Classics Commons^™

0887: Gwenyth E. Hood Collection, 1889-2023, Marshall University Special Collections

Guides to Manuscript Collections

Gwenyth Elise Hood was born on December 10, 1955, to Thomas Arthur Hood and Marion Louise Snee Hood in White Plains, NY, but moved with her family to Brandon, Vermont at the age of seven. She developed a love of reading and writing at an early age, discovering some favorite authors—Rudyard Kipling, Shakespeare, and J.R.R. Tolkien—at roughly the same time, in early adolescence. Then came Dante. Dante drew her to learn Latin and Italian; she had already started on French due to family heritage and the availability of the language in High School. In 1979 she won a University of …

How Fears Of Ai In The Classroom Reflect Anxieties About Choosing Sophistry Over True Knowledge In The American Education System, David Arellano Smith

Critical Humanities

The rise of ChatGPT has educators across the United States of America worried about scholastic integrity like never before. This paper argues, however, that underneath this initial concern lies an even greater one, that the education system in the United States so closely resembles the style of teaching used by the sophists in Ancient Greece that it has ultimately failed to cultivate critical thinking skills in America’s youth, so much so that ChatGPT has become a far greater issue than it ever needed to be. The practice of ‘teaching to the test’ and the commodification of education, which is akin …

Plagues, Oblivion, And The Anonymous Dead Echoes From Seneca’S Oedipus And Lucan’S Civil War To Covid-19, Christina Franzen

Critical Humanities

The dead who are piled up in the literary worlds of Seneca’s Oedipus and Lucan’s Civil War are not very different than those of modernity. In their anonymity and silence, they speak so much about the atrocities and traumatic events of the societies in which they live. In Oedipus, nameless citizens claustrophobically are joined to one another in death, and, in Civil War, heaps of dead rot as Caesar looks on. One cannot help being reminded of the mass graves on Hart Island, the refrigerated morgue trucks, and the mass funeral pyres in India. This essay explores how the …

The Centrality Of The Regime For Political Science: Review Of C. Bates Jr., The Centrality Of Politeia For Aristotle’S Politics: Aristotle’S Continuing Significance For Social And Political Science. Warszawa: Wydawnictwa Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 2016. 105 Pages. Isbn 9788323526407. 29.00 Zł (Pb). Bmcr 2018.06.53., C. Sydnor Roy

Humanities Faculty Research

Excerpt: The stated goal of Bates’ book is “to make the case for the centrality of what Aristotle called ‘the politeia’ and contemporary political scientists call ‘the regime’ in any attempt to have a science of politics” (7). To do this, Bates makes an argument for a shift in how we understand the relationship between the idea of the politeia and the idea of the state. Instead of equating the polis with the state, and finding imperfections in that comparison, Bates argues that scholars should compare the politeia to the state. He goes on to argue that the concept of …

Review Of The Gift Of Active Empathy: Scheler, Bakhtin, And Dostoevsky, By Alina Wyman, Slav N. Gratchev

Modern Languages Faculty Research

There are certain writers that literary scholars of all times will study again and again, and there are certain literary works that are too important to be examined only once. Reading Dostoevsky is always an “excruciatingly visceral experience” not only for us, the readers, but also for scholars like Max Scheler and Mikhail Bakhtin (p. 230). Alina Wyman’s book makes a major contribution to this experience.

Wyman’s argument is both original and elegantly simple: for Bakhtin and Scheler the concept of loving empathy is fundamental in both their respective models of being and in the particular structure of their careers. …

Psychosexualism In Victorian Literature: A Psychoanalysis Of Jane Eyre And Dracula, Heather Marie Ward

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

My thesis consists of historical facts and literary analysis and is made up of three chapters. In the first chapter, I look at two varying elements of psychosexualism, the emotional and the physical, and discuss how each can be applied to Jane Eyre and Dracula. The chapter also contains an explanation for the term psychosexualism and provides a brief history of: the Victorian notion of hysteria and spermatorrhea, the twentieth-century classifications of love and sex addiction, as well as the twenty-first-century to Histrionic Personality Disorder and Sexual Sadism Disorder. The second chapter provides an analysis of Jane Eyre, specifically looking …

20140904.2: Classical Studies, 1915-1984, College Of Liberal Arts

Guides to University Archives

These items include materials from the Department of Classical Studies at Marshall University from 1915-1984. Items were received in 2014 and include notable materials from the Classical Language Association, lecture slides, readings, suggested changes in the university calendar, and Marshall University News from May 30, 1984. This is not an exhaustive list. Please download the finding aid for a full list of contents

Scandalous Deception In The Castle: An Examination Of The Gender Performance Through The Bedtrick Trope In Arthurian Literature, Abby Louise Daniel

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

The bedtrick – mistaken identity in a sexual encounter – is a comic motif employed by medieval, renaissance and modern storytellers. While modern readers tend to recognize this motif as (at best) a disturbing sexual escapade and (at worst) rape, the scholarship on mistaken identity in medieval literature still generally glosses over the bedtrick as a moment of comedy. My thesis examines the literary trope of the bedtrick through the critical lens of Judith Butler’s performativity theory, and the motives behind this form of deception and the modern implications. Furthermore, the bedtrick trope is explored in Malory’s Le Morte Darthur …

The Constitutional Debate: Herodotus’ Exploration Of Good Government, C. Sydnor Roy

Humanities Faculty Research

Herodotus’ Constitutional Debate is an important contribution to the development of political thought, since Herodotus provides in it definitions of the three forms of government, democracy, oligarchy, and monarchy. Yet the narrative context of the debate, as well as the Histories entire, often undermines these descriptions. In this article, I attempt to show how Herodotus focuses much more on the pragmatic goals of government—accountability, good decision-making, and stability—than on pure constitutional forms, and such a pragmatic focus suggests that Herodotus may be an early proponent of a ‘mixed’ constitution.

Lend Me Your Voice: Discovering Romanity In Seneca's De Otio And De Brevitate Vitae, Joshua Dean Wimmer

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

This thesis is primarily concerned with the theory that the writings of Seneca the Younger display an array of stylistic choices theretofore unprecedented in the production of philosophical works in Latin, as well as that, in so doing, Seneca is able to cultivate an approach to Latin literature that is uniquely Roman in character. By using two of the “dialogues” of Seneca—De otio and De breuitate uitae—as representative of his prose works, particularly those philosophical in nature, I analyze the author’s specific use of language in order to highlight and to detail those methods which he employs in an effort …

A Feminist Critique Of Beowulf: Women As Peace-Weavers And Goaders In Beowulf's Courts, Charles Phipps

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

This thesis documents the relationship between “Goaders" and "Peace-Weavers" amongst the women of Beowulf. These roles have a large place to play within the framework of the Beowulf narrative and all of its female characters fall into one of these descriptors. Goaders are women who have the role of driving men to violence with words. They do not actually perform the violence themselves but instead induce it in others, souring relationships and compelling men to war. Peace-weavers, by contrast, urge men toward reconciliation with speech and encouragement. Examining the poem's context for these two roles and how they relate to …

Epigrafía Del Apócrifo. Revisión Del Juicio Colonial, Carlos M. López

Modern Languages Faculty Research

The location of Latin-American pre-colonial era texts in a World-taxonomy of art is very problematic from the perspective of Western axiology. The concept of ‘literature’ was defined at the end of the 18th century by thinkers of the Enlightenment, particularly by Herder, Lessing, Kant and Hegel. They invented the paradigm that established the standard that written printed text, especially those on phonetic systems, are the highest expression of human spirit. According to this paradigm Europe, and particularly Prussia, were the ones to have reached the summit of History; ergo, European written-printed texts were defined as the true ‘literature’. On the …

Deathly Erichtho As Vital To Lucan’S Bellum Ciuile, John Byron Young

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Lucan’s Bellum Ciuile has provided much difficulty for scholars in the identification of a hero, as none of the main characters of the epic, Caesar, Pompey, and Cato, fully become a hero. I argue that a minor character, Erichtho, the necromancer in book 6, is not only the hero, but also the supreme uates and reflection of the poet. Through her comparison with Scaeva in book 6 as well as Aeneas of Vergil’s Aeneid and her interactions with Sextus Pompey, her heroism becomes fully developed. She creates a corpse uates through her vatic powers and gains access into the Underworld …

A Poet's Request : Text And Subtext In Horace's Odes 1.1, Virginia C. Cook

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

As the first poem within Horace's original publication of Odes, Odes 1.1 embodies aspects of theme and style representative of the poet's approach to the genre of lyric poetry. The Odes of Horace allow various interpretations by the reader based on construction, vocabulary and imagery. This thesis explores Odes 1.1 in its entirety through such approaches and focuses on the text and subtext incorporated by the poet. The first chapter sets the foundation needed in order to begin a study of Horace's lyric poetry, detailing the genre as a whole, the life of the poet, as well as the contradiction …

Borrowing In Context : The Importance And Artistic Implications Of Chaucer's Use Of Sources In The Merchant's Tale, Austin Taylor Mcintire

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

In this thesis, I consider the implications of Chaucer not only as a man of his age but also as a poet who made deliberate decisions to borrow, imitate, and adapt the work of others, specifically in the context of The Merchant’s Tale. Chapter I of this thesis establishes the significance of the medieval understanding of auctor and auctoritas during the medieval literary period and, furthermore, examines Chaucer’s artistic output both during his career as a court poet and following his removal to Kent in an attempt to reach a clearer understanding of Chaucer’s use of source material when composing …

The Postcolonial "Knight‘S Tale": A Social Commentary On Post-Norman Invasion England, Ruth M.E. Oldman

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Every author injects a purpose into his or her works; in Chaucer‘s case, he scribed The Canterbury Tales, which tackles and successfully demonstrates various aspects to fourteenth century English society and culture. "The Knight‘s Tale" is no different; the tale is almost identical, plot-wise, to Giovanni Boccaccio‘s Teseida, and yet Chaucer weaves a tale that is distinctive. The tale reflects Chaucer‘s views on his society, in particular post-Norman attitudes. By examining the text with a post-colonial theoretical approach, Chaucer‘s "The Knight‘s Tale" is a subaltern commentary on the colonization of England after the Norman Conquest.

Women With Short Hair, Amanda Layne Stephens

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Women with Short Hair is a short-fiction collection that centers on the lives of four women who live in West Virginia. Each story depicts a female character during a different developmental stage: childhood in ―In Casino Daycare,‖ young adulthood in ―Felis domestica,‖ adulthood in ―Date Night at the Beach,‖ and middle-age in ―Women with Short Hair.‖ Short-fiction collections that influenced Women with Short Hair include Flannery O‘Connor‘s A Good Man Is Hard to Find, James Joyce‘s Dubliners, and Ernest Hemingway‘s In Our Time. Symbolism, repetition, the objective correlative, and free indirect discourse constitute reoccurring literary devices while reappearing themes include …

Metaphysics And The Charge Of Misanthropy : Ralph Waldo Emerson’S “Circles” As A Cipher For Understanding The Connection Between Robinson Jeffers And Herman Melville, Hunter Stark

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Herman Melville’s and Robinson Jeffers’s metaphysical thoughts reflect Ralph Waldo Emerson’s notion of looking towards Nature for discovery; all three writers’ observations of Nature influence how they see humanity’s place in existence. Both Melville and Jeffers observe Nature decentralizing humanity, which distinguishes their views from Emerson’s. Where Jeffers’s verse sternly voices this message, openly criticizing the anthropocentric viewpoint, Melville utilizes humor, subtly confronting the anthropocentric proponent and downplaying humanity’s power. Jeffers garners the label of misanthrope, whereas Melville’s metaphysical realm in Moby-Dick largely escapes this charge with the masking quality of his humor. Comparing both writers’ texts to an Emersonian …

Power, Courtly Love, And A Lack Of Heirs : Guinevere And Medieval Queens, Jessica Grady

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Authors have given Queen Guinevere of the Arthurian stories a wide variety of personalities; she has been varyingly portrayed as seductive, faithful, “fallen,” powerful, powerless, weak-willed, strong-willed, even as an inheritor of a matriarchal tradition. These personalities span eight centuries and are the products of their respective times and authors much more so than of any historical Guinevere. Despite this, however, threads of similarity run throughout many of the portrayals: she had power in some areas and none in others; she was involved in a courtly romance; and she did not produce an heir to the throne. None of these …

Ariadne As The Exemplum Of The Virtutes Of Heroes In Catullus Carmen 64, Chad P. Brown

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

In Carmen 64, Catullus establishes Ariadne as an exemplum of a new type of hero whose uirtutes are motivated by love rather than by the desire for glory that motivated traditional male epic heroes. Catullus utilizes the ecphrasis, a literary device which is traditionally a digression from the main narrative, to place Ariadne in this new heroic role. The first chapter reviews the past scholarship of Carmen 64. The second chapter examines how Catullus makes Ariadne the exemplum of this new type of hero while presenting a negative portrayal of Theseus. The third chapter discusses how the wedding of Peleus …

Body Parts And Their Epic Struggle In Ovid’S Amores, Leisa M. Muto

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

This thesis examines how body parts in Ovid’s Amores provide the location for an epic battle between the conflicting genres of Tragedy and Elegy. The first chapter summarizes past Ovidian scholarship. The second chapter examines how Ovid separates body parts of the amator and the puella in Amores 1.4 and 1.5 in order to deny the lovers complete unification. The third chapter expands the conclusion of the second by analyzing poems in Books 2 and 3, which contain a significant number of body parts, to determine how the amator’s interaction with the puella’s body parts reflects his lack of union …

“Since Merlin Paid His Demon All The Monstrous Debt”: The Celtic In Keats, Brandy Bagar Fraley

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

This thesis argues that the Keatsian critical canon refuses to acknowledge the influence of Celticism in the works of John Keats and that such a gap displaces his poems from their cultural context and also prevents re-readings that might add depth and distinction to his place in the Romantic canon. After discussing the Celticism inherent in the literature, art, and social phenomenon of Keats’s day and briefly reviewing the scarce criticism that exists on the topic, the author reveals the prevalence of Celtic philosophies, figures, myths, and settings in Keats’s poetry. Then, she further argues that Keats through the feminized …

From Orthodoxy To Heresy: A Theological Analysis Of Sonnets Xiv And Xviii, Timothy J. Burbery

English Faculty Research

The commentary on Milton's eighteenth sonnet ("On the Late Massacre' in Piedmont") is rich and extensive. Kester Svendsen's often cited 1945 essay, the first close reading of the poem; ushered in many other interpretations of its biblical imagery, as well as speech-act analyses, reader- response discussions, and at least one Foucaldian study. Yet even though a religious conflict inspired the sonnet, and although numerous interpreters have paid close attention to the work's biblical texture, no sustained theological account of the poem has been offered. The present essay seeks to fill that gap by examining the work in light of two …

John Milton, Blackfriars Spectator?: "Elegia Prima" And Ben Jonson's The Staple Of News, Timothy J. Burbery

English Faculty Research

In the spring of 1626 John Milton was temporarily expelled from Cambridge University, perhaps over a quarrel with his tutor William Chappell, and sent home to London, where he remained for at least several weeks. There, the seventeen-year-old poet composed his first elegy, a Latin verse-letter to his closest friend, Charles Diodati. In it, Milton claims to be enjoying his unexpected holiday by reading, girl watching, and attending the theater. Milton scholars have never reached consensus about his alleged playgoing, for while the young man speaks as a spectator, the plots and characters he mentions-these include comic types such as …

Aesthetic Revolutionaries : Picasso And Joyce, Joy M. Doss

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Picasso’s Cubist works and Joyce’s Ulysses transcend tradition, merge time and space, and radicalize form. By accomplishing these feats, the two men become seminal embodiments of Modernism. This thesis examines the conceptual and formal qualities shared by Cubism and Ulysses. With particular attention given to changing concepts of space and time, similarities between the works are related to four characteristics generally attributed to Modernism: deviance from tradition, an emphasis on form, fragmentation, and appropriation of popular culture. The monumental effects of these works on society are examined in the conclusion. The legacy of these aesthetic revolutionaries is unavoidable and continues …

Chasing Demons: Female Villains And Narrative Strategy In Victorian Sensation Fiction, Heather Sowards

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

This thesis explores Victorian sensation fiction and key authors who rely on essentialism, employing the classifications of either angel or demon to their literary female figures. Using Nina Auerbach's theories on these above categorizations and Helene Cixous's linguistic binaries, I examine the ways in which the narrators of Mary Elizabeth Braddon's Lady Audley's Secret, Sheridan Le Fanu's Uncle Silas, and Wilkie Collins's Heart and Science force this taxonomy onto the female villains who dominate the novels' themes. By looking closely at the narrative strategies, I conclude that these female characters themselves are proposing a very different sense of self or …

Jane Austen's Powers Of Consciousness, Diane M. Counts

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

This thesis incorporates information from recent biographies, feminist studies, and scholarly interpretations focusing on Jane Austen's narrative strategies. Such incorporation of material provides a context for understanding the significance of Austen's contributions to the novel form and illuminating the development of the female narrative voice. It focuses on Emma, Austen's last novel published during her lifetime, as an exemplification of Austen's enunciation of a feminine perspective of life and vocalization of a growing female self-awareness - her powers of consciousness - through Emma. Of primary concern is Austen's use of narrative techniques enabling the reader to become intimately acquainted and …

O Caramuru Y Caramurú: Sus Relaciones En La Formación De Un Protoimaginario Nacional Uruguayo, Maria Cristina Burgueno

Modern Languages Faculty Research

This article examines the inter-textual relations between the novel Caramurú (1848?) by the Uruguayan writer Alejandro Magariños Cervantes, and the epic poem O Caramuru (1781) by the Portuguese Friar Jose de Santa Rita Durão. The thesis of the article is that these literary works reflect the deep cultural and political connections between Uruguay and Brazil, and how these links were present at the time when –surrounded by uncertainties about the viability of the new state—the elaboration of a Uruguayan national identity started. The pro-Brazilian option –shown by the selection of Caramuru, who was a foundational character of the Brazilian History …

Abandonment, Neglect, And Poverty As Reflected In The Novels Of Charles Dickens, Melissa K. Smith

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

Biographers have written numerous accounts of the events of Charles Dickens's life, and critics have made some interesting observations about Dickens's novels and the characters he depicts in those novels. For example, these critics discuss characters who represent different people Dickens encountered in his life, familial relationships as presented in the novels, and Dickens's attack on various institutions and ideas, such as the Poor Laws, the legal system, and the industrial revolution. There are few references, however, to the influence on his writing of two major experiences in Dickens's childhood, neglect and abandonment by his family, and poverty. I have …

The Representation Of Samson's Eyes In Samson Agonistes, Timothy J. Burbery

English Faculty Research

Everyone knows that in Samson Agonistes Milton altered many details in the judges narrative of Samson, changing Dalila from a concubine to a wife, for instance, and inventing the characters of Harapha and the Public Officer. Yet one alteration that has gone unnoticed is the fact that Samson's eyeballs remain intact and his face looks normal and uninjured even after his being violently blinded by the Philistines.