Night Mail - Wystan Hugh Auden (1936)
Book review - 3 pages - Literature
Night Mail was written in 1936 by Auden. He was asked to write it for a 22-minute-long documentary also called "Night Mail," and also released in 1936 by the general post office in the UK. This documentary was created to show how the night mail worked, to illustrate what it was like to work on...
Junky - William Seward Burroughs (1953) - Is Junky merely the story of the narrator's drug addiction?
Essay - 4 pages - Literature
Junky, the first novel of W. BURROUGHS, was published for the first time in 1953. It deals with the story of drug addiction, through one example: William LEE, the narrator. It is a major work relating the lifestyle of drug addicts during the 1950s. He employs a laconic tone, but he always seems...
The Subterraneans - Jack Kerouac (1959) - The role of jazz in the novel
Essay - 2 pages - Literature
"The Subterraneans" is a Jack Kerouac's novel written in the 50's (written in 1953 and published in 1958). This novella is not fictional, it deals with a very short romance that Jack Kerouac had with an African American woman, Alena Lee (New York, 1953). But it was bad form to have this...
Is a road trip running away from things or running towards something?
Text commentary - 1 pages - Literature
A road trip is a travel, an escape by campervan or motorcycle (like a Harley Davidson), through vast spaces and during long hours on the road, to discover new landscape, cities or countries. I will take three texts as examples.
The Tell-Tale Heart - Edgar Allan Poe (1843)
Book review - 2 pages - Literature
Edgar Allan Poe is a 19th century American romantic writer best known for his dark and mysterious short stories. 'The Tell-Tale Heart', published in 1843, is one of the most famous ones. It is about a murderous narrator trying to convince the reader of his own sanity by explaining and...
The Great Depression and World War II (1929-45) in U.S. Literature
Essay - 6 pages - Literature
The confidence of the Jazz Age died in 1929 with the Crash. As the nation threatened to disintegrate, the American writer recognized the fragility of its coherence ; capitalism and industry could no longer be trusted to sustain an egalitarian society that could guarantee the welfare of all....
Catcher in the Rye - J. D. Salinger's (1951)
Book review - 5 pages - Literature
This novel is often considered to have been the bible of the postwar young, the story of Holden Caulfield, an upper-middle-class adolescent schoolboy just on the edge of losing his presocial and presexual innocence - which he is able to express, like Huckleberry Finn, in his own vivid vernacular...
The Blood Runs Like a River Through My Dream - Nasdijj, Timothy Patrick Barru (2020)
Book review - 6 pages - Literature
The Blood Runs like a River Through My Dreams (2000) is the memoir of a man, Nasdiij (the author) who writes about his life and feelings. Being of mixed Caucasian and Navajo decent, Nasdijj feels like he does not belong to any of those groups. Nasdijj has a hard life, his dad beat him, his mom...
The Blindfold - Siri Hustvedt - Post-modernism
Essay - 2 pages - Literature
'There are no hard distinctions between what is real and what is unreal, nor between what is true and what is false. A thing is not necessarily either true or false; it can be both true and false.' Is a quotation from Harold Pinter that illustrates the ideas of the post-modernist movement,...
Beat Generation - Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg
Essay - 2 pages - Literature
'Follow your inner moonlight, don't hide the madness' is a quote by Allen Ginsberg that embodies the ideas that members of the literary and social 'beat generation' movement advocate. The later was created in the 1950s at the end of the Second World War, mainly by two young...
Oedipus The King - Sophocles (425 B.C.) - The Dramatic Power of Fate
Text commentary - 3 pages - Literature
Over the centuries, people have believed in the influence of divine or diabolical power in their lives. One of the most often discussed themes of ancient Greek tragedy is fatalism, the idea and belief that human actions are guided by the hand of fate, destiny, the gods or some other supernatural...
The Appointment in Samarra - W. Somerset Maugham (1933) - Encounter with Death
Essay - 2 pages - Literature
Terrorising and scary, death has always been a threatening subject. Although nobody wants to think about dying, we all wonder when Death is going to take us. In the fable "The Appointment in Samarra" by W. Somerset Maugham (1933), the author demonstrates that humans cannot avoid their fate. When...
The House of Mirth (Edith Wharto, 1905) and Passing (Nella Larsen, 1929) - Women identity issues in the early twentieth century
Essay - 3 pages - Literature
The House of Mirth (Edith Wharton) and Passing (Nella Larsen) are novels presenting female characters struggling to fit into the 20th century society. At the time, women were not very independent and had almost no means to earn a living. In The House of Mirth, Lily Bart's parents died and in...
How to write an essay? A short guide to increase your skills
Practical guide - 3 pages - Literature
An essay is the English equivalent of a dissertation in French. You will be asked a question about a subject, or a fact, and you will have to develop about it. An essay has some particularities, that differentiate it from the French dissertation. Indeed, even if the same type of questions is...
How to become a part of the Great British story?
Text commentary - 2 pages - Literature
Cultural heritage, representing culture and civilisation, has a vital importance in Great Britain, and in this context the school has an important place. Access to culture is achieved primarily through education and training and, in addition, literature, theatre and art, which are unique and...
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest - Ken Kesey (1962) - The 3 main characters
Essay - 3 pages - Literature
At first sight, this quotation makes me think that in reality it is our acts which determine the person that we are. We can be judged by our acts. It is particularly true in Ken Kesey's novel... The example of the three main characters: The Chief, the Big Nurse and McMurphy.
Marvels, Monsters and Miracles in Anglo-Saxon England - Genders and Feminine Monstrosity in Beowulf and Judith
Essay - 6 pages - Literature
Monstrosity has always been a recurrent topic in literature, especially during the Anglo-Saxon period, as people were fascinated by what was considered as abnormal, such as monsters, marvels and miracles. Definition of monstrosity is intricate and is profoundly associated with the viewer's...
Pride and Prejudice, Volume II, Chapter 3 - Jane Austen (1813)
Essay - 2 pages - Literature
This fragment is located in the third chapter of the second volume of the book. This chapter is showing that Elizabeth Bennet has been rejected by Mr Collins, cousin of the Bennet sisters and the heir to their properties. Its principal function is to show us that this rejection has touched her...
Dance of the Happy Shades: And Other Stories - Alice Munro (1946) - Comparaison with Naomi Wolf's The Beauty Myth (1990)
Text commentary - 3 pages - Literature
The first text we study here is a story from Dance of the Happy Shades: And Other Stories, which was written by Alice Munro in 1946. From the beginning of the text, the protagonist explains that her mom spends all of her time working on sewing her daughter's dress for the dance. She spends...
Damned Human Race - Mark Twain (1905)
Book review - 2 pages - Literature
Initially, Twain appears as the narrator having a serious voice which gives his age credibility. This is the false authority fallacy he uses the first. However, the instant satire appears, the satirical intentions of the author become clear. All the society represents the only stereotype in this...
Education and gender bias in accounting - Literature Review
Book review - 3 pages - Literature
In a workplace, managers, employees, and other workers are faced with different situations that require critical thinking and involving decision-making. Interactions and people's behaviors influence their perception towards each other. For example, gender issues arise from these factors and...
Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been Vs. Smooth Talk
Essay - 2 pages - Literature
The movie Smooth Talk which is based on the short story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been" has many similarities. The majority of the movie uses the same outline on which the short story is written from, as well as uses the same characters that are also used in the novel. Yet, a sober...
Comparing male antagonists in Francis Ford Coppola's film Bram Stoker's Dracula and Anonymous' short story The Mysterious Stranger
Essay - 3 pages - Literature
Anonymously written and translated from German into English, then published in 1860, "The Mysterious Stranger" is a tale which can irrefutably be compared to Bram Stoker's Dracula, published in 1897. It is unknown if Stoker was inspired by this anonymous author, but readers of vampire tales...
The Tenement Saga: the Lower East Side and early Jewish American writers - Sanford Sternlicht
Book review - 1 pages - Literature
The book "The Tenement Saga: The Lower East Side and Early Jewish American Writers" by Sanford Sternlicht explores the life of Jewish immigrants living in tenements on the Lower East Side of Manhattan during the early 20th century. The Jewish immigrants who migrated from Europe to find a better...
Jewish Wisdom for Business Success: Lessons from the Torah and Other Ancient Texts - Levi Brackman and Sam Jaffe
Book review - 2 pages - Literature
The book "Jewish Wisdom for Business Success: Lessons from the Torah and Other Ancient Texts", by Levi Brackman and Sam Jaffe, is a business book that incorporates lessons from the Torah and other Jewish texts and applies the concept to success in business. Through a series of stories related to...
The truth about identity in "The Apology" and "The Iliad"
Book review - 2 pages - Literature
Greek texts often emphasize the relationship between the community and the individual, and often with tragic results for the individual who chooses to fully express his individuality. The characters who are the centerpieces of ancient Greek literature, then, are those who, alone in that...
Iago's victory over Othello
Book review - 3 pages - Literature
There is no question that, like any tragically flawed hero, Othello is complicit in his own undoing. However, the nature of his character flaw is somewhat unusual in Shakespearean tragedy in that it is a flaw which the entire audience is tricked into sharing. Shakespeare takes pains to make the...
A comparison between "Wuthering Heights" and "Great Expectations"
Book review - 2 pages - Literature
In the Victorian era, there were many novels written about love and its consequences. Romantic love, particularly in this time period, is often characterized by the works of Emily Brontë and Charles Dickens, especially in the novels Wuthering Heights and Great Expectations. While both...
An analysis of "The Masterpiece" by Emile Zola
Book review - 2 pages - Literature
Each artist's life is surrounded by passion. It can be a pleasant association, one filled with success and inspiration, or it can be deadly and obsessive. In the case of Emile Zola's "The Masterpiece", Claude Lantier, a young painter, is consumed with creating his vision, his life's...
An analysis of "As Nature Made Him" by John Colapinto
Book review - 2 pages - Literature
There are many different ways to be uncomfortable in one's own skin. Each individual is never satisfied with their appearance, or some other aspect of their everyday lives, like their jobs. However, there are many cases where people are so unsatisfied in their own skin that they ask for a...
