The Yellow Wallpaper is a much acclaimed nineteenth century short story authored by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. It first appeared in The New England Magazine in 1892. Upon its publication it proved controversial and provocative due to its bold portrayal of women’s sexuality and psychology. The story is also unique, for it adopts the epistolary style,…
Category: Literature
Critical Analysis of Colleen Burke’s ‘Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness: A Metaphor of Jungian Psychology’
The article by Colleen Burke titled Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness: A Metaphor of Jungian Psychology is well written, insightful and instructive. The author draws on parallels between the works of two great intellectuals in the form of Joseph Conrad and Carl Gustav Jung. Although Conrad and Jung were not contemporaries, one could see striking…
The Color Purple: Critical Analysis
The novel The Color Purple by Alice Walker is a ground-breaking work in American fiction. The topic of emotional/physical abuse, especially that endured by black American women of earlier generations is not openly spoken about or documented in history books. By bringing focus to this sensitive, yet saddening, experience of black women, the novel attracted…
An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge by Ambrose Bierce: An Analysis
Ambrose Bierce’s short story titled An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge is one of the classics of the art form. The story could be read from three different angles. First, the political angle provided by the American Civil War of the 1860s. Second is the cultural angle, whereby the unique flavors of the American South…
Two great speeches: Ain’t I a Woman and Address to the People of the Free States
What do Ain’t I a Woman and Address to the People of the Free States by the President of the Southern Confederacy tell us about the divisions between people in United States during the 1860s? The 1860s were a tumultuous time in the history of the United States. Public discourse and debate centered on the…
Play Review: Hay Fever by Noel Coward
Authored by Noel Coward in 1924, the play Hay Fever was first performed the following year at the Ambassadors Theatre. The original cast included eminent actors and actresses from the Jazz Age America. These include Helen Spencer, Robert Andrews, Marie Tempest and Graham Browne who comprise the members of the Bliss family. Most of the…
The portrayal of Communism in Ayn Rand’s We the Living
‘We The Living’ is the first published work of Ayn Rand. The novel deals with Communism and its various drawbacks. Having escaped from Communist Russia into the United States during her late teens, the novel thus represents a first-hand view of her experiences in Russia. In this sense, the novel can be considered part autobiographical…
The reasons why Old Major’s teachings are wrong in the book Animal Farm
Thesis: “The character of Old Major in the story Animal Farm by George Orwell denies truths about the nature of evil when he says all men are the enemy and claims that mans’ removal will abolish the root cause of suffering.” Old Major’s assessment that human beings are the root enemy is not true. His…
George Orwell’s ‘Shooting an Elephant’ vis-a-vis ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin’ and ‘Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl’
George Orwell was a champion of the underprivileged and the oppressed. Through his essays, novels and journalism he amply illustrated his solidarity with the downtrodden, be it the natives of colonial Burma or the working classes of Britain or the peasantry of Soviet Russia. The protagonists in most of his works of fiction are drawn…
Walt Whitman’s Poetry and American Identity
Born on 31st May, 1819, Walt Whitman is an iconic figure in the history of American literature. His lifetime’s work, especially his poetry, has come to define the sentiments, aspirations and experiences of American citizens in the nineteenth century. Although Whitman was not active politically, he expressed his political views through his poetry. Having lived…