English Language and Literature Commons^™

The Hero’S Journey: A Postmodern Incarnation Of The Monomyth, Sarah Hoffman

Honors Theses

‘Monomyth’ is the term coined by James Joyce and popularized by Joseph Campbell in his seminal work, The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Its structure is delineated by Campbell, and it follows that of the traditional heroic myths that permeate human culture and history. Margaret Atwood’s two companion novels, Oryx and Crake and The Year of the Flood, incorporate Campbell’s monomyth and transplant it into the realm of postmodern dystopia. In this way, Atwood offers an escape from the existential dilemmas that face the postmodern subjectivity through the self-perpetuated, neo-shamanic journey toward the recognition of immanence. The …

Matriarchal Monsters: Literary Villians Through The Lens Of Gender, Katherine Currie

Honors Theses

The exposure of American readers to the literary monster culminates at an incredibly young and impressionable age. The genre of children’s literature seems to rely heavily on the impact of the presence of villainous monster characters. From the “boogey man” to “Cruella de Vil” to “The Grinch,” children are presented at a very young age with the character of evil. As a result of our early experience with villains, we as readers accept the “bad guy” created in a novel to be classified under the category of “monster.” However, most readers have never even pondered or questioned the label of …

“Critical Habitat” And Other Stories, Jon Michael Mitchell

Honors Theses

The nature of writing, that is, storytelling, is difficult to discuss in a technical manner. Often it is easier to demonstrate by example rather than theory how storytelling does and does not work. This thesis is a collection of short stories written to practice the art of writing and storytelling. They do not follow a central theme or motif; they are self-contained projects demonstrating the application of the theories discussed in the introduction. The point of this thesis is not to show the correct way to write or provide examples of perfect stories. It is to show the learning process …

What Makes A Man: Social Constructions Of Masculinity In The Works Of Stanley Kubrick, Michael Cory Taylor

Honors Theses

This study examines three male protagonists from films by Stanley Kubrick, and the original literary texts, with specific focus on the social influence of each character’s sense of masculinity. Much has been written about literature and film as a social critique, but there is a particular need for study through Kubrick’s lens. The original literary texts are Lolita, A Clockwork Orange, and The Shining. By considering the historical context of both the novel and its adaptation, it is possible to provide an indication of each protagonist’s effect on social constructions of manhood. It is also necessary to note the …

The Laureate Eleventh Edition, Bridget Dooley

Honors Theses

Editor-in-chief of the 2012 Laureate.

The Assertion Of Identity: Storytelling And Testimony In The Works Of Edwidge Danticat, Michael R. Kurban

Honors Theses

Haitian-American author Edwidge Danticat evokes the Haitian tradition of storytelling in many of her novels and short story collections. A tradition formulated by vodou religion and the amalgamation of African cultures, storytelling acts to entertain, educate and enlighten the people of Haiti. Additionally, her novels are often written in the context of traumatic events in Haitian history. While Danticat's works have been studied with focus on their depiction of storytelling and of trauma, little has been done on the restorative power that storytelling provides. In this thesis, I seek to examine the potential for Danticat's characters and works to create …

Mediums Change, Fears Stay The Same, Lucy Wilhelms

Honors Theses

Although generally dismissed by scholars as being overly sentimental or superstitious, the gothic genre has survived for over four centuries and maintained significant cultural appeal, outlasting the sentimental novel and the travelogue as popular literature. What, then, makes this genre different? What is so special about the gothic?

In my thesis, I examine the evolving cultural appeal of the gothic genre that keeps it attractive and relevant for readers by tracing the gothic text, The Woman in Black by Susan Hill, through its initial inception and its subsequent adaptations. As a novel, The Woman in Black both repeats and revises …

Shakespeare's Newest Stage: The Reshaping Of Cultural Capital Through Youtube, Ben G. Long

Honors Theses

Since its launch in 2005, YouTube has quickly situated itself as a major facet of popular culture. The prevalence of Shakespeare on YouTube is fascinating considering the diversity of the videos found, and the tremendous audience response to these clips. Is YouTube helping or hurting Shakespeare's reputation? This thesis explores this question through the lens of Pierre Bourdieu's theory of cultural capital. The argument is that amidst the process of reinvention, a redefining of what is Shakespeare is occurring. The support provided is framed through numerous video analyses, that cover a wide range of topics including: Shakespeare in education, Shakespeare …

Love's Labour's Lost 2.0: Exploring Identity Formation On Facebook And Beyond, Mitchell Watson Hobbs

Honors Theses

An adaptation of William Shakespeare's play of the same name, Love's Labour's Lost 2.0 utilizes the social network website Facebook as its stage so as to explore the unique problems and opportunities that social media affords identity creation. Through this lens, I find that identity creation in this digital world is discursively composed, much like identity in the analog world, and serves to shunt dissent or action that may threaten the status quo. Facebook's ultimate promise to this constantly composing individual is the comfort and security of an audience.

Western Culture And The Spread Of Serial Murder, Angela Pilson

Honors Theses

Serial murders may have occurred in non-Western cultures, like Japan, South Africa, and Pakistan, before the introduction of Western ideals. These murders would have gone unnoticed and unreported if the populace did not know or understand the significant differences between serial murder and other types of violence and death. The people and authorities in non-Western cultures would not know of these differences unless they were made known to them or if they started to investigate the murders more closely. People from Western cultures who move to non-Western areas or communicate with non-Western natives may introduce these differences and familiarize the …

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

Honors Theses

No abstract provided.

Scout's Daughters : Race And Creative Development In Contemporary Adolescent Literature, Amanda Malloy

Honors Theses

At the heart of what Roberta S. Trites titles ―adolescent literature‖ – works written both for and about young adults—is a question of agency (Disturbing 7). In Disturbing the Universe: Power and Repression in Adolescent Literature, Trites asserts that adolescent novels attempt to answer the question of young adults who wonder if they ―should or even can affect the world in which they live‖ (1). Trites‘ argument is based on the idea that the distinguishing characteristic of adolescent literature is its focus on ―the social forces‖ that …

Purpose Found: Conditions Of Meaningful Existence, Selfhood And The Role Of The Other In John Milton's Paradise Lost, Anna Sawch

Honors Theses

While Biblical interpretations of Genesis posit God as omnipotent creator and teacher, in John Milton's Paradise Lost it is Adam and Eve‟s relationship and interactions with one another that make them who they are and mold them into who they become. The Adam and Eve of Paradise Lost are true characters, and dynamic ones at that. Rather than serve an allegory or work to create a lofty moral lesson, Adam and Eve grow through speech, desire, and language, interfacing with one another in the spirit of true human curiosity and self-discovery. I first explored this observation that Milton's Adam and …

Of Horror And Humor : The Transformation Of The Grotesque Into The Gothic In The Novels Of Frances Burney, Brittany Taylor

Honors Theses

This year was ushered in by a grand and most important event,—for at the latter end of January, the literary world was favoured with the first publication of the ingenious, learned, and most profound Fanny Burney!—I doubt not but this memorable affair will, in future times, mark the period whence chronologers will date the zenith of the polite arts in this island! This admirable authoress has named her most elaborate performance “EVELINA, OR A YOUNG LADY’S ENTRANCE INTO THE WORLD.” (Ellis 212)

When 1778 dawned, twenty-five-year-old Frances Burney was not the egotist this pronouncement in her diary might suggest. She …

Shakespeare And Homoeroticism: A Study Of Cross-Dressing, Society, And Film, Leigh Bullion

Honors Theses

William Shakespeare’s plays cover an array of topics focused on sexuality, from gender reversal to adultery to beastiality. But perhaps the most consistent and emphasized topic is homoeroticism.This focus on homoeroticism proceeds from the prohibition of women on the English stage and the subsequent female roles young boys would play. A Midsummer Night’s Dream, As You Like It, and Twelfth Night each present different representations of homoeroticism yet complement each other. A Midsummer Night’s Dream focuses on the erotic potential of unrestrained desire and the tense relationship between female amity and dominating patriarchal and heterosexual interests. As You Like It …

That Glorious Fire It Kindled: Extremes Of (Un)Righteous Sexuality In Books I And Iii Of Spenser's Faerie Queene, S. Erin Mclean

Honors Theses

Edmund Spenser's epic romance, The Faerie Queene (1590, 1596), claims to glorify Queen Elizabeth I, but the author hides an underlying critique of the queen throughout the poem. At the same time that Spenser openly praises the English monarch, he also reveals the faults and contradictions present in her image through how he presents the main characters in the story. In Faerie Queene, Spenser establishes a sexuality spectrum that features the lechery of Redcrosse Knight and the hypersensitive purity of Britomart; this demonstrates the various extremes of immoral sexuality. Studying both these characters reveals that the success of each knight's …

A Conversation Among Sisters : The "Dangerous Lover" In The Texts Of The BrontëS, Jennifer K. Patchen

Honors Theses

Since the Brontes first published their novels, critics and readers have often associated the male leads with the Byronic hero. Certainly, Arthur Huntingdon in Anne's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Edward Rochester in Charlotte's Jane Eyre and Heathcliff in Emily's Wuthering Heights are all, like Lord Byron's own heroes, brooding and damaged men. Each of these men, additionally, is fundamentally willing to flout social expectations. Their search for selffulfillment often leads them outside of the boundaries of conventional society, although the three sisters sometimes ascribe conflicting moral values to that search. For Charlotte and Emily, Rochester's and Heathcliffs strong personalities …

Eve In The Image Of Man: Feminist Concerns In Paradise Lost, Katharine Van Arsdale

Honors Theses

John Milton’s epic poem Paradise Lost (1667) follows the story of creation, the transformation of Lucifer to Satan, and the eventual fall of humanity. Traditional readings of this poem that focus on Milton’s portrayals of Adam and Eve purport that the text presents an unflinchlingly misogynistic view of women. In Paradise Lost there is a definite gender hierarchy at work. This hierarchy is constructed by certain binaries that separate the world of the male from that of the female. Examples of these binaries are rampant throughout the text; men use reason, women do not. Men are strong and women are …

Reading Joycean Comedy And Faulknerian Tragedy: Exploring The Significance Of Location, Literary Influence And The Possibilities Of Heroism With Leopold Bloom In Joyce’S Ulysses And Quentin Compson In Faulkner’S The Sound And The Fury And Absalom, Absalom!, Colin R. Cummings

Honors Theses

The distinct similarity between Joyce’s and Faulkner’s philosophical concerns (the affirmation of life in spite of its myriad difficulties), and the striking disjuncture between their aesthetic approaches (comedy for Joyce and tragedy for Faulkner), is where my interest in this project began. I sought to explore the lives and works of both writers in order to get a sense of how two artists could attempt to convey a similar message through such different means. The first thing I explore is a number of similarities between Joyce’s and Faulkner’s personal worlds (particularly their intimate connections to location) and their sources of …

Cosmological Vision(S) : History, Modernism, And American Renewal In Hart Crane's The Bridge, Lauren Grewe

Honors Theses

With the help of recent Crane studies, along with my own ear, I intend to prove the worth of Crane's myth of bridging as a way of responding to and eventually reforming the Elitonian vision of the modem world. The Bridge counters Eliot as a way to offer hope to the modem world in place of despair, as a way to offer a system of belief that is neither dogmatic nor futile, that incorporates a vision of the future just as much as a vision of the past.

The Ownership Of Cultural Objects : Means, Mechanics And Masteries, Anne Marie Salloum

Honors Theses

The issues surrounding cultural objects and their ownership have risen to greater prominence in the recent past. Consider the Elgin Marbles, to take a well-known and hotly debated example. They were taken from the Parthenon by Lord Elgin when Greece was part of the Ottoman Empire, and as soon as Greece gained its independence, it demanded their return. Even this relatively simple case raises questions about cultural objects and ownership. To whom do cultural objects belong? Why? What effect do the changing circumstances brought about by the passage of time have on ownership? And the Elgin Marbles are only one …

"I Don't Think She's Like The Rest Of Us" : The Freedom In Disadvantage For Orphan Girls In Early 20th Century Literature, Giavanna Palermo

Honors Theses

Marianne Hirsch notes that often, in literature, the absence of the mother is the basis for the heroine’s development. On this foundation, there is nothing new in the observation that orphan girls in literature enjoy a kind of freedom that comes from being without parents and, specifically, without a mother. What this paper seeks to examine, however, through the textual analysis of Johanna Spyri’s Heidi, Eleanor H. Porter’s Pollyanna, Kate Douglas Wiggin’s Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, Lucy Maud Montgomery’s Anne of Green Gables and Jean Webster’s Daddy Long Legs, is the way in which the figure …

The Death Of The Virtuous Heroine As Social Criticism In Clarissa And Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Carmel Rosanna Nunan

Honors Theses

While Samuel Richardson meticulously documents the slow decline of his heroine in the novel Clarissa, other characters in the novel struggle to understand a death that for them has no rational explanation. The novel Les Liaisons Dangereuses by Choderlos de Laclos, also epistolary and published thirty-five years after Clarissa, allows for a similar interpretation. Contemporary French reactions to Madame de Tourvel’s death cannot compare to the English response elicited by Clarissa’s, but, like Richardson, Laclos also introduces certain social forces that seal his heroine’s fate from without while her own psychological experience of virtue works to destroy her …

Representations Of Grief In Akhmatova’S Requiem And Pushkin’S The Bronze Horseman, Hillary R. Smith

Honors Theses

Anna Akhmatova composed Requiem largely before 1940, but it was not published until the mid 1960s – after her death. It is now known to be one of her best works. Requiem is a cycle comprised of fifteen poems, the entireties of which are introduced by a personal reflection written in prose. Alexander Pushkin wrote his lyric ballad The Bronze Horseman in 1833 about the tremendous flood of 1824 in St. Petersburg and the involvement of the bronze equestrian statue of Peter the Great. Everything that the protagonist, Evgeny, cares for is destroyed, and he blames the Tsar for his …

Individual Autonomy And The Work Of Resistance: How Authors Of The 1950s Reject State Absorption Through Imagination And Reaffirmation Of The Body, Benjamin L. Boroughf

Honors Theses

The purpose of comparing two works of literature is to highlight similarities and differences that might provide a greater understanding of the works. When comparing the two works, one can emphasize various elements of the texts, including national or international conventions, periods, genres, themes, influences, culture, movements, or aesthetic choices. At the same time, however, this process may actually distort the way in which one views the works. A reader can easily seize upon surface similarities and identify some "deep" relationship between the works that may not in fact actually exist. Moreover, a reader can easily focus on surface similarities …

Word Oper Findan : Seamus Heaney And The Translation Of Beowulf, Jack Harding Bell

Honors Theses

In 2000, Nobel laureate Seamus Heaney published a new translation of the early medieval epic, Beowulf The work was subsequently lauded as a masterpiece. Despite this ensuing surge of interest in Heaney's translation, very few scholars have undertaken the task of a critical analysis of the translation and none have assumed the task of a comparative analysis between the original text and Heaney's version. Most, it seems, have assumed that Heaney's translation is a faithful rendition of the original, and with good reason. Heaney maintains fidelity to the structure, stylistics, and meter of the original, as well as to its …

The Dwarfing Of Men In Victorian Fairy-Tale Literature, Heather Victoria Vermeulen

Honors Theses

As Jack Zipes explains in his preface to Victorian Fairy Tales: The Revolt of the Fairies and the Elves, "The Victorian fairy-tale writers always had two ideal audiences in mind when they composed their tales -young middle-class readers whose minds and morals they wanted to influence, and adult middle-class readers whose ideas they wanted to challenge and reform" (xiv). "It was through the fairy tale," he continues, "that a social discourse about conditions in Victorian England took form, and this discourse is not without interest for readers today" (xi). My project begins with a critical analysis of the Grimm Brothers' …

Marginalized Literature In The English Classroom Working With Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel And Dimed, Noelle Carpenter

Honors Theses

Literature in the English classroom should give students the opportunity to explore the voices of a diverse range of people, especially in a school system that is becoming increasingly diverse itself. By exposing students to literature that engages them in important social issues, students become aware of a world beyond their own. Marginalized literature shows students different perspectives that exist in the world in which they live. Ehrenreich's autoethnography Nickel and Dimed is a window into the lives of the working poor based on her own personal experiences and research during a time when the views surrounding those in poverty …

Agent Of Change: Trickster In Ojibwa Oral Narratives And In The Works Of Louise Erdrich, Patrick B. Benton

Honors Theses

Change is not only a theme of Louise Erdrich’s work, but the paramount theme. Critic John Purdy concurs, writing that “the characters who people her pages are immensely recognizable to an audience comprised of many cultures: they exhibit all the frailties and strengths, the failures and triumphs one would expect for humans who face what we all – as individuals, as cultures, and as species – must face: change” (Purdy, 8). What is this change, though? And, who is the agent of this change? Casual readers of Louise Erdrich’s works may not be aware that her characters are informed by …

Apple And The Tree: Shakespeare’S Use Of Father-Child Relationships In Character Construction, Elizabeth Finn

Honors Theses

Before he stood the test of time, William Shakespeare had to survive the fire of the early modern marketplace. The surviving records indicate that Shakespeare was quite successful, not only artistically but also financially. In his home of Stratford-upon-Avon, he owned an impressive house, New Place, as well as significant amounts of arable land (Greenblatt 330). Meanwhile, he also became a part-owner in the Globe and Blackfriars theaters (Greenblatt 368). To accumulate such funds, Shakespeare had to write plays that would sell tickets; plays that would intrigue audiences and keep them coming back for more. Thus, he must have had …