Digital Commons Network^™

Shaping Character: The Role Of Mythology In Society, Jaclyn Weist

Masters Theses

Throughout history, man has told stories. Some stories were written on walls, tablets, or bits of parchment. Others have been passed down to posterity through oral tradition. Every culture worldwide has a rich tapestry of legends and myths. It is my intent to demonstrate that these stories use the tools of character development within their various plot lines to both express and shape beliefs, superstitions, and life lessons. Whether they are religious in nature or simply trying to make sense of the world, these stories, myths, and legends have played a part in shaping society into what it is today.

Fair Folk, Jamie M. Good

WWU Honors College Senior Projects

This is the outline for an upcoming novel centering retold Celtic fairy tales. The project includes research about fairy lore and Celtic mythology, as well as modern Irish customs surrounding cultural beliefs surrounding fairies. This story prioritizes the Pagan versions of folklore, rather than the more modern Victorian and Christian depictions of Celtic traditions and fairies.

The outline includes an introduction, short synopsis, short summaries and goals for fifty-four chapters (the full length of the novel), a list of characters, and a short reflection.

Synopsis:

Three children, Molly, Cal, and Jack, are abducted into the fairy realm. Molly and Cal …

Dark Magic Part 1, Rachel Quaid

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

Dark Magic is a novel that mixes old folklore with fantasy and a splash of modern day. This first part of the novel readies the readers to enter the world of the old Irish Aos Sì. Ophelia is a witch, living in the land of the fae. She signs up to help with a research study to better her chances at succeeding as a healer. Rhea is a member of the Tuatha de Danann, the fae folk who rule the land from their courts of old. She is sent by her caretaker to observe this study. Everyone knows witches and …

Lesson Plan For Teaching Four Stories Featuring Multi/Mixed Identities, Sierra Sweeney , '21, Peter Schmidt

English Literature Faculty Works

Developed by a Swarthmore College student, Sierra Sweeney, with feedback from Professor Peter Schmidt, as a final assignment in English 71D, "The Short Story in the U.S.," fall 2018.

Fiction as a genre is well known for its ability to discuss a wide range of topics in a way that is both entertaining and empathetic. But while fictional pieces, especially the short story, are famous for creating narratives that help readers understand experiences unlike their own and characters unlike themselves, I would argue that fiction can also serve as a medium of self- reflection. As someone who identifies as multi-ethnic …

Emergent Fiction, Brandon Mcfarlane

Publications and Scholarship

The sixty-four works of emergent fiction of 2015 evidence several noteworthy transitions in Canadian prose. While it is admittedly problematic to discuss the novels and collections of short stories as some form of unified whole, several patterns emerged that merit highlighting and demand critical attention because they represent new directions for Canadian fiction.

The texts mark the arrival of a new wave of literary experimentation that embraces risk-taking and the pursuit of novelty as fundamental characteristics of good art and great storytelling. The featured texts created wonderfully new ways to tell stories by inventing narrative techniques or breaking with generic …

Janice Holt Giles And The "White Caps” Of Kentucky, Michael R. Brown

Library Staff Presentations & Publications

Janice Holt Giles (1905-1979) has more to say about the Brethren in Christ than any other novelist or popular writer;' in fact, she stands alone. Her 25 books, written from 1950 to 1975, sold four million copies in her lifetime, and some remain in print and have recently attracted renewed interest. Primarily noted for her historical fiction about the Western frontier, she is also noted for novels and memoirs set in her adopted state of Kentucky. Of these, four describe or characterize the Brethren in Christ at varying length and another three mention or make allusions to them. One novel, …

Faith In Our Fathers: Can You Believe In Fictional Priests?, Eamon Maher

Articles

I was struck recently by an article that appeared in the online section ofthe Irish Times (November 14th. 2015). Written by a priest called Martin Boland, the piece was prompted by the publication of a novel by John Boyne, A History of Loneliness, which has as its main protagonist Fr Odran Yates, who is forced to live in an Ireland where the priest is more likely to be viewed as a paedophile or pariah than as a respected member of society. Clearly a novelist as disaffected as Boyne admits to being with the Catholic Church, would find it hard to …

In Solidarity: Collaborations In Lgbtq+ Activism, Lisa M. Tillmann Ph.D., Kathryn L. Norsworthy

Faculty Publications

What follows is a fictional account. Our “characters” bear our real names; the other eight are composites of students we have taught and from whom we have learned; activists with whom we have worked; and staff, faculty, and administrators we have trained in venues such as Safe Zone. We portray our ally (Lisa)-lesbian (Kathryn) relationship this way for two reasons: one, we had not secured permission from real students, colleagues, or community members to represent their lives and experiences, and two, we seek a way to show our partnership, both personal and professional since 2000, in action. To each of …

Catholic Sensibility In The Early Fiction Of Edna O'Brien, Eamon Maher

Articles

No abstract provided.

Compulse, Candise W. Henson

Student Publications

A short short story that looks at the details of a strange marriage between a minister with Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and his pregnant wife as they attempt to exorcise five girls at a backwoods church camp.

The Casualty Of Home, Molly Koeneman

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

Casualty of Home is a novel-in-stories focusing largely on the displacement felt due to situation or family. Often, members of a family have trouble making connections with each other, for each has its own thoughts, desires and expectations. Still, they have something rudimentary in common: blood. Because they are related, family members are inclined to care for individuals they might not even know, much less love. Spanning three generations, the characters in Casualty of Home deal with the constraints of family, the pressures of adolescence, and the limitations of the rural Southern culture in which they live. The characters face …

Island Culture: The Role Of The Blasket Autobiographies In The Preservation Of A Traditional Way Of Life, Eamon Maher

Articles

The Blasket Islands, located off the west coast of Kerry, are remarkable for having inspired a flourishing literature, mainly autobiographical in nature, which is generally acknowledged as being of great anthropological value, as well as of significant literary merit. When one considers that the islands never had a population of more than around 160 persons (with an average of closer to half that number) during the years covered by the autobiographies, the existence of such an important chronicle of the simple and at times perilous life on these Atlantic outposts is all the more noteworthy. The language spoken on the …

Librarians And Gumshoes, Kellian Clink

Library Services Publications

I studied how the protagonists in prize winning murder mysteries used libraries as well as the gratifying number of times that the authors of said mysteries praised their public libraries in their acknowledgements page.

Crossing Borders In Anne Tyler's Fiction, Susan Norton

Articles

No abstract provided.

June 1940, William Preston Davies

W. P. Davies' Newspaper Column ('That Reminds Me')

No abstract provided.