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Veiled Victorian Vampires: What Literary Antagonists Reveal About Societal Fears Of 19th Century England, Jenna Harford

Honors Theses

In my thesis paper I look at three primary texts, Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations, and Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray to analyze their main antagonists through a vampiric lens. I explain how the characters of Bertha Mason, Miss Havisham, and Dorian Gray are all written with veiled vampiric traits that revolve around themes of sexuality, secrecy and seclusion, and unbridled physical and emotional violence. Although none of these texts is obviously a “vampire novel”, the authors lean into vampire tropes including eerie physical description, doubled relationships, and other vampire lore that can be best …

"The Stuff Of Thought" : Virginia Woolf's Object Lessons, Sam Mitchell

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Anna Letitia Barabauld's Poetic Vision: Community, Imagination, And The Quotidian, Carrie Ann Woods

Master's Theses

With the publication of her Poems in 1773, favorable reviews welcomed Anna Letitia Barbauld into the literary world. However, Barbauld has traditionally been left out of English literature anthologies, condemned to the murky depths of obscurity. Why has this talented British poet of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries been undeservedly marginalized? Perhaps she has never achieved the status of a major literary figure because her impulse towards community places her outside the mainstream Romantic tradition dominated by the "egotistical sublime." In the poetry of William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Lord Byron, and John Keats, an …

In Search Of A Female Self : The Masculinization Of May In Chaucer's Merchant's Tale, Kimberly Diane Whitley

Master's Theses

This examination of Chaucer's Merchant's Tale was undertaken as a response to existing scholarship. While criticism in the past tended toward a literal reading of the text, viewing it as a misogynist Merchant's story attesting to the innate depravity of women, more recent feminist criticism has leaned toward a reading which endeavors to defend the actions of May, claiming an evolvement on her part towards autonomy and self-knowledge. This thesis, taking its cue from French feminist theoretical assertions concerning self, refutes both of these readings. While it acknowledges the subversive nature of May's actions, it is unable to recognize any …

Shakespeare And Astrology, William Bruce Smith

Master's Theses

The popular ity of astrology in Elizabethan England is ref lected by the large number of references to it in the works of William Shakespeare. The majority of astrological references in the Shakespearean canon are "commonplaces" and do not add signif icantly to our understanding of his work, although they are of interest in studying exactly how much astrological knowledge he possessed. There are astrological references in the plays, however, that are of significance in the study of character in Shakespeare. In certain plays (Romeo and Juliet, The Winter' s Tale) a judgement concerning various individuals ' inner nobility may …

Shakespeare's Treatment Of Love : The Mature Tragedies, Albert E. Clark

Master's Theses

The machinery of criticism has been extensively applied to those plays in the Shakespeare canon often referred to as the mature tragediess Othello, Macbeth, Hamlet, and Antony and Cleopatra, One seeking enlightenment in veritably any area of interest will find the means in the varied approaches which have proliferated through four hundred years of Shakespeare criticism. New and valid interpretations testify to a continuing need for insight into Shakespeare's arts nevertheless,. the word "supererogatory" must surely have occurred to even the moat resilient seeker after Shakespearean truth. A spate of learned articles and scholarly tomes inundate, and the burden is …

Goe, And Finde A Mistris : The Concepts Of Woman In The Poetry Of John Donne: The Elegies, The Anniversaires, The Songs And Sonets, Leanne Wade Beorn

Master's Theses

This study of the concepts of woman in the poems, combined with an analysis of the poems' internal structure and content in relation to the literary background, seems to me to be a most profitable approach to the whole of Donne's love poetry. By focusing on the concepts of woman I shall provide a common basis for comparison, since woman figures in all of the poems but one. By summarizing the characteristics of the major literary traditions about love operative in Donne's time, I shall provide information which is essential to understanding the diversity of attitudes in the poems. And …

Chaucer's Criseyde : The Pressures Of The Courtly Love Code, Betty Ann Jaffee

Master's Theses

When Chaucer wrote the poem Troilus and Criseyde, he created a heroine who stands out from other romantic med­ ieval heroines such as Guinevere and Ysolt. He created a heroine of such complexities that critics have debated her motives endlessly and have explored the psychology of her emotions with every literary tool at their command. He created a heroirie whose sin was so damning that it inspired Robert Henryson to provide for her what he considered a fit­ ting punishment; and it inspired Shakespeare to try to salvage the wreck left by Henryson to create his masterful play.

It is …

Determinism And Freedom Of Choice Operating Through Five Experiences In Psychological Development In The Lives Of Three Of George Eliot's Heroines, Elisabeth Even Sale

Master's Theses

George Eliot's world is a deterministic world. She believed that circumstances and conventions imposed by society control events in an individual life; nevertheless, in the inevitable conflicts between inner desire and outer reality, the individual is responsible for his own choices and the acts which they direct. Furthermore, only in a deterministic world are intelligent, moral choices possible. The explanation or this seeming paradox lies in education or the individual by experience to learn to make satisfying choices and to develop a strong will. Through experience, the individual learns both the hazards of the selfish choice and also the lasting …

Mrs. Gaskell's Industrial Novels: Mary Barton And North And South, Yvette D. Marambaud

Master's Theses

Since 1910, when Mrs. Gaskell's centenary was celebrated, few articles have been written about her. Except for her Life of Charlotte Bronte, she is not really well known in America. Few people read her tales or her short stories, and her novels are quite neglected. Yet her industrial novels, Mary Barton (1848) and North and South (1855), were very successful when they were first published. Mary Barton was an immediate success - perhaps in part because of the controversies it aroused.

The Contributions And Effects Of The Drama On Paradise Lost, Robert Elliott Bayliss

Master's Theses

Upon reading John Milton's Paradise Lost, one cannot help but notice that its tone, its moving scenes and confrontations, and its moments of psychological and cathartic impact all help to shape what one might call the poem's total effect -- the impressions it leaves with the reader. Upon close examination it becomes obvious that Milton was consummately adept in his adaptation of the dramatic element in his great epic. What is generally unrecognized, yet surprisingly evident, is that the dramatic element plays a unique and singularly important role in building the poem's grandeur. This dramatic element, more than any of …

Images Of Creation And Destruction In The Early Poetry Of Dylan Thomas, Willard Liston Rudd

Master's Theses

The intent of this thesis is to examine the two major categories into which Dylan Thomas' images seem to fall: images associated with creation and images associated with destruction.

Shakespeare's Treatment Of Kingship In The Lancastrian Tetralogy, June Stemen Allman

Master's Theses

The English history play reached its highest peak of development between 1595 and 1599, for it was during these years that Shakespeare wrote the set of four plays covering the historical period from Richard II to Henry V. Each of the plays is a single entity, but in their entirety, they constitute a unified tetralogy concerning the rise of the house of Lancaster. Through the illegal seizure of the crown by Bolingbroke from Richard II to the glorious reign of Henry V, Shakespeare, as an intensely political writer, examines the facets of kingship and its inherent power and authority.

Chaucer's Ecclesiastics In The Canterbury Tales, Helen Lee Coleman

Master's Theses

It is thought that Chaucer began composing The Canterbury Tales as a dramatic whole around 1387. This is his last and by f ar his best known work. In this final. masterpiece Chaucer undertakes the tremendous task or presenting in poetic form a whole society. However, he does not merely explore society in general; he also develops the theme or the individual's relation to the community and the integral part that each person plays in making up the whole. The Canterbury Tales is, as George Lyman Kittredge so aptly puts it, "a micro cosmography" or a little image of a …

Chaucer's Ecclesiastics In The Canterbury Tales, Helen Lee Coleman

Master's Theses

It is thought that Chaucer began composing The Canterbury Tales as a dramatic whole around 1387. This is his last and by far his best known work. In this final masterpiece Chaucer undertakes the tremendous task of presenting in poetic form a whole society. However, he does not merely explore society in general; he also develops the theme or the individual's relation to the community and the integral part that each person plays in making up the whole. The Canterbury Tales is, as George Lyman Kittredge so aptly puts it, "a micro cosmography" or a little image of a great …

Jane Austen's Use Of The Epistolary Method, Barbara Tavss Bender

Master's Theses

There is . . . a prominent use of letters within the novels of Jane Austen. It has been shown that she wao influenced by Samuel Richardson and Fanny Burney and that she had a long experimental period of almost exclusive use of the epistolary method. It is from their influence and from her experimentation that the six major novels evolved; this supreme achievement was to give their creator a prominent place in the history of the English novel. No one factor can be cited as Miss Austen 's outstanding contribution, for each novel is a synthesis of many superior …

The New British Drama 1956-1966 : A Critical Study Of Four Dramatists: John Osborne, Brendan Behan, Arnold Wesker, And John Arden, Jeanne Fenrick Bedell

Master's Theses

In the history of England, as well as in the history of the English stage, 1956 was a momentous year. It was the year of the Suez, the year that saw the destruction of the myth of the British empire. And it was the year of the Hungarian Revolution, which crushed liberal illusions about Soviet Russia. In 1956 the old idols were crumbling fast, and defense of tradition was fast becoming not only impossible but ludicrous. The bankruptcy of the older generation was apparent; it was time for the new to speak out.

Chaucer's Pandarus : A Character Study, Phillip Valentine Daffron

Master's Theses

Chaucer 's Pandarus has been an intriguing character for me ever since my first exposure, as an undergraduate, to Troilus and ­Criseyde. Pandarus interests me because he is true to human nature in that he is not consistently one way all of the time. Like most human beings, Pandarus has many facets to his nature; therefore, I find it distressing that many critics and students of Chaucer will not acknowledge this complexity but rather tend to want to stereotype him. If Pandarus were a simple, transparent character, then his rank in English literature would be considerably less significant. It is …

Marlowe's Cosmology, William H. Caldwell

Master's Theses

A general study of Marlowe 's cosmology may by no means be original, for numerous critics have mentioned the subject in varying degrees; however, there is a wide disparity or opinion concerning the relative importance of the subject in relation to the playwright. This study is not exhaustive; it is significant, however, because it attempts to prove by means of biographical and historical backgrounds the idea that Mar­lowe had an intellect that was always "climbing after knowledge infin­ite."

In this study there are two obvious omissions: the plays Dido, Queen of Carthage, and The Massacre at Paris. …

Shelley's Prometheus Unbound : A Critical Analysis And Interpretation, Emily Carol Braxton

Master's Theses

As a basis for Prometheus Unbound, which he completed in 1819 and which is his masterpiece, Shelley used Aeschylus' Prometheus Bound. Shelley used the Prometheus myth to express his own ideas about present evils and his hopes for man's future as a result of his belief that man was capable of perfectibility.

Dryden's Adaptations Of Shakespeare, Massie C. Stinson Jr.

Master's Theses

It is the purpose of this study to discuss Dryden's adaptations of Shakespeare's The Tempest, Antony and Cleopatra, and Troilus and Cressida. As a background for this study, Restoration drama will be discussed from the standpoint of the following criteria: relationship to Elizabethan drama; Restoration audiences, theaters, and fashion; adaptations, primarily of Shakespeare; D’Avenant, Dryden, and heroic drama; and finally, English opera in the Restoration period. The first of the five chapters in this discussion will be concerned with the items listed above. Succeeding chapters in order will discuss Dryden's adaptations of Shakespeare’s The Tempest, Antony and Cleopatra, Troilus and …

An Evaluation Of The Autobiographical Interpretation Of Samson Agonistes, Edward P. Crockett

Master's Theses

Certainly, every reader of Samson Agonistes who is at all familiar with the circumstances of Milton's life, his thought, and the history of his times has been attracted by obvious parallels between 'the poet and certain aspects or his dramatic creation, and he may understandably assume that the presentation or the sufferings of Samson constitute intentional, hidden autobiography. To assume even the obvious, however, is something too blithely done. A little research into this area of Miltoniana will reveal to him that scholarly opinion concerning Samson Agonistes and autobiography is greatly varied and that some scholars are inclined not only …

Character And Theme In Romeo And Juliet And Troilus And Cressida : A Comparative Critical Study, Charlotte H. Oberg

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

The Problem Of Satan In Milton's Paradise Lost, Jeanne Saunders

Master's Theses

By 1641 John Milton had prepared a rather detailed outline for a tragic drama, Adam Unparadised. The design was to take form and grow, not as a religious drama, but as a magnificent epic poem which would "assert Eternal Providence,/And justify the ways of God to men" (I.25-26). In the original design for the drama the character and person of Satan did not constitute a basis for sustained interest. However, when Paradise Lost was finished in 1665, this was no longer the case; Satan, as an historical figure treated by the poetic and religious imagination of Milton, emerged as one …

William Butler Yeats' Contribution To The Celtic Renaissance In Ireland, Marian Marsh Sale

Master's Theses

The story of Ireland's Literary Revival is the story not only of the life and death of the Gaelic language in Ireland and the attempt to revive it as the national medium of speech, but also of the rise, during the last quarter of the nineteenth century, of modern Anglo-Irish literature, which gave to Irish letters the right to be judged independently of English literature. The formation of this new medium of national literary expression was the result of the interaction of the work of certain translators and folklorists with that of those writers who sought to restore the Gaelic …

A Study Of Chaucer's Influence On English Literature Through Dryden, Elder Blair Apperson

Master's Theses

Geoffrey Chaucer is one of the greatest poets of our English literature. If Shakespeare stands apart as our greatest, then it is John Milton who must dispute with Chaucer the honor of second place. Milton undoubtedly surpasses Chaucer in the grandeur of his imagination and the sublimity or his poetic style; but "he cannot equal him in the range and variety of his art." On one hand we have Chaucer, the grave and serious poet.always keenly conscious that "our human life is a shifting quicksand of mutability, that lasting happiness can never be our earthly portion;" whereas we have but …

A Comparison Of The Uses Of Astrology In The Works Of John Gower And Geoffrey Chaucer, George Rufus Wyatt Jr.

Master's Theses

The literary interest in astrology which had been gradually increasing during the fourteenth century in England, culminated in the works of Geoffrey Chaucer and John Gower. It is not surprising that these two poets have used astrology very extensively in writing stories for their medieval audiences since the average man in the Middles Ages believed that life depended upon the influences of the seven planets in their positions in the zodiac. It is the purpose of this thesis to present a comparison of the uses of the astrological material in the works of Geoffrey Chaucer and John Gower. In this …