Abstract This paper examines how Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven", "Annabel Lee", and "The Fall of the House of Usher? all depict the tragic loss of young and beautiful women. Poe describes Lenore, Annabel Lee and Madeline as young and achingly beautiful and all three women die premature and tragic deaths. In "The Raven" and "Annabel Lee", Poe mourns their tragic loss, while in "The Fall of the House of Usher?, Poe is clearly simply horrified at the gruesome and tragic death and he is not so deeply wrought with grief over the loss of someone he loves. It considers how Poe's depictions of women in his literary work reflect his personal experiences with the premature deaths of his young and attractive wife and mother. Poe's depictions remain relevant to readers of all ages and nationalities, as they speak to the universal misery of tragic loss and mourning.
From the Paper "Poe's poem "Annabel Lee" recounts the perfect love of the narrator and his child bride Annabel Lee. As in the Raven, Poe delves into the tragic loss of a beautiful woman within the lines of "Annabel Lee". Annabel Lee's similarity in age to Poe's young real-life bride is striking, and the poem can be seen as a reflection of Poe's grief over the loss of his young wife. As in "The Raven", Poe focuses on the beauty of the young woman who dies tragically. The stars and the moon even remind the narrator of the young woman's beauty after her tragic death. "Annabel Lee" focuses primarily on the depth of the feelings of between the two young lovers, while "The Raven" focuses more clearly on the grief at the loss of the young woman. In "Annabel Lee", the narrator tells a tale of a kingdom by the sea, where both he and Annabel Lee lived, and that they "loved with a love that was more than love"."
Tags: death, youth, beauty, wife, mother, saint, angel, love
Abstract This paper compares and contrasts the styles and themes fround in Martin Luther King Jr.'s "Letter from Birmingham Jail" and Nelson Mandela's ?I am Prepared to Die.? Some of the topics discussed include prejudice, white supremacist attitudes, the use of non-violence to achieve your goals and that freedom will not be given unless it is demanded by those who are oppressed. The paper points out that although the messages are similar, they were written for different reasons. King's was written to explain his mission and his message, to the white clergy to chastise them for their neglect and condemnation of his actions, while Mandela's was written to defend the charges brought against him before a court of law and to explain his actions. According to the paper, these two men have become symbolic with the fight for freedom and equal rights.
From the Paper "Although, the message is the same in each work, they are written to different audiences and from different reference of perspective. King's letter is written to his fellow clergymen, directing his remarks to the white clerical population, Christian and Jewish communities. It was written to explain his mission and his message, as well as a chastisement for not only their neglect, but for their condemnation of King's actions. Mandela's work was addressed to the court as a legal defense case. It was written to defend the charges brought against him before a court of law and to explain his actions. King's work is cited with biblical references, such as, ?just as the Apostle Paul left his village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to the far corners of the Greco-Roman world, so am I compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond my own home town."
Abstract This paper describes the life of the Underground Man in Dostoevsky's work, "Notes from the Underground". It analyzes his ways of thought from a naturalist perspective. The paper shows how the Underground Man is a romantic dreamer, living in a fantasy world and unable to make his own decisions.
From the Paper "Dostoevsky's Notes from the Underground is a critical commentary and rebellion from the traditional romantic view that had been so popular in previous eras. Dostoevsky belongs to the naturalist and realist school of thought, which emphasize the idea that life is hard and complex, and we must deal with it. This contrasts with the romantic thoughts regarding life as simple, beautiful and correlated to nature. In his work Dostoevsky uses each of these conflicting views to build the mindset of the protagonist known as the Underground Man (UM). The UM is a very intricate individual. While he is very shy and reserved, he deeply craves attention. He desperately wants to succeed, but is constantly setting himself up for failure. He feels superior to others by recognizing he own inferiority. It seems that the UM's life is full of contradictions and it is this life that are meant to represent human nature."
Discusses novella's themes (loneliness, acceptance of death), plot, characterizations, style, irony, symbolism, messages and relationship to author's life.
1,800 words (approx. 7.2 pages), 3 sources, 1989, $ 63.95
From the Paper "This paper will discuss the novella The Death of Ivan Ilych by Leo Tolstoy. One of the basic themes of this story is that of "loneliness in the face of death" (Cain 4). It can be seen that the mediocrity of Ivan Ilych's life has done little to prepare him for the unexpected shock of dying. At the very end of the novella, Ivan Ilych undergoes a transformation during which he comes to an acceptance of death and realizes that his entire life has been one of avoiding other people. Thus, the intense loneliness suffered by Ivan Ilych is due to his attitude toward life, in which he always placed the highest value on work, career and material possessions while rejecting the real life needs of his family and others. Tolstoy makes it clear that this fault in Ivan Ilych's life exists in virtually everyone's life, with the only exception being seen in the character of the servant (...)"
This paper analyzes the poetic wit of Alexander Pope, 19th Century British writer, in two of his poems "Essay on Criticism" and "The Rape of the Lock".
1,575 words (approx. 6.3 pages), 3 sources, 1991, $ 55.95
From the Paper "This essay is concerned with Alexander Pope (1688-1744), and poetic wit. For the purpose of this analysis, two of Pope's poems will be examined: "Essay on Criticism" and "The Rape of the Lock".
The eighteenth century was known as the Age of Enlightenment or the Age of Johnson in English literature. Neoclassicism was one of the most prominent movements during that time. Classical literature was very much admired, and the imitation of nature and the classics was a much sought after ideal. In fact, it was thought by eighteenth-century thinkers that the classics imitated nature. Very much admired were the artistic ideals of order, concentration, economy, utility, logic, wit, retrained emotion, 'correctness,' 'good taste,' and decorum. The favorite form of verse consisted of rhymed couplets. Poetry was inclined to be ... "
From the Paper "Thomas Bell, in Out of This Furnace, published in 1941, presents a fictional portrait of the life of three generations of Slovak immigrants in the United States of the early 1900s, emphasizing the struggles of these people as they carved out their existence in the steel mills of America.
The life of these struggling immigrants is so difficult that they inevitably find sense and comfort in their existence primarily in their families, in their communities. They have left the old country behind in order to pursue the American Dream, but they quickly discover that the dream is more of a nightmare.
Bell writes that George Kracha "came to America in the fall of 1881 . . . It may be that he hoped he was . . . leaving behind the endless poverty and oppression which were the birthrights of a Slovak peasant . . . He was bound for the hard-coal country of..."
From the Paper "In her novel Song of Solomon, Toni Morrison uses the history of one black family as a way of commenting on the history of blacks since the Civil War, and the main character of Milkman goes on a quest for his past, discovering how the women of his family have been ill-served by the world, by the men in their lives, and by himself because he has not known of their sacrifice or their reality. Yet this does not necessarily mean that he will be able to achieve a stronger sense of either their lives or his own. Even though his quest appears to be successful, the ambiguous ending of the novel leaves the reader uncertain about his fate, a device whereby Morrison creates some doubt and leaves the reader more interested in seeing to it that such a quest is successful and that a new attitude is created than would be the case if the story were clearly resolved."
From the Paper "This study will examine the 1946 novel Mine Boy, by Peter Abrahams, first giving some information on the author and the background of the book and its historical context, and then exploring the elements of the novel itself, including plot, characterization, style, intended audience, and the contribution the book makes to an understanding of African life and history.
As we read in Charles Larson's Introduction to the novel,
the book was published "two years before the Nationalists gained control of South African politics" and "just before apartheid became entrenched into the South African legal system and racialism became a sanctified governmental policy (Abrahams 5)."
The book was published in South Africa, as Shava writes, precisely because its publication preceded what was to shortly be the beginning of official and legal crackdowns against such..."
From the Paper "In his book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Robert M. Pirsig offers an assessment of the idea of quality and applies this to life, using as his platform the maintenance of a motorcycle. He uses the quality of a mechanical object and the relationship of that object to himself as a thinking human being as a way of finding a unity with the idea of quality in every life experience. The motorcycle is more than just his tool for accomplishing this. It is a physical object that is also a mental construct. It is an object of art and an object of technology at one and the same time, and it is through Pirsig's direct work on the motorcycle that he is able to see the unity in what are sometimes set forth as opposites--technology and art, classical and romantic, the internal and the external.
The book has as its overt subject one man's quest for truth..."
From the Paper " This study will provide a comparative analysis of two short stories by Edgar Allan Poe---"The Masque of the Red Death" and "The Tell-Tale Heart." As the study will show, despite some important differences, the fundamental message of the author in both stories is the same. Both stories feature protagonists who believe they are somehow exempt from the physical and/or psychological laws and conditions which control the lives of others. The protagonist of "Red Death," Prince Prospero, believes that he is beyond the power of the plague. He believes that ordinary people will be killed by the plague, but that he and his friends are immune. It seems that this immunity is based on more than the fact that he has tried to physically wall out the disease. Before he takes extraordinary measures to keep the plague out, he "summoned to his presence a thousand hale and.."
From the Paper "One of the world's most enduring legends is the story of King Arthur and the Round Table, a story which in the popular imagination has become lodged somewhere in the fourteenth century when knighthood was in flower, though in fact the story is much older. If there were a historical King Arthur, in fact, he would have existed centuries before the era of knighthood, probably sometime in the sixth century. The historical reality of Arthur is much in doubt and remains a controversy, though Arthur has his champions who believe the stories of his reign began with a real personage and then were turned into myth and legend by various writers.
The Arthurian legends began as a literary form in the twelfth century with traveling minstrels who told stories of heroism, usually built in the exploits of the French king..."
From the Paper "The novel Little Women by Louisa May Alcott stands as an archetype of feminine writing from the nineteenth century, a story emphasizing the choices facing women in terms of home and family, career choice, and aspirations. Much of the sense of choice is placed in the hands of Jo, the strongest female in the novel and the one who becomes the center for her family as well. It is this power of choice and inner strength that has attracted generations of readers and that was the attraction for filmmakers recently when they produced a new version of Little Women and successfully shaped the story for a feminist age.
Little Women is not a complex novel nor a complex study of human nature. It is largely about Jo and her struggle to be good and to improve herself in the world, and as such it is believed to represent Louisa's own struggle with the same issue..."
From the Paper "This study will examine August Wilson's play Joe Turner's Come and Gone, focusing on the characters' search for their "song." The play offers a number of definitions of what this "song" is, but it is roughly equivalent to one's individual spirit or purpose in life. The study will consider in greater depth what this song is, its significance, which characters have found theirs, which are still searching, and which will probably never find it. The thesis of the study will be that those who have found their songs have come to a state of acceptance about life and its difficulties, and have as a result discovered within themselves what the others are seeking in vain outside themselves. Those who have not found their songs are still doing battle with life, with people, and with themselves. The significance of the song, then, is found in the fact that the ..."
Compares roles, motivations and moral corruption of central males in Matthew Lewis' "The Monk", Ann Radcliffe's "The Italian" and Horace Walpole's "The Castle of Otranto".
1,800 words (approx. 7.2 pages), 3 sources, 1995, $ 63.95
From the Paper "This study will compare the role and significance of the evil male character in three Gothic novels, Matthew Lewis' The Monk, Ann Radcliffe's The Italian and Horace Walpole's The Castle of Otranto. The study will argue that these characters in the three novels are described in different ways, but the similarities among them predominate. In every case, the evil character is shown to be undesirable, and the message sent by the authors is that evil will be eventually punished. The evil male characters all serve the purpose of supporting the moral argument that good in some way will finally triumph.
At the same time, however, there is something contradictory at the heart of this moral use of the evil male character. All of these characters are intensely fascinating, at least as fascinating as the "good" characters, so that the reader finds ..."
From the Paper "In his play The Price, Arthur Miller attempts to bring moral and familial issues far closer to home than he believes he had done in some of his "larger" social and political plays. He writes in his autobiography Timebends about his own vision and purpose with respect to the play and its very personal message:
Two brothers, one a policeman, the other a successful surgeon, meet again after an angry breakup many years before. . . . Grown men now, they think they have achieved the indifference to the betrayals of the past that maturity confers. But it all comes back; the old angry symbols evoke the old emotions of injustice; and they part unreconciled. Neither can accept that the world needs both of them---the dutiful man of order and the ambitious, selfish creator who invents new cures ..."
