English Language and Literature Commons^™

Exploring The Matriarchal Past To Forge A Modern Identity: Maternal Origins In Woolf And Ihimaera, Kirsten W. Burningham

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

Though the writings of Virginia Woolf and Witi Ihimaera are “incommensurable” in many ways, I find “commesurablilities”––the kind of commensurabilities the Susan Stanford Friedman seeks out across the planetary landscape of modernism––in the way they negotiate a new creative identity in a modern environment with the bang clash of history and present ringing in their ears. I see this commensurability in at least three key features: 1) Woolf and Ihimaera each gave birth to new literary movements: Woolf was mother to high British Modernism with experimental techniques such as free indirect discourse and the relegation of plot to the background; …

Women After Waterloo: Evolving Females In Jane Austen’S Persuasion, Madison Maloney

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

In Jane Austen’s last novel, Persuasion, she offers a glimpse into a character that breaks past the societal restraints women typically experience. Mrs. Croft, ostensibly, is the first Austen woman to find her way out of England; the Napoleon wars afford her the opportunity to travel the seas with her Admiral husband and participate in traditionally masculine experiences. Though other women in Austen novels do travel, they remain in-country, and they always find their way back to their original society. Throughout many wars in history, the absence of men as they fight in the military offers women the opportunity to …

Subverting Social Order: Investigating Class Critique In Homer’S Odyssey, Riley R. Mayes

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

The ‘Homeric Question,’ or the question of who Homer was, has long preoccupied the minds of the Western world (Foley 2). Due to the amorphous nature of oral tradition and the lost histories of ancient Greece, it is likely that this question may never be answered to satisfaction. However, what historical data we do have allows us to synthesize a composite character of who Homer might have been and, more importantly, what he represented. As we will explore, records reveal that the mythology of ancient Greece arose from the lower rungs of the social ladder; storytellers were often members of …

“Hopelessly Crippled”: The Construction Of Disability In Borges’S “Funes, His Memory”, Madilyn Abbe

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

In Jorge Luis Borges’s “Funes, His Memory,” the narrator presents Ireneo Funes as an intriguing example of both physical and cognitive atypicality. Although the narrator is quick to identify Funes’s deficiencies, he unashamedly acknowledges his own cognitive weaknesses as well. Using a literary disability studies lens, this article examines the construction of disability within the text, arguing that the narrator imposes disability onto Funes to mask the possibility that he be categorized as disabled. The narrator sets up an ableist binary to undermine Funes physically, yet this binary falls apart when applied to cognitive ability. In order to address this …

Henrietta Maria: Royalist Women’S Representations Of The French Catholic Queen, Kim Hansen

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

By the mid-15^th century, the royal marriage of King Charles and Queen Henrietta Maria incited enough conflict to spark civil war, as the English struggled to reconcile between the long-established image of female English domesticity and a pervasive cultural expectation for equality between marriage partners. Any form of equality in the royal marriage called the absolute power of the king into question, as it would imply that his actions had included her direct involvement, and even at times were more representative of her, not his, views. Letters captured at the Battle of Naseby confirmed fears that the queen …

“I Suppose An Island Dweller Should Expect It To Be So”: The Contradiction And Drama Of Maternity And Islands In Caleb’S Crossing, Shayla Frandsen

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

Islands have a long tradition of capturing human imagination and functioning as a space that nurtures both magic and mystery. As geographic locations, they seem to avoid easy taxonomy even while behaving easily categorizable: they exist as tourist fantasies separate from everyday landscape even while many operate as an othered land that is still “safe” enough to visit. They are isolated yet capable of nurturing strong cultural identity. They also act as autonomous entities while still being interconnected within larger natural structures, coastlines, and waterways. In these ways and more islands navigate as border spaces of inherent contradiction—contradictions which are …

Cover And Front Matter

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

No abstract provided.

To The Lighthouse Or To Mrs. Ramsay? A Study Of Materialization Through The Symbolism Of The Lighthouse In Virginia Woolf’S To The Lighthouse, Virginia Moscetti

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

In this paper, I argue that the “lighthouse” in Virginia Woolf’s novel To The Lighthouse operates as a symbol for Mrs. Ramsay’s “self-hood” and for Mr. Ramsay’s obscure desire for sanctuary and domesticity in Mrs. Ramsay. Through this symbolism I further contend that Woolf renders the ambiguous processes associated with self-hood and desire materially legible and, in doing so, demonstrates how metaphor and symbolism reconstitute our material world into representation. Moreover, I argue that we can conceptualize the lighthouse symbolism revolving around and centered in Mrs. Ramsay in terms of T.J. Clark’s “dual figure”; a figure with two symbolic connotations …

Character First: Defining And Methodizing Character Depth, Jeff Mason

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

This paper explores the definition of "depth" in characters and provides a radical new definition, supplemented by an applicable model. By looking into significant literary theory, contemporary works of story, and even elements of mathematics, this paper advances our understanding of characters and how they create meaning in stories.

Marriage And Relationships In Art Spiegelman’S Maus: The Erasure Of The Female Experience, Gretchen K. Picklesimer Kinney

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

In this paper, the author explores how Vladek’s focus on money, control, and independence creates an imbalance of power in his romantic relationships with Luica, Anja, and Mala. She explores Vladek’s motivations for continuing (or not continuing) these relationships, and how Vladek tries to maintain power and control. She analyzes how Vladek ignores the perspectives and experiences of these women to create his own biased narrative of the relationships.

Full Issue

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

No abstract provided.

The Only Way Out Is Through: Community, Death, And The Desacralization Of Trauma In George Saunders’ Lincoln In The Bardo, Josey Gardner

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

The arrival of George Saunders’ novel Lincoln in the Bardo as yet another trauma narrative is not surprising. What began as a desire for representation of trauma in media and literature has morphed into an obsession in which trauma is the gold standard. Upon becoming so, trauma is inevitably placed upon a pedestal—the shining object that all other decisions are measured against and based upon. Its placement on this pedestal marks the “sacralization” of trauma. However, Lincoln in the Bardo fills a unique niche in the current portrayals of trauma found in popular media by seeking to minimize its importance …

Genre In Translations Of Sir Gawain And The Green Knight, Madison Schow

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

A comparison of J.R.R. Tolkien’s translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, published posthumously in 1975, and Simon Armitage’s 2007 translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight reveals that a translator’s choices can affect the genre of a work. Tolkien’s foreignizing translation situates Sir Gawain in the tradition of medievalist fantasy and should be read in the context of twentieth century fantasy, the same genre as Tolkien’s original works. Armitage’s domesticating translation places Sir Gawain in the context of twenty-first century fantasy. An examination of the subgenres represented in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (ghost story, thriller, …

Fragments And Foreignness In Claudia Rankine's Citizen, Cutter Mendenhall

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

This analysis investigates Claudia Rankine’s redefinition of foreignness as the fragmenting force of microaggressions that splinters the African American identity. This fragmentation has implications that shatter and reconstruct the traditional understanding of the African American self, the source and fallacies of both white and black anger, and what it means to be native to mainstream American society. Ultimately, Rankine asserts that the foreignizing nature of microaggressions is a socially constructed form of oppression. This foreignness breaks the African American identity into easily accessible subhuman caricatures that leave the black identity in a ruptured state of cognitive dissonance. While making coherence …

Full Issue

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

No abstract provided.

Ghosts’ Stories: Addictive Behaviors And Complicated Grief In George Saunders’ Lincoln In The Bardo, Jc Leishman

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

When experiencing the natural motions of the grieving process, some individuals encounter an inability to pass this process by a phenomenon known as complicated grief. To deal with the cyclical trauma this causes, the human mind seeks to engage in addictive behaviors (both substantive and behavioral) that work to artificially and momentarily circumvent grief. This process, as it appears in George Saunders' experimental novel, Lincoln in the Bardo, reveals a depth of commentary on human attachments and grieving processes through the lives and narratives of ghosts found in the bardo.

To Put Her In Her Place: An Interrogation Of Death And Gender In Shakespearean Tragedy, Isabella A. Zentner

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

This analysis investigates the gendered implications of Shakespearean heroines' deaths. Using Macbeth, Antony and Cleopatra, and Titus Andronicus as case studies, evidence is drawn from the text. This evidence is then supported by extensive historical research and reference to external critical studies of these tragedies. By identifying the gendered aspects of these heroines’ deaths, one can gain a greater understanding of Shakespeare’s view of female autonomy and power. The deaths Shakespeare inflicts often act as a punishment for the heroines' betrayal of traditional gender roles and forcibly return the heroines to the feminine sphere.

Entropic Interactionist Theory: Reading Social Constructionism Through Thermodynamics And Samuel Beckett, Brie Barron

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

This essay aims to explain the breakdown of social constructs through the concept of Entropic Interactionist Theory. EIT argues that it is the nature of creations to be vulnerable to the same forces as their creator, and that social constructions (like identity, for example) are subject to the very same physical forces that give rise to humanity’s creative impulse. At its core, EIT is informed by social constructionism and Nietzschean sociological theory, but it names the second law of thermodynamics and the concept of entropy as the driving force behind societal disintegration. The complication with this theory is that it …

The Walls That Define Us, Kaitlyn C. Nielson

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

Herman Melville’s short story “Bartleby the Scrivener: A Story of Wall Street” tells the story of Bartleby, a man living in the lower-class of nineteenth century New York City, who secures a job copying legal documents. Unlike the other employees’ eagerness to work, Bartleby remains behind his “green screen” that demarcates his office space and repeatedly responds “I would prefer not to” when asked to complete a task.

Most readers and critics alike interpret Bartleby’s behavior as a mode of passive resistance against his boss and the larger institutions of Wall Street and capitalism. However, through close reading, I instead …

A Sharply Worded Silence: Silence As The Revelatory Link Between Past And Future In Faithful And Virtuous Night, Noah Hickman

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

Given the recent celebrity of 2020 Nobel Prize Laurette Louise Glück, the 2014 collection Faithful and Virtuous Night enjoys a relative bounty of reviews and criticism for such a recent collection. Most of these reviews make oblique reference to Glück’s use of silence in the collection, but none forward any serious argument regarding the function of silence in the argument of the collection. This essay argues that Glück relies on silence as a kind of revelation for her speakers, marking the end of a given system of being and the inauguration its supplanting ontology. Within the collection, Glück’s silence represents …

Cover And Front Matter

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

No abstract provided.

Kindness In The Bardo: Empathy As A Catalyst For Healing In Victims Of Dissociation, Julia Dorothea Chopelas

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

In George Saunders’ Lincoln in the Bardo, a host of undead characters find themselves in a spiritual limbo based on the bardo. Although they won’t admit it to themselves, Roger Bevins III and Hans Vollman are most certainly dead. Despite their supernatural makeup as ghosts, Bevins and Vollman bear strong psychological resonance with the living: they are human, heartbroken, and lost. For the ghosts of Oak Hills Cemetery, the inefficient coping mechanism of dissociation perpetuates their afterlife imprisonment in the bardo. Bevins and Vollman suffer from a variety of dissociative symptoms, their minds’ psychological defense against the trauma that has …

Assimilation In The United States: Semitism And Asian Americanism, Megan Gibson

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

No abstract provided.

How Gender Affects Writing: Jackson’S And Fitzgerald’S Portrayals Of Mental Illness, Cryslin A. Ledbetter

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

Cryslin Ledbetter's essay, "How Gender Affects Writing: Jackson’s and Fitzgerald’s Portrayals of Mental Illness" examines the similarities and differences between Shirley Jackson's We Have Always Lived in the Castle and Fitzgerald's Tender is the Night. Through a careful comparison of male and female writers, the author analyzes defining factors that effect the final product of each novel.

Racial Spatial Relationships In Claudia Rankine’S Citizen, Thomas Jenson

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

In Citizen: An American Lyric, Claudia Rankine addresses topics from segregation to police brutality to indicate the extreme spatial relationships between racial groups. Her work reveals the geographic mechanisms that confine African Americans to certain locations as well as the coerce them to violently share space with their white counterparts. Drawing upon spatial theory, which exposes the structures of unjust geography, my analysis also considers language as an additional spatial force that harms the black community as much as more physical phenomena.

“Boys Will Be Boys”: Antithetical Boyhood In Claudia Rankine’S Citizen, Madilyn Abbe

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

This paper explores Claudia Rankine’s work Citizen: An American Lyric and how the text applies boyhood and manhood differently to white and black males. The text subverts these terms’ straightforward relationship with actual age, instead recognizing them as reverse age categorizations. While these contradictory applications minimize black men through infantilization and expedite the maturation of black children, these same converse categorizations excuse the violence of white men. Through this distinction, Citizen exposes childhood as a subjective categorization to benefit white power. To address the resulting self-fragmentation for African American males, I maintain that the text proffers storytelling as symbolic mothering …

Sacramental Aesthetics: A Herbertian Reading Of John Dewey, Hayley E. Langton

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

I argue that a Herbertian reading of John Dewey’s aesthetic theory reveals his aesthetics as sacramental and offers a new lens through which to understand the functioning of Herbert’s rhetoric as well as Dewey’s philosophy. In turn, the sacramental qualities of Dewey’s aesthetic theory make a compelling argument for a postsecular interpretation of his work. First, I posit Herbert’s poetry within The Temple as sacramental; second, I discuss Dewey’s theory and the way Herbert follows it in structure; lastly, I highlight the ways in which this reading renders Dewey’s aesthetics as sacramental and outline the implications of this reading for …

Another Paris: Gabriel And Greek Mythology In “The Dead”, Rebekah Olsen

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

The works of James Joyce, including his short story collection Dubliners, have been studied to distraction by academics throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. In this paper, I expound on ideas of Edwardian masculinity in Joyce's "The Dead," as well as the links between the myth of the Judgement of Paris and Gabriel's experience with the three key women in the story: Lily, the maid, Molly Ivors, the modern woman, and Gretta, Gabriel's wife. These women are first perceived as graces, merely ornamental figures, but they force their personhood onto Gabriel, and he is shocked by their deviation from his …

Existential Orwell: Capitalism, Religion, And Philosophy, Eliza A. Morgan

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

Orwell wrote in the same 1930s Europe as existentialist philosophers: most notably, Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre. We know, through his critique of Sartre’s “Portrait of an Antisemite” (Coombes 12), that Orwell was active in these circles, well enough to critically evaluate absurdist theories. As such, it’s long overdue to discuss how the concept of existentialism may have shaped Orwell’s beliefs, specifically in two of his contemporary novels, The Clergyman’s Daughter and Keep the Aspidistra Flying. The purpose of this paper is to argue that existentialism, specifically the ideas of bad faith and absurdism, played a pivotal role for Orwell …

Experimenting Upon The Feelings: Maria Edgeworth’S Empirical Approach To Love In Belinda, Emily Hopwood Durney

Criterion: A Journal of Literary Criticism

In her 1801 novel/moral tale Belinda, Maria Edgeworth presents a story of love, family, reconciliation, and education in a time when the popularity of companionate marriages was rising in British society along with the acceleration of scientific innovations and advancements. Belinda mixes these two interests of love and science as Edgeworth, empirically minded like her inventor father, frequently has her characters debunk illusion and deceit through induction and logic. Critics, such as Nicole Wright, have argued that Belinda is a far more significant character than is often recognized because of her logic and reason—especially as she helps other characters …