English Language and Literature Commons^™

Jesse B. Semple And The Black Press : The Voice Of Black People, Mary A. Massey

Master's Theses

Black newspapers play a vital role in keeping people up-to-date with what's happening in the Black community. This study will show how Black newspapers play a vital role in reporting news and comments from an Afro-American perspective. It will provide a historical overview of Black news as well as a close examination of Langston Hughes' columns and his character of Jesse B. Semple within the context of the Black press, particularly the Chicago Defender.

The results of this study will reveal the joys and concerns that Afro-Americans shared with each other through the Black newspapers and show how the character …

The Question Of Free Will In James Joyce's Exiles And William Faulkner's Requiem For A Nun, Robin Hume Brownhill

Master's Theses

Joyce's Exiles and Faulkner's Requiem for a Nun are both unsuccessful naturalistic dramas written by novelists. This study compares the two texts, applying the question, "Is free will possible?" to four common themes within each work: the past, religion, marriage and politics. Within these four contexts, the two plays exhibit similarities of language and content; however, they consistently distinguish themselves on the question of free will. Joyce's work shows a protagonist who "frees" himself, through sacrifice, from the bonds of tradition. Faulkner's work shows a protagonist "doomed" and "damned" to suffer endlessly for her past. Despite their opposing presentations of …

The Representation Of Tabooed Love In Lillian Smith's Fiction, Jane Elizabeth Payne

Master's Theses

My study explores Lillian Smith's autobiographical relationship to her fiction, particularly two novels, Strange Fruit, and One Hour. The focus of this work is Smith's challenge to the category of sexual orientation and her related use of fiction as a source of social commentary and self-reflection. Smith's uses veiled and encoded language and other kinds of tabooed love to study her own lesbian love. She also assumes a male persona to understand and express her erotic attraction to women. I approach Smith's life and literature in chronological order with an emphasis upon characterization, symbolism, narrative technique, and metaphors of nature. …

Finding The Words : Negotiating Linguistic Communities In Sherley Anne Williams' Dessa Rose, Nanci M. Roberts

Master's Theses

A study of linguistic communities in Sherley Anne Williams' Dessa Rose, this thesis focuses on the relationship between cultural behavior and the use of language. Using anthropological studies on the role of language in society, as well as major criticism of the novel, this paper seeks to prove that only through equalizing linguistic power can the characters achieve a language system which accurately reflects their experience. The paper focuses on four primary communities: the unequal interracial community of Southern slave society, the slave community, the white planter community, and finally the equal interracial community that results after slavery.

A Thesis Without A Moral: Regarding Plum Bun And Quicksand, Dana Desjardins

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Jesse B. Semple And The Black Press : The Voice Of Black People, Mary Ann Massey

Master's Theses

Black newspapers play a vital role in keeping people up-to-date with what's happening in the Black community. This study will show how Black newspapers play a vital role in reporting news and comments from an Afro-American perspective. It will provide a historical overview of Black news as well as a close examination of Langston Hughes' columns and his character of Jesse B. Semple within the context of the Black press, particularly the Chicago Defender. The results of this study will reveal the joys and concerns that Afro-Americans shared with each other through the Black newspapers and show how the …

The Empathetic Savior : Narcissism And The Role Of The Son In "Paradise Lost", Anna Nabb Meade

Master's Theses

I began my research intending to develop a coherent theory regarding the poolside scene in "Paradise Lost." Troubled by the recognition that Eve was created perfect and yet shows a disturbing tendency toward vanity, I began to probe possible interpretations for Milton's allusion to the Narcissus myth. I incorporated Satan and Adam as further exploration of narcissism, and the Father and Son as self-love recognized ideally. Working with the theories of Heinz Kohut, I concluded that certain aspects of the Son's role in the Christian faith are analogous to the role of the therapist in healing the narcissistically impaired individual, …

Fresh Woods, And Pastures New: Chorography, Cartography And The Puritan Perspective In "Lycidas", Laura Nilges-Matias

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Walking Percy's Tightrope : From Alienation To Affirmation, Karen Y. Carter

Master's Theses

Walker Percy's Binx Bolling, of The Moviegoer, and Will Barrett, of The Last Gentleman and The Second Coming, are two Southern existential seekers who move from alienation and despair to create lives of meaningful commitment with the promise of fulfillment. Because of their similarities, we can trace a development in Percy's fiction which parallels the questor's development. These three books move from a preoccupation with death-in-life to a discovery of self and on to individual and cultural rebirth. Thus, The Moviegoer (1960) is about alienation and despair; The Last Gentleman (1966) is about the possibility of human relationships, …

Tristram Shandy And The Discursive Self, Susan Denman Breeden

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

James Branch Cabell's Jurgen : Fulfillment And Paradox, Elizabeth Witham Loving

Master's Theses

James Branch Cabell's controversial, Jurgen, is the novel that propelled him into fame. Suppressed as pornography only months after its publication, Jurgen drew attention from many areas. While Cabell's peers protested the suppression and praised the novel as a masterpiece, other readers were only interested in the forbidden "racy" language. Unfortunately, it was for the second reason that Jurgen became the most widely read of Cabell's works. The general public was not interested in his talent as a writer, but it was interested in a scandalous book. The novel's suppression received so much publicity, that everyone wanted to read …

"This Enterprise Non Shall Partake With Me." : Milton's Conquering Of His Precursors Through Orphean Allusions, Kathryn Nyreen Cooke

Master's Theses

Within his poetry and prose, John Milton shows a respect for the authors of antquity while simultaneously seeking his own voice, a style that makes him different from and better than his predecessors. Milton's works contain expressions of these Renaissance characteristics: the appreciation of the Classics, the search for a more personal relationship with God, and the attempt to achieve some individuality; however, even in the smallest of literary figures such as the Orphean allusions, the need to combine a respect for the past with the ambition for a uniquely personal voice as a poet exists. The isolation of the …

The Voice Unbound : Mary Shelley's Vision Of Romanticism, Courtenay Noelle Smith

Master's Theses

Mary Shelley was propelled into fame while still a teenager because of her powerful and "gothic" novel Frankenstein. This novel and several facts about the author's personal life have kept her in the public eye since her death. Though Frankenstein has long been a subject of scholarship, Mary Shelley has been little studied directly in relation to the great literary movement, Romanticism, in which she participated Romantic literature is pervaded by numerous political and aesthetic tensions, in particular the paradox of the ideals of genius and fellowship. In many of the Romantic works readers and scholars will find that the …

Shakespeare And Astrology, William Bruce Smith

Master's Theses

The popular ity of astrology in Elizabethan England is ref lected by the large number of references to it in the works of William Shakespeare. The majority of astrological references in the Shakespearean canon are "commonplaces" and do not add signif icantly to our understanding of his work, although they are of interest in studying exactly how much astrological knowledge he possessed. There are astrological references in the plays, however, that are of significance in the study of character in Shakespeare. In certain plays (Romeo and Juliet, The Winter' s Tale) a judgement concerning various individuals ' inner nobility may …

Character Revelation In Hawthorne: A Study Of Inappropriate Laughter And The Deceptive Quality Of Appearance And Reality, V. Garvey Helen

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Character Revelation In Hawthorne: A Study Of Inappropriate Laughter And The Deceptive Quality Of Appearance And Reality, Helen Garvey

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

An Experiment In Southern Letters : The Reviewer, 1921-1925, Elizabeth Spindler Scott

Master's Theses

The Reviewer (1921-1925) was a "little magazine" created by four iconoclastic young editors, Emily Clark, Hunter Stagg, Margaret Freeman, and Mary Street to counter Mencken's claim that the South was a "Sahara of the Bozart." Aided by R. L. Mencken, James Branch Cabell and Carl Van Vechten the editors secured contributions from the most famous writers of the time to publish with their "discoveries." This thesis contains the magazine's history, an extensive bibliography, and an anthology drawn from the most representative sections in each genre. Copies of The Reviewer are extremely rare, and the anthology is intended to show that …

The Radiant, Ron Felber

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

An American Myth : James Dickey's "The Zodiac", Arthur Gordon Van Ness

Master's Theses

In the brief explanatory preface of "The Zodiac" Dickey says: "Its twelve sections are the story of a drunken and perhaps dying Dutch poet who returns to his home in Amsterdam after years of travel and tries desperately to relate himself, by means of stars, to the universe." The question immediately arises as to how a Dutch poet, and particularly one living in the Old World city of Amsterdam, relates to an American myth. What, in other words, does a Dutchman returning to his home in Holland nave to do with the New World?

Meredith's Women In Time : Diana Merion And Clara Middleton, Dana Sims Brewer

Master's Theses

In The Egoist and Diana of the Crossways, George Meredith joins the ranks of Mary Wollstonecraft and John Stuart Mill in a slowly evolving cultural crusade to gain self respect, dignity, and independence for Victorian women.

The Post-Postmodern Aesthetics Of John Fowles, Claiborne Johnson Cordle

Master's Theses

Because a thesis is by definition a proposi­ tion to be argued, I feel some obigation to make strong assertion--either John Fowles is a post­ modernist writer, or John Fowles is not a postmodernist writer. What is immediately "problematic" about such an either/or proposition is that each side can be argued convincingly by a careful process of selection of examples to support the prospective cases (and omission of those which refute them). I cannot easily dismiss the wisdom of Northrop Frye's statement that, "They think of ideas as weapons; they seek the irrefutable argument, which keeps eluding them because all …

A Kierkegaardian Reading Of Three Novels By Faulkner, Francine Marilyn Hall

Master's Theses

William Faulkner and S¢ren Kierkegaard, although separated in time by almost a century, possess a common concern: both are deeply interested in the numerous ways in which individuals live out their lives in either hope or despair. Exploring the avenues which might alleviate this despair and providing a basis for hope are tasks both authors have accepted as theirs.

This paper relates three novels by Faulkner to the stages of existence set forth by Kierkegaard in much of his philosophical writing. I intend to show that Faulk­ ner's characters serve as illustrations of different ways in which an individual may …

Charles R. Mcdowell, Jr. : One Man's View Of The National Folklore, Sandra Leigh Spratley

Master's Theses

A journalist's range of interests may be as varied and complex as the range of interests of the audience to whom he is appealing. Whereas Samuel Feinberg in Women's Wear Daily writes mainly for persons interested in business, a perusal through decades of Time shows its writers trying to reach a larger audience and thus writing on scores of different topics. The longevity of an author's work correlates to the success with which he captures his audience's characteristics and oral traditions. We find that such writers as E. B. White, Finley Peter Dunne, and Mark Twain have succeeded in almost …

Influence Of The "International Theme" In The Novels Of Sinclair Lewis., David Charles Thaw

Master's Theses

The "International Theme" in literature arose as a result of real-life confrontations between Americans and Europeans. Conflict was inevitable as the feudal tradition of England with its emphasis on social caste met head-on with the democratic traditions of a ew nation. By definition the "international theme" focused on the conflict of manners between two citizens of different nations who disagree on the correct way of behaving in a given situation. For example, the titled nobility of Europe feel that some deference should be shown to them due to their rank and not because they have accomplished something of merit. Particularly, …

Images Of Hope For Immortality Pervading The Patterns Of Doubt In Emily Dickinson's Death Poetry, Nicholas Desmond

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

The Grotesque In The Fiction Of Joyce Carol Oates, Kathleen Burke Bloom

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Reaction To Religious Elements In The Poetry Of Robert Browning: An Introduction And Annotated Bibliography, Vincent P. Anderson

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Meaning And Method : A Comparative Study Of Edmund Husserl And Ezra Pound, Jesse N. Mayo Jr

Master's Theses

In his essay entitled "Phenomenology of Heading" Georges Poulet explains how a "reading" is possible"

The universe of fiction is infinitely more elastic than the world of objective reality. It lends itself to any use; it yields with little resistance to the importunities of the mind. Moreover - and of all the benefits I find this the most appealing - this interior universe constituted by language does not seem radically opposed to the me who thinks it.... In short, since everything has become part of my mind, thanks to the intervention of language, the opposition between the subject and its …

The Females Within The Design/Debris Motif In Three Novels By John Hawkes, Evelyn Carol Sweet

Master's Theses

John Hawkes, according to Tony Tanner, is perhaps the most "disturbing" contemporary American writer. Many people would agree with this commentary on Hawkes, a man whose work has moved from the surreal in The Cannibal (1949) toward the more realistic, a movement predicted by Albert Guerard in his introduction to The Cannibal. As this movement away from the surreal has occurred, then why does Tanner find Hawkes' "disturbing" in a review of his most recent novel, Travesty? Perhaps because this movement was not from the surreal to the realistic as we generally use the term, but rather a movement from …

Benjamin Compson : Consciousness, Rhetoric, And The 'Fictive Art', Ann Brooke Lewis

Master's Theses

A study of consciousness in the first section of The Sound and the Fury clarifies both the novel's technique and its rendering of human truth. My reading of this monologue is based on the premise that the way Benjamin Compson views the world and the way in which his mind arranges those views enhances our understanding of the novel's other brother-narrators, Quentin and Jason. As limited and distorted as Benjy's perceptions may be, they provide a model by which the perceptions of Quentin and Jason gain clarity and meaning. Benjy's monologue begins the novel and provides the reader's entrance into …