Literature in English, British Isles Commons^™

A Pure Woman, Archetypally Presented: Towards A Jungian Criticism Of Hardy’S Tess Of The D’Urbervilles, Bethany M. Gullman

Senior Honors Theses

Tess Durbeyfield is one of the most memorable characters in English literature. She is at once a working-class woman and a mythic figure. Abused by her superior and caught between classes, she represents the individual struggling for identity.

Tess of the d’Urbervilles appeals universally to the nature of the woman in literature. Her status as the natural or archetypal woman is clear throughout the novel. Hardy created Tess who cannot be defined by just one categorization. Tess certainly fulfills the limited idea of the fallen woman. However, Hardy is appealing beyond this narrow view of humanity to the more ancient …

Playing For His Side: Kipling’S ‘Regulus,’ Corporal Punishment, And Classical Education, Emily A. Mcdermott

Classics & Religious Studies Faculty Publication Series

Rudyard Kipling’s short story, “Regulus,” revolves around the flogging of a student who has let loose a mouse in the drawing classroom of a turn-of-the-century British public school. The first part of the story is devoted to a fifth-form Latin class’s line-by-line explication of Horace’s fifth Roman ode, in which the story’s title character is presented as a paradigm of manly virtue; the remainder is given over to narration of the mouse-miscreant’s progress toward punishment, in thematic counterpoint to the Regulus exemplum. Within that idiosyncratic framework, the story tackles as ambitious a topic as the purposes of education, with particular …

The Tractarians' Political Rhetoric, Robert Ellison

English Faculty Research

This article examines the political speaking and writing of John Keble, John Henry Newman, and other leading figures of the Oxford Movement. It argues that while they were essentially conservative in the pulpit, where they spoke as official representatives of the Established Church, they were more critical and outspoken in other works, where they enjoyed more of the freedom afforded to private citizens.

Propaganda And Poetry During The Great War., Norma Compton Leadingham

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

During the Great War, poetry played a more significant role in the war effort than articles and pamphlets. A campaign of extraordinary language filled with abstract and spiritualized words and phrases concealed the realities of the War. Archaic language and lofty phrases hid the horrible truth of modern mechanical warfare. The majority and most recognized and admired poets, including those who served on the front and knew firsthand the horrors of trench warfare, not only supported the war effort, but also encouraged its continuation. For the majority of the poets, the rejection of the war was a postwar phenomenon. From …

Purloined Voices: Edgar Allan Poe Reading Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Alexander M. Schlutz

Publications and Research

This essay unfolds the complex intertextual relationship between the work of Samuel Taylor Coleridge and that of Edgar Allan Poe. References to and extended borrowings from Coleridge’s poetry and philosophical texts mark Poe’s œuvre throughout, but – as is only fitting for borrowings from the great borrower Coleridge – they are never anything as simple as plagiarisms or acts of intellectual theft. As this piece demonstrates through readings of Poe’s early poetological text “Letter to B–,” the Dupin story “The Purloined Letter,” and the late tour-de-force prose-poem Eureka, tracing the recurrence of Coleridgean poetry and prose in the work …

Naïve Narrators: The Voice Of The Child In The Poetry Of Paul Muldoon, Stephanie Jean Osburn Alexander

All-Inclusive List of Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Paul Muldoon, author of eleven volumes of poetry and two books of criticism and the recipient of numerous other accolades, is often the subject of literary criticism. A complicated and multi-faceted poet known for his use of dense reference and allusion, clever wordplay, and dazzling technical prowess, Muldoon is often branded a "difficult" poet. In the face of this difficulty, this project attempts to navigate a new point of entry to Muldoon's work through the identification and study of na1ve narrators, or child speakers, and to study them alongside the larger themes of performance and play within …

What Happens In The Links? Framing Judgment In Context, Emily A. Fournier

Honors Scholar Theses

Scholars of Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales have focused much of their research on the interpretation of individual tales in the collection. The meaning behind these tales is clearly important to the work as a whole, as the Tales discuss grand themes that run throughout human life. The choice of themes and arguments in each pilgrim’s tale can also reflect back on the pilgrim’s own motivations and ideas. However, in searching for some greater meaning for Chaucer’s collection, it is important not to leave out the framework within which the tales exist. The links that join the tales to one another, arguably …

Metoikos: Modernism's Resident Aliens, Justin Glen Williamson

Dissertations

This dissertation examines why D.H. Lawrence, Joseph Conrad, T.S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, and James Joyce all conceived of themselves as cultural outsiders and how they used this ostensibly marginal social status to conceal a set of conservative core values they sensed were eroding. This otherwise disparate group shared a sense of cultural alienation, recognized the potentially powerful position of the exile, and demonstrated a keen willingness to exploit its possibilities. Although these writers have long been acknowledged and heralded for their experimentation, their technical and formal innovation, much of their work springs from essentially conservative impulses, beliefs, and values, aimed …

Open, Clear Decisions: Virginian Woolf's Orlando And Clarissa Dalloway As Bisexuals, Sarah Brey

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

In Orlando Virginia Woolf, shows Orlando as a person with a clear conscience who knows what he/she wants. Like Clarissa Dalloway in Mrs. Dalloway, who is also often regarded as a lesbian because she loves Sally fondly her whole life but chooses to marry Richard, Orlando loves Sasha regardless of what changes her body undergoes, but chooses to marry Shel. Neither Clarissa nor Orlando is forced into marriage. Both choose to marry and abandon their active lesbian tendencies because they know what is most comfortable for them. As bisexuals they show the confusion of desiring both sexes, and instead of …

The Reality Of Happily Ever After: Charlotte Bronte's Revision Of Fairy Tales In Jane Eyre, Sarah Rice

Theses & Honors Papers

This thesis analyzes Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre through the lens of fairy tale stories, investigating the parts of Jane’s story that seem to parallel stories such as “Bluebeard” and “Cinderella”. It argues for a revisionist view of fairy tales as created by Bronte and discusses how the usage of fairy tale elements helps to further the plot and sociocultural messages of Jane Eyre.

"There's Nothing Like Dancing, After All" Gender As Performance In Jane Austen's Dance Scenes, D. Nicole Swann

Theses & Honors Papers

This thesis examines the elaborate and intricate dance scenes in many of Jane Austen’s novels as representations of marriage and the performance of gender. Along with looking at the successful marriages in Austen’s novels which result from the social convention of English country dancing, this thesis also analyzes the failed relationships and broken hearts that result from Austenian dancing and discusses the role of gender in finding both a good dance partner and a good spouse.

Manacled Desires: William Blake's Struggle For Sexual Autonomy, Cheryl Adams Rychkov

Theses & Honors Papers

This thesis closely examines William Blake’s attitudes towards women and compares and contrasts the texts with what can be known of Blake’s life and world. It examines his interest in sexual freedom and where these interests might have emerged from. The author explores the possibility that he might be interested in sexual freedom for the benefit of both men and women.

The Precognition Of Crime: Treason In Medieval England And Terrorism In Twenty-First Century America, E. Kay Harris

UNIversitas: Journal of Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity

“The Knight of the Two Swords” in Thomas Malory’s Morte Darthur (1485) tells a story of an invisible knight who without provocation kills other knights. Rather than have the identity of this invisible knight become part of the plot of this tale, Malory names him immediately (1:79-80). This early identification of the invisible knight has led Eugene Vinaver to speculate that Malory “wants at all costs to avoid suspense, and so transfers the solution of the mystery from the end of the dialogue to the beginning. There are cases,” Vinaver continues, “where such a method can relieve the story of …

Honor And Transgression: The Poetics And Politics Of Shame And Guilt In Sir Gawain And The Green Knight, April E. Cook

UNIversitas: Journal of Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity

Since its conception in the late fourteenth century, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight has been lauded not only for its virtually seamless synthesis of Christian doctrine, Celtic myth, and Arthurian romance, but also for the complex and enigmatic poetics that have come to define and establish it as one of the most unique and perplexing texts within the diverse and substantial corpus of late medieval literature. A meticulously crafted, structurally symmetrical, alliterative romance governed by the dynamic interplay of proximate opposites and ostensibly contradictory discourses, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (Sir Gawain) furnishes a revealing reflection of the …

Arthur C. Clarke’S Childhood’S End: A Prescription For Producing Humanity’S Psychological Maturity, Bill Koch

UNIversitas: Journal of Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity

Earlier this year, when I would tell people that my Intro to Lit class was reading Arthur C. Clarke’s Childhood’s End, they would react with smiles and nods of recognition.

Many said, “Yes, I read that long ago—it’s about spaceships coming to earth, right?”

Indeed it is, and more.

It was the first Clarke book I had read (several years ago for some forgotten reason), but when I finished the book I felt that Clarke had conveyed something of importance, even if in the form of science fiction. There was a gravitas to it I hadn’t expected. I read several …

Dryden’S Battle With Music In King Arthur: The Bracegirdle Hurdle, John Sievers

UNIversitas: Journal of Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activity

John Dryden came of age during a turbulent portion of England’s history. In his lifetime, he observed the collapse of four different governments. Born in 1631, Dryden lived through Charles I’s beheading, the republican experiment of the interregnum, the return to monarchy under Charles II, and finally the glorious revolution in which perhaps no blood was spilt but the condition of the English throne was undeniably weakened.1 These abrupt and tremendous political changes also included substantial cultural transformations. One of the transformations that had a limiting effect on Dryden’s literary career was the closing of the English theaters during the …

Morton, David, 1886-1957 (Mss 50), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid only for Manuscripts Collection 50. Correspondence of David Morton, correspondence concerning Morton Collection, speeches, essays, MSS: "Entries for a Diary," and MSS: "The Amateur Listener" -- diary, poems, pamphlets, and miscellaneous items of Morton, a poet and English professor born in Elkton, Kentucky.

Angels And Demons: Christina Rossetti’S Goblin Market As A Social Critique Of The Victorian Ideal Of The “Angel In The House” And The Pre-Raphaelites’ Response To That Ideal, Melissa Adams

Theses and Dissertations

Christina Rossetti’s poem Goblin Market presents a subversive critique on the socially constructed dichotomy of Angel versus Demon as depicted in Pre-Raphaelite artwork, Dante Gabriele Rossetti’s poetry, and Coventry Patmore’s poem Angel in the House. An analysis of Goblin Market in relation to Patmore’s poem and the Pre-Raphaelite paintings The Annunciation, Ophelia, Lady Lilith, Circe Offering the Cup to Ulysses, and Sibylla Palmifera and Dante Gabriele Rossetti’s poems “Soul’s Beauty” and “Body’s Beauty” illustrate the ways in which Rossetti presents a counter-image that breaks down this socially constructed dichotomy. This is additionally supported by an exploration …

Resisting The Human Need For Enemies, Or What Would Harry Potter Do?, Mary E. Hess

Faculty Publications

Most mass-mediated popular cultures surround us with enemies, offering up vivid depictions of a world seen as either “for us” or “against us.” Christian faith, on the other hand, draws us towards love even in the presence of hatred. A close look at the surprisingly countercultural world of Harry Potter provides some ways forward in walking the path of love.

“Everything She Knew": Race, Nation, Language, And Identity In Philip Pullman’S The Broken Bridge, Ebony Elizabeth Thomas

Teacher Education Faculty Publications

A decade before his international acclaim for the His Dark Materials fantasy series, Pullman authored The Broken Bridge, a coming-of-age tale featuring Ginny, an Afro-British teenaged girl living in postmodern coastal Wales. The Broken Bridge delves into dilemmas of racial identity, ideologies of language and location, and aspects of non-Western religion that are not often touched upon in young adult literature. Pullman’s deft characterization prevents Ginny from becoming a caricature; instead, he presents the story of a very real sixteen-year-old girl with resentments, fears, and doubts. Ultimately, The Broken Bridge serves as a metaphor for the irreconcilability between an …

A.S. Byatt's "Morpho Eugenia": Prolegomena To Any Future Theory, Michael Lackey

English Publications

The traditional view holds that love and knowledge are only possible if a person can transcend the human—love is that which overcomes biological urges like lust, while knowledge is that which gets beyond self-interested perception. In the nineteenth century, when theories about anthropomorphism came to dominate, the traditional views of love and knowledge were exposed as incoherent. In "Morpho Eugenia," A.S. Byatt brilliantly dramatizes how these intellectual developments impacted the lives of a wide range of nineteenth-century characters—some sunk into nihilistic despair, some became dogmatic scientists, some became tortured existentialists, and some tried to build a new and more reasonable …

Eugenic Discourse In The Work Of D.H. Lawrence, Christopher Lawrence Cotton

Theses Digitization Project

Eugenic discourse is apparent in the work of many writers in the early 20th century, but is especially explicit in D.H. Lawrence's novel, Lady Chatterley's Lover, as well as his private letters. A close reading of these works illustrates Lawrence's attempts to grapple with his advocacy of eugenic.

Rasselas: A Realist’S Narrative On The Quest For Ideal Happiness, Lauren Le

Undergraduate Review

No abstract provided.

Religious Heresy And Radical Republicanism In John Milton’S Paradise Lost, Lisa Riva

Undergraduate Review

No abstract provided.

Review Of Telegraphic Realism: Victorian Fiction And Other Information Systems, Richard Menke

The George Eliot Review Online, ISSN: 2831-5375

Richard Menke's study draws illuminating connections between the development of literary realism and the revolutionary changes which the nineteenth century saw in methods of communication and information management. Innovations such as the Penny Post, the telegraph, photography and wireless communication all raise fundamental questions about the representation in media both of the material world and of human subjectivity and social interconnection. Menke's discussion of these provides the context in which he examines how novelists grapple with similar issues, and he thus offers fresh new ways of thinking about realism as a self-conscious representational practice and about how the novel form …

Review Of The Cambridge Introduction To George Eliot, Nancy Henry

The George Eliot Review Online, ISSN: 2831-5375

This lively book is part of a new Cambridge University Press series already more than thirty titles strong, for 'readers who want to broaden their understanding of the books and authors they enjoy' - a mission statement which is quickly decoded: 'Ideal for students, teachers and lecturers'. The range of authors and topics included is canonical yet catholic, and not exclusively Anglophone: American authors are well represented along with English and Irish ones, there is a clutch of drama and theatre titles, Francophone literature and Derrida, postcolonial literatures and Modernism. The books are relatively short at about 60,000 words, and …

Review Of The Marriage Of Minds: Reading Sympathy In The Victorian Marriage Plot & Victorian Fiction And The Insights Of Sympathy: An Alternative To The Hermeneutics Of Suspicion, Rachel Ablow, Brigid Lowe

The George Eliot Review Online, ISSN: 2831-5375

These two studies show that the ideological tug-of-war over the Victorian novel is far from over, and that George Eliot stands in the middle of it. Brigid Lowe's Victorian Fiction and the Insights of Sympathy is a bold and provocative attack on critics who have trawled nineteenth century novels for evidence that these works were concerned above all with exercizing ideological control. D. A. Miller, Terry Eagleton, Stephen Greenblatt, Catherine Gallagher, Deirdre David and Mary Poovey are all amongst Lowe's targets, and she draws on a wide range of sources to dismantle their conjectures. Rachel Ablow's The Marriage of Minds …

Review Of The Spanish Gypsy By George Eliot, Antonie Gerard Van Den Broek

The George Eliot Review Online, ISSN: 2831-5375

This edition complements the two volume edition of The Complete Shorter Poetry of George Eliot, also edited by Antonie Gerard van den Broek and published by Pickering and Chatto in 2005. Like those volumes it presents an edited text and a mass of information, editorial, critical and contextual (the list of textual variants alone occupies about 120 pages). These volumes make an essential reference point for future discussion of the poem. William Baker's Preface describes its conception, progress and reception, and van den Broek's Introduction takes up in more detail the critical and conceptual contexts. There are four appendices. The …

George Eliot Birthday Luncheon, 25 November 2007- The Toast To The Immortal Memory, Roger Simmonds

The George Eliot Review Online, ISSN: 2831-5375

Ladies and Gentlemen, I am extremely grateful to you for inviting me here today to give this speech on George Eliot's Birthday. It is a real pleasure and very flattering: I hope I can live up to expectations.

If you had told me a year ago that I would be standing before you all now as Project Officer for the 150th anniversary celebrations of George Eliot's first work of fiction, I would have been surprised to say the least! For somebody who values literature as much as I do, who greatly admires the work of George Eliot, and who loves …

Japanese Branch Report 2007, Maiko Ohtake

The George Eliot Review Online, ISSN: 2831-5375

The eleventh annual convention of the George Eliot Fellowship of Japan was held at Chuo University on Saturday 24 November 2007.

The morning session began with an opening address by Miwa Ohta (Chuo University). Four papers were presented in the morning; the first two were introduced and commented upon by Michiko Kurisu (Daito Bunka University), and the last two by Shigeko Tomita (Koshien University).

The first paper was titled 'Rethinking Adam Bede - Why Does No One Help Hetty?' by Mayumi Fujita (Kwansei Gakuin University). Starting with a question about the severe treatment of Hetty, Ms. Fujita examined the moral …