English Language and Literature Commons^™

The Authenticity Of Benson's Historical Novels, Estelle T. Bell

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the historical accuracy of Robert Hugh Benson's historical novels "The King's Achievement," "Come Rack! Come Rope!," and "By What Authority," arguing that despite their fictional romantic elements, these novels authentically portray the historical relationship between the English and Catholic Churches during the reigns of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I. Bell opens by distinguishing the aims of the historian from those of the novelist, then situates Benson biographically as a convert from Anglicanism to Catholicism whose religious sensibility shaped his literary work.

Drawing on the "Lingard-Belloc History of England" as an authoritative historical source, the thesis traces the …

A Criticism Of Paul Lawrence Dunbar And His Works, Ethel M. Baptiste

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis, presented at Xavier University in June 1930 in partial fulfillment of requirements for the degree of Bachelor of Arts, offers a critical study of the life and poetic works of Paul Laurence Dunbar. The thesis opens with a biographical account of Dunbar's impoverished childhood in Dayton, Ohio, his early literary talent, his work as an elevator operator while writing verse, and the publication of his first volume, "Oak and Ivy," in 1893, before turning to a close examination of his poetic output.

The thesis organizes its analysis by literary form, examining Dunbar's lyrics, sonnets, odes, dirges, ballads, and …

Machiavelli And Shakespeare., Edith M. Stark

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

A brief introduction to Nicola Machiavelli is necessary for a better understanding of the influence he exerted upon English thought. He was a descendant of old Florentine nobility and lived from 1469 to 1527. Little is known of his early years and education, but it is evident from his works that he read widely in the Latin and Italian classics, particularly the Roman histories, and that he was a student of men and things. His first entrance into public service was made in 1494. He was made clerk of the second chancery and four years later was appointed second chancellor …

The Madrigal., Frank B. Martin

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The madrigal is the oldest of concerted secular forms. It had its origin in northern Italy, perhaps as early as the twelfth century. The early compositions had none of the elaborate devices which characterize the madrigals of the sixteenth century. Francesco di Landino, (1325-1390), an Italian, and the leading musician of the Florentine school of his time, wrote a madrigal, Tu che l'opera d'altrul, an extract of which appears in Fellowes' English Madrigal (1) Composers. Landino's life is interesting. He was blind from youth, but was organist for many years in the church of San Lorenzo in Florence. His madrigal …

Types Of Children In Dickens' Novels., J. T. Highfield Mrs.

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

The Platonic Lover Of Elizabethan Poetry., Dorcas Douglass Ray

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Just what is the meaning of Platonic love? It is a term that has caught the attention of scholars, poets, and plain men, in many countries and during many centuries. Perhaps its wide appeal accounts for the varied and tortuous shapes its meaning has assumed as it has passed through the inquisitive and often callous fingers of the multitudes. It is a term applied popularly today to a kind of abstract, passionless friendship, which, to the practical-minded American, can exist only in theory. Few who use the term Platonic love or Platonic friendship have paused first to read the pages …

Hawthorne's Life And Works Portray Him A Solitary Genius, Miss O. Ellis

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

From amid an unadorned practical industrial community, arose one of America's brightest stars whose radiance has illuminated American Literature. Nathaniel Hawthorne was bore in Salem, July 4, 1804.

The Autobiographical Elements In Francis Thompson's Hound Of Heaven And St. Augustine's Confessions, Ages Blanchard

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Hawthorne's Life And Works Portray Him A Solitary Genius, Miss O. Ellis

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Shakespeare's Genius Was Essentially A Dramatic One, Marie Valentine Prudeaux

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis, submitted to Xavier University in 1929, argues that Shakespeare's genius was essentially a dramatic one, examining his life, artistic development, and dramatic works across four periods of composition. A biographical account of Shakespeare's life at Stratford-on-Avon and London opens the study, followed by an analysis of the qualities that distinguish his genius, including originality, insight into character, and the power to portray emotion.

Prudeaux draws on the critical tradition of Dryden, Hazlitt, Johnson, Pope, and Schlegel, among others, to organize Shakespeare's dramatic output into four periods, characterized in the thesis as "In the Workshop," "In the World," "Out …

The Rise Of The Short Story In American Letters, Mary M. Barra

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Like all other nations America too has had her birth in the literally world. Her beginning has not been less forceful than other nations. We find that English literature, undivided in the past, at the end of the nineteenth century has four divisions: British, American, Canadian, and Australian. The British is still the most important since it has the greatest literary background. But the steadily growing American literature ranks second to it. We glory in this heritage as much as the British because we feel that it belongs to us as well, and prize this tremendous possession

Formal Retraction Or Literary Repentance In The Elizabethan Age., Irene B. Rhoads

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Before entering upon a discussion of those writers of the Elizabethan Age whose works present specific instances of Personal Retractation, let us turn our attention to the problem in general and try to find out why writers of this age and of earlier times felt it necessary to repent of their literary efforts. Some critics may say that retractation was merely a literary convention; and why bother about its beginnings, sources, et cetera? Others may have the opinion that it was a personal trait, only a means of satisfying some peculiar whim or fancy of the author. Some may go …

The Rise Of The Short Story In American Letters, Mary M. Barra

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

The Negro In Literature, A. W. Arnaud

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis traces the development of the Negro in American literature from its origins in the spirituals through the flowering of the "New Negro" Renaissance of the early twentieth century. Arnaud opens by defining literature as the artistic record of a people's inner life and argues that Negro literary expression developed first through song, tracing the movement from oral spirituals through the early poetry of the enslaved and freed population toward increasingly sophisticated literary forms.

The thesis presents Paul Laurence Dunbar as the foremost early exponent of Negro poetry, examining his biography and his work in both classic English verse …

The Renaissance Paradox In Spenser., Juretta V. Bamber 1898-1981

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The complex phenomenon known as the Renaissance stimulated man with an insatiable curiosity in all things that had to do with human life and activity. The powerful searchlight of curiosity was especially turned on the ancient world – its learning, art, and literature – with a resultant diffusion of light so widespread that its influence is incalculable. In Italy, which in the fourteenth century saw the dawn of the Renaissance, “a glorious sumptuousness” of life prevailed. Ostentation, manifesting itself in brilliant dress, in beautiful homes, in wealth, and in magnificence of every kind, characterized the new movement. The Renaissance insisted …

A History Of The Theatre In Louisville., Mary Martha Dietz

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

A child is considered by some psychologists to pass through on its way to manhood the stages through which the race has passed on its way to civilization. If this is true of a single man, might it not equally be true of a community of men? Have not most settlements, in greater or a less degree, passed through the stages of development common to the growth of all cities until they have reached the standards of their day? A company of civilized men and women going forth to make a settlement in a new place, upon their arrival at …