such as…
Ernest Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises is critically acclaimed and confronts various themes. One prominent theme is the impact of war on individuals, and having lived near war, Hemingway can be considered an authentic and credible source of information on this topic. In this novel, events linked to the war shape characters differently. Precisely, The…
Sharon Olds’s poem Demonstrations Day is a free verse narrative that does not follow a particular rhythm of rhyme scheme structure. The free verse poem is long and does not contain sporadic rhymes but conveys powerful ideas and feelings as a demonstration poem. Precisely, Olds writes the poem to confront issues and make a stand against injustices…
Night is a novel based on a true story detailing the events of the holocaust and a narrative of hope about better days ahead. The main character, Elie experiences terrible things but hopes things will be better. However, Elie’s hope gets tested, especially at the concentration camp, where he experiences and witnesses terrible things such…
Judy Brady’s essay I Want a Wife generally applies several anecdotes to explore the demands of being a wife and gender roles and expectations. Speaking from her own experience, Brady is bitter about how demanding being a wife is and how the same demands are not expected of men. Overall, Brady’s concern is that the imbalance between…
The play Trifles by Susan Glaspell is based on true events that happened at the turn of the 20th century in Iowa. Although a murder mystery, the play explores gender-based themes like power between males and females, gender roles, and gender relations, among others relevant to the play’s setting and contemporary society. Gender roles, in particular, are…
In the book White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide, Carol Anderson confronts structural racism’s legacy conveyed through white resentment and shows how its persistence threatens the promise of America’s democracy. Anderson explores historical events like the Civil War, Reconstruction, passage of the Thirteenth Amendment, Civil Rights Act, the decision in Brown v.…
In A Rose for Emily, William Faulkner uses different literary techniques to generate emotions from the writer and reader. Tone and point of view have been used to convey the narrator’s sympathy and attitude toward Emily, the protagonist. Notably, A Rose for Emily is a tragedy with a dark twist where the protagonist suffers extreme…
Like most of Chopin’s work, this story is a major sociopolitical force that confronted gender inequality and female powerlessness when women’s suffrage and feminist movements had barely started in the United States. The author’s life significantly influences the story, particularly her defiance of conventional gender roles. In most of Chopin’s writings, she asserts personal opinions…
In A Good Man is Hard to Find, the story begins with the characters planning a family trip to Florida. However, the unnamed Grandmother, the matriarch, disagrees with the rest of the family as she would instead go to Tennessee. The Grandmother mentions a dangerous individual, the Misfit, to make her case against going to…
Passion Perhaps the most essential theme in the play, and what keeps Cleopatra and Antony in a magnetic pull towards one another the entire time, is passion. Both lovers feel passionate—in both a sexual and romantic sense—towards one another. Their passion for one another exceeds all reason, which keeps Cleopatra and Antony continually making poor…