English Language and Literature Commons^™

Unraveling The Threads: Memory And Narrative In Ian Mcewan's Atonement, Emily Rooksby

Departmental Honors & Graduate Capstone Projects

This paper, written for Dr. Haffey’s English 449U course on 21st Century Fiction, explores the intricate narrative structure and metafictional elements in Ian McEwan’s novel Atonement. The novel is a commentary on the power and responsibilities of storytelling, particularly how narratives shape our understanding of memory and truth. Through the lens of its protagonist, Briony Tallis, McEwan demonstrates the complexities of memory and the subjectivity of truth. Briony’s narrative, marked by guilt and a quest for forgiveness, becomes a vehicle for examining how biases and emotions influence perception. The paper delves into the novel’s use of multiple narrative perspectives and …

What's The Deal With Conspiracy Theories?, Blake Ross

Transformations: Research Papers

The usage of the word Conspiracy Theory isn't anything new. In fact it is a word used widely in today's society. But what is a conspiracy theory, how are conspiracy theorists and believers viewed in the public eye, and what about conspiracy theories do people find so alluring?
The common notion of conspiracy theories are that they are inherently wronged, that history just happens. That people are wrong for trying to connect dots that aren’t there and are a result of un-informed, ill-educated people lacking skeptical and critical thinking skills. In testing this notion I examined two conspiracy theories, one …

Evermore And Evermore: A Discussion Of Spiritual Fulfillment As Found In Stoppard And Kerouac, Duncan Soughan

English Senior Capstone

Mankind has often struggled with the question of who am I? What am I if the institutions speaking into my life cease to adequately represent me? Nietzsche tackled this question and came to the conclusion that man should turn to his desire to fulfill that lack of direction. Tom Stoppard in Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead as well as Jack Kerouac in his novel, On the Road, interact with Nietzsche’s proposals in fascinating ways with Stoppard’s work essentially proving Nietzsche’s point, and Kerouac clarifying that yes, outside the self should not be the sole input for direction but it …

The Light And The Nothing: Escapism In Ready Player One And Confessions Of An English Opium-Eater, Katherine Bodkin

English Senior Capstone

In their novels Ready Player One and Confessions of an English Opium-Eater, Ernest Cline and Thomas De Quincey shed light on the individual and societal desire to escape pain and suffering. The drastically different time periods of these two stories show that addiction and avoidance have been plaguing humans for centuries. These characters’ unhealthy use of escapism serves as a warning to readers about the dangers of identifying oneself within a false reality. Ultimately, both characters exemplify that placing one’s agency within a false reality renders one completely powerless. When one accepts their inability to change their undesirable pasts …

To Do Or Not To Do: Anne Elliot And Edith Hope’S Evolving Perceptions Of Marriage In Persuasion And Hotel Du Lac, Jillian Cook

English Senior Capstone

While Anita Brookner might deny a connection between her characters and those of Jane Austen, placing Brookner’s Hotel du Lac and Austen’s Persuasion in conversation with one another reveals how similarly their protagonists are shaped. Edith Hope and Anne Elliot are both characters who make choices based on a high opinion of love that has been cultivated through the various interactions they have with the single, married, and widowed people in their lives. This paper seeks to investigate these relationships to understand why the two women respond so differently to the marriage proposals they receive at the end of their …

Reputation And Reality: Revelations Of Monstrosity In Frankenstein And Six Of Crows, Jordyn Fortuna

English Senior Capstone

The main characters in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein and Leigh Bardugo’s Six of Crows reveal the potential within everyone for Monstrosity. This disregard for humanity can stem from many things, but it can also be prevented through community and sympathy. Monstrosity is often misconstrued due to a false perception guided by a sighted bias. In reality, however, characters’ humanity can be shown to the reader through a greater insight into their traumas and intentions. This paper highlights the idea that reputation cannot be trusted, but instead but be further examined to reveal the Monster within.

The Holding On, Lydia Price

English Senior Capstone

“The Holding On” is a work of creative nonfiction, fiction, and poetry that explores the tension that lies at the heart of growing up and departing the world as you have previously known it. Through the lens of reflections on home life and family, this project seeks to honor the unique blend of celebration and mourning that we meet with during the transitions of life. Joy does not undo sorrow, but neither does sorrow undo joy, and the ultimate purpose of these stories is to transport you to that threshold moment— the moment before leaving.

"Big Medicine, Strong Magic": Sacrament And Sacrilege In Till We Have Faces And The Wind In The Willows, Kayla Kovacs

English Senior Capstone

Magic abounds as the fantastical and ordinary collide in C.S. Lewis’s final work of fiction, Till We Have Faces, and Kenneth Grahame’s children’s classic, The Wind in the Willows. As these authors weave worlds of profound, yet wonderfully simple beauty, they tell stories that point towards the deep intersectionality between seen reality and myth. This paper aims to show the permeability of the veil separating these realms through the concept of sacrament. While sacrament is seen as a kind of gate through which characters may pass to taste and see with new senses, it is contrasted throughout with …

Bibliography For "Pubcrawl: Stacy Russo Display", Arianna Tillman, Isabella Piechota, Kalea Brown

Library Displays and Bibliographies

A bibliography created to accompany a display about Stacy Russo during April 2024 at the Leatherby Libraries at Chapman University, to support the annual Literary Pub(lishing) Crawl event hosted each year by the Department of English and the Leatherby Libraries.

Phantasma, Grace Wright

ALL - Honors Theses

This project, titled Phantasma, can be described as a queer retelling of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, in which Brutus is the central focus. It will interrogate the question of what draws readers back to that fateful day at the Roman Senate time and time again. It will also question what drew Shakespeare and his audience to it, as well as deconstruct the nuances of his recreation. The narrative will be greatly influenced by the structure of Shakespeare’s play, but will take on new forms as scenes are added in places where Brutus would ordinarily be “offstage”. Using queer theory as well …

Asexuality In Science Fiction: A Study Of Non-Sexual Queer Intimacy In Short Stories By Ursula K. Le Guin, Samuel Delany, And Theodore Sturgeon, Mik Dressler

Honors College Theses

The study of asexuality is still a relatively new concept in queer studies, and the rarity of asexual literature poses questions about how media can help further develop this study. This question takes unique shape in the genre of science fiction, one deeply and intrinsically tied to queer storytelling but very often hypersexualized. This essay evaluates the asexual themes of four sci-fi short stories which predate modern vocabularies and frameworks of asexuality: “The Widget, The Wadget, and Boff” by Theodore Sturgeon, “Unchosen Love” and “Mountain Ways” by Ursula K. Le Guin, and “Aye, and Gomorrah” by Samuel Delany. Referencing queer …

Sinclair Lewis Society Newsletter, Vol 32, No. 2, The Sinclair Lewis Society

Sinclair Lewis Society Newsletter

“Taking a Chance on Love: A Review of the Play Free Air,” by Deborah Brown

“Lewis on Stage: In the Audience for Free Air and Babbitt,” by Sally E. Parry, Illinois State University

“Quiet Desperation: Matthew Broderick’s George Babbitt Conforms to Stage,” by Cassandra Csencsitz

“Nothing in Particular: A Review of Joe DiPietro’s Play at the La Jolla Playhouse,” by Ralph Goldstein

“Lewis and Rome”

“Move of Arrowsmith Restored”

“Danny Klecko and Sinclair Lewis”

“It Can’t Happen Here in Smithsonian Magazine”

In Memoriam: Carol Dahlquist

A Loving Compilation Of Ecopoems: An Anthology Of My Favorites From The Ecopoetry And Climate Crisis Course Syllabus And Beyond, Emily Kerimian , '25, Peter Schmidt

English Literature Faculty Works

This anthology draws from a series of poems that I read as a college junior in a humanities-focused environmental studies class at Swarthmore College, as well as ecopoems that I have read in my own free time. It is meant to honor each of these poems that touched me in a unique way, which I will discuss in my commentary. For some, I was drawn to the poem’s overall message, or strong sensory language, or the identity of the poet that seeped through. I love poetry as a medium of expression, even though I sometimes struggle to find my poetic …

Poets Rooted In Nature: An Ecopoetry Anthology, Ian Chen , '24, Winston Zhang , '27, Riya Rao , '26, Peter Schmidt

English Literature Faculty Works

Anyone who has studied poetry has experienced its elusiveness as well as the profound impact that it brings upon its readers. Although poetry comes in many shapes and forms, the universal theme among impactful poetry is its ability to both evoke powerful emotions and inspire readers to action. In the somewhat bleak time of the present, individuals can easily feel insignificant among the masses; however, poetry can inspire wonder and break readers away from the screens and fickle distractions ever present in the modern world. In this anthology, we focus on the multifaceted genre of ecopoetry, a genre of poetry …

Wonder & Warning: The Salve That's Needed To Heal Our Planet, Benton Greenberg , '26, Elle Anthony , '26, Peter Schmidt

English Literature Faculty Works

Icebergs melting; plastic in the oceans; greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere; deforestation; industrial agriculture; pollution; overfishing. Humans have inhabited Earth for a mere fraction of its existence, comprising less than 1% of its total timeline, yet we are rapidly destroying it. The health of our planet is at a tipping point. Poets have been writing about the disharmony between the environment and humans for hundreds of years. Writers like Nathaniel Hawthorne plead us to change our ways through their haunting and ghastly works, while Jane Hirshfield and others speak through animals to hold us accountable for our faults. However, not …

Echoes Of Nature: Exploring The Intricacies Of Existence And The Environment, Lena Massengale , '25, Peter Schmidt

English Literature Faculty Works

In this anthology, the works from highly skilled authors allow the reader to peek into the existential through a celebration of the natural world. Featuring the unique writing styles of Charles Simic, WS Merwin, and bell hooks, the reader is transported into a world of ecopoetry that aims to touch on more than earthly space. Transcending the rigid bounds of environmental scholarship, these authors incorporate their personal experiences in their interpretation of environmentalism. From the spiritual and ancestral ties to masked social critique, my anthology “Echoes of Nature: Exploring the Intricacies of Existence and the Environment” invites readers to explore …

Before We Say Farewell: An Anthology Of Ecopoetry, Suhyun Kim , '24, Peter Schmidt

English Literature Faculty Works

When faced with the climate crisis, we humans have responded with varying levels of distress. Most of us swing between despair, when we fall into grief at our own stupidity and possible doom, and hope, that a solution is right around the corner. There is a middle ground of apathy, for those who’ve lost all hope and/or become paralyzed by the sheer magnitude of the climate crisis. Regardless of where we are, life under the climate crisis is not easy, and we all need to be reminded that it’s worth going on from time to time. Ironically, many of us …

Understanding The Anthropocene, Monica Kramer , '25, Peter Schmidt

English Literature Faculty Works

The current climate crisis can be a daunting, anxiety-provoking topic. Terms such as “climate anxiety” are brought up because thinking about the prospect of future warming can cause extreme dread. Our current trajectory has even pushed people to forgo having children. Yet although this dread is very warranted and cannot be minimized, simply fearing for the future does not present any solutions to improving it. Ecopoetry can give us a window into helping deal with our grief, and can also suggest solutions for moving forward. This anthology presents poems that do both, helping us to better understand our current era …

The Whispers Of Magnolias, Nican Tlaca, And The World Around Us: An Anthology, Gabriela Rodriguez , '27, Qing Hao , '25, Peter Schmidt

English Literature Faculty Works

Why read poetry after all, for all the frustration it can stir and the immense degree of patience it often demands (particularly challenging in our age of distractions)? Jane Hirshfield’s quotes offer a lucid insight: good poetry often changes how we perceive our surroundings and our states of existence. It lets us experience life in a transformed way – different before and after reading the poem – and inspires us to view our world with a sharper, more curious eye.
Here, we have compiled an anthology of ecopoetry that features a diverse selection of poems, ranging in time, culture, and …

Death, Love, And Feathers: Poems Teaching Us To Fly, Isa Specchierla , '26, Sophia Cáceres , '26, Peter Schmidt

English Literature Faculty Works

Death, Love, and Feathers: Poems Teaching Us to Fly is an anthology that provides readers who are just starting to become interested in ecopoetry and want a place to begin their wonderful journey. We have incorporated some well-known ecopoets such as Mary Oliver, Robert Frost, Emily Dickinson, and Maya Angelou, which have personally inspired our own interest and sparked our love for ecopoetry. We have also included a few other lesser-known contemporary eco-poets, whose work touches on how our environment has been transformed through climate change.
We also present poems by Wanda Coleman, Eleanor Wilner, and Joy Harjo.
Through this …

Mythos And Logos: Foucauldian Subjectivities Of Virginia Woolf's Orlando, Hayley R. Cisney

Student Publications

Virginia Woolf’s Orlando: A Biography details a centuries-long battle between Orlando and the sexual structures of repressive power in England. The biographical framework of the novel implies its contribution to objective, historical fact, while the miraculous nature of Orlando’s sexual transformation directly conflicts with constituted epistemologies of being. This paper examines these contrasting forces through Michel Foucault’s post-structuralist considerations of knowledge, power, and sexuality, in addition to the incorporation of other scholarship on Woolf’s conceptions of gender. I specifically follow the timeline of Foucault’s interpretation of the repressive hypothesis as it unfolds throughout the course of Woolf’s novel. By establishing …

Escaping From Myth: Denver’S Reclamation Of Love In Toni Morrison’S Beloved, Lainey Terfruchte

Audre Lorde Prize

No abstract provided.

Sinning As Empowerment: Reclaiming God As A Black, Queer Woman In Alice Walker’S The Color Purple, Bethany Abrams

Audre Lorde Prize

In this paper, the author embarks on the task of re-imagining the seven sins of Christianity in the context of Alice Walker's The Color Purple, specifically in relation to the character Shug Avery.

2024 Greenleaf Review-- Catharsis (No. 37), Sigma Tau Delta

The Greenleaf Review

No abstract provided.

Bibliography For "Pico Iyer Display", Isabella Piechota, Arianna Tillman, Kalea Brown

Library Displays and Bibliographies

A bibliography created to support a display about Pico Iyer at the Leatherby Libraries during April 2024 at the Leatherby Libraries at Chapman University.

Beyond The Looking Glass: Dreams And Somnial States And Spaces In Nineteenth-Century British Literature, Anne N. Nagel

Dissertations and Doctoral Documents, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2023–

Poised between a waning magico-theological tradition of symbolic dream interpretation and the rising influence of scientific dream theories, which equated dreaming with disorder, the dream occupied a unique space in nineteenth-century Great Britain. Dreams were coming untethered from signification, as natural philosophers deemed their content indecipherable and chaotic. Yet vestiges of early modern beliefs could still lend supernatural power and polyphony to dreams.

This was not simply a matter of making a binary choice between two ways of thinking about dreams but instead a site of collisions and coalescences. I contend that the ways in which dreams were conceptualized in …

Booktok's Potentials And Possibilities In Composition Studies: An Interactive Digital Collection, Hanna Varilek

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The following thesis, “BookTok’s Potentials and Possibilities in Composition Studies: An Interactive Digital Collection,” explores the phenomenon of BookTok, a vibrant out-of-school literacy program on the social media platform TikTok centered around books, reading, and literary discussions. As digital platforms continue to shape contemporary cultural landscapes, BookTok emerges as a unique space where users engage with literature and participate in discussions that influence their reading habits and preferences. This thesis explores the possibilities of BookTok in reimagining the current landscape of first-year writing and composition classrooms by introducing an interactive digital collection of BookTok content and educational resources titled, The …

Prose By Any Other Name: Analyzing Changes To Translated Book Titles In Japanese And English, Angela Griffin

Book Publishing Final Research Papers

This research analyzed the ways in which book titles are changed in translation from English to Japanese and Japanese to English. The titles of one hundred books, fifty in Japanese and fifty in English, were sorted into three main categories of translation based on Tsukawaki’s research on translated sci-fi movie titles (2009): those using the Japanese katakana script, literal, and semantic. For Japanese to English titles, literal translations accounted for 68% of the data and semantic translations for 20%, while Japanese to English titles were literally translated only 48% of the time but semantically 34%. The changes made to translated …

Between Pages And Politics: An Interdisciplinary Exploration Of Book Bans, Hannah Morrison

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Across the United States, school boards are being inundated with requests to ban books. While these conversations are often localized, what the rise in censorship across the country suggests is that there is a fierce movement behind censoring young adult literature. What is frequently erased in these campaigns are stories of people of color and queer communities, alongside topics such as sexuality, drugs, or violence. The presiding conclusion within childhood studies on how we have reached a point where censorship is abundantly common in American schools is that public discourse views children as less than or not fully formed, thus …

Inviting Submission: Isabella Beeton At The Englishwoman's Domestic Magazine, 1856-1865, Julie Megan Sorge Way

English Theses & Dissertations

Isabella Beeton, creator of the iconic domestic manual Beeton’s Book of Household Management, died suddenly in 1865, just before her twenty-ninth birthday. Her popular book survived to codify stereotypical Victorian female ideals. Yet the “Mrs Beeton” mythos camouflages a remarkable talent: far from domestic drudgery, Beeton maintained a vibrant career as a writer and editor at the Englishwoman’s Domestic Magazine (EDM), traveling widely to research the latest fashions and laboring behind the scenes to ensure the magazine’s success. Closely examining Beeton’s EDM work demonstrates how these formative, productive years shaped her later, more popular writing. Such a …