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An Introduction To The Victorian Woman : A Comparative Study Dealing With Poetical And Historical Sources, Lois Iffert Rudge

Master's Theses

The purpose of studying the Victorian women in poetry has been to find some relation between the historical woman and the literary woman. Louise E. Rorabacher in a similar thesis considered only the novels of the day (Victorian Women in Life and Fiction, University of Illinois, 1942). Her purpose was to determine the validity of the concept of the woman in the novel in terms of historical fact. She concluded that the fictional woman was real, in a narrow, myopic sense, but that she did not reflect the social change. The picture of her social and conservative home life was …

The Contemporary American Short Story (A Study Of The Best American Short Stories, 1950-1959), Gertrude Carrick Curtler

Master's Theses

The purpose of this paper is to analyze and review the contemporary short story by means of an intensive study of The Best American Short Stories of the past ten years. The obvious weakness of the project is that all these two hundred and forty-five short stories were selected as the best of each year by one person, Martha Foley. While she is generally respected as a critic, still her opinions are based on her own taste and judgement alone. It is possible that she leans too much toward avant­-garde stories, or even that she may prefer stories of one …

Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889), Helen Levine Berkowitz

Master's Theses

Gerard Manley Hopkins' reputation as a poet has been almost wholly posthumous. He did not "arrive" in a critical way until the l930's when interest seemed to be centered more on the religious implications of his work than on the poetic. Today we are beginning to accept Hopkins as a major poet and to assess his virtues and limitations somewhat more objectively.

A Study Of Hypnotism In The Works Of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Helen Lei Hsu

Master's Theses

I propose in this study to examine the uses of hypnotism in two of Hawthorne 's tales: "Ethan Brand" and "The Prophetic Pictures"; and three of Hawthorne's romances: Fanshawe, The House of the Seven Gables, and The Blithedale Romance. My aims are generally these: to investigate Hawthorne's interest in hypnotism with reference to the manifested popularity of hypnotism in his time; to identify Hawthorne's implication of hypnotism in the above tales and romances; and to analyze Hawthorne 's art of interweaving his themes with the practice of hypnosis.

Actuality And Realism In The Poetry Of George Crabbe, Gerald Meredith Garman

Master's Theses

It ia a generally accepted fact among critics that George Crabbe was a realist. It will be the purpose of this paper to examine this conclusion for its validity. More exactly, I shall compare the poetry of Crabbe with the historical records of his era and measure how closely Crabbe came to reproducing, realistically, his own times. The paper is really a study of Crabbe's realism as reflected in his poetry with a view toward questioning the verdict of the critics.

In this work I have attempted to dispel several misconceived notions about Crabbe's poetry, but the general conclusions will …

The Portrayal Of Historical Character In Browning's Poetry, Claudius Williams Griffin

Master's Theses

Robert Browning is one of the most popular of the English poets, in his day and ours. There are Browning Societies and Browning lovers all over the world, from England and America to Africa and South America. He is also popular with scholars. There are at least twelve biographies, three handbooks to interpret his poetry, and six or more collections of his letters to his wife and friends. What accounts for Browning's popularity? He was not a lyric poet like Shelley, nor was he a nature lover like Wordsworth. Much of his poetry is difficult and requires careful reading. Some …