Symbol Literature Reviews Samples For Students

Analysis of the poem “The Blue Bowl” by Jane Kenyon

Jane Kenyon’s poem “The Blue Bowl” is a short but strong work, representing the feelings about loss and death. Initially, it seems to be quite a simple and explicit poem, as the author tells us about the death of a cat in the first line:

with his bowl.” (Kenyon)
However, with further reading and restating the poem, we realize that it has a much deeper sense. It is filled with symbols, which show us the inevitability of death. The title of the poem is a clear evidence that the blue bowl is a symbol, which must be explained ...

This novel is a collection of personal letters from a boy named Charlie to an anonymous person. Charlie is fifteen, and is a freshman in high school. In these letters he describes everything that happens to him: all of his first times, the complicated journeys of his friends Sam and Patrick, his love to Sam and his greatest hobby – observing other people’s lives.
The language is kept fairly simple, which makes it possible for everyone to understand the most difficult thing in this world: teenagers; A.V. Club says that it is because “The Perks of Being a Wallflower ...

Part I

While Child Protective Services might find the dance that unfolds in Roethke’s “My Papa’s Waltz” to be a bit unsightly, it is clearly an event that the little boy enjoys, finding it a moment of bonding with his father. The fact that the boy’s “mother’s countenance/Could not unfrown itself”(Roethke 7-8) suggests that she disapproves of the father drinking. Indeed, the father has had more than a couple of shots, as the mere smell of it on his father’s breath turns the boy dizzy. This use of alcohol may well be just a form of solace after a long ...

Wit was written by Margaret Edson. This one-act play has won the Pulitzer Prize for drama. It is a story which deals with the medical profession as well as with the culture of education at universities. Both sides are brilliant in this story. Vivian Bearing is represents brilliant academic staff whereas, Doctor Kelekian and Dr Jason Posner represent the brilliant side of medical research. None of them have emotions when it comes to work. The only character which feels empathy for Vivian is the nurse, Susie. She is the only character who is acting humane.
Whereas Vivian is strict ...

Violence of colors in “The Raven” and “Lenore”

In the poems “The Raven”, “Lenore” Poe inquires the loss of ideal beauty and the difficulty in getting it back. These two poems are narrated by a young man crying over the untimely death of his beloved.
In “The Raven,” Poe successfully unites his philosophical and aesthetic ideals. In this piece, a young scholar who is emotionally exhausted of the phrase “Nevermore” repeated by a raven in answer to his question about the probability of an afterlife with his deceased lover.
“Lenore” shows different ways in which the dead are best remembered, either by mourning or celebrating life beyond earthly ...

Death is the expression of life. It has a double sense and a double meaning in Shakespeare’s “Hamlet”. The funeral ceremony, mourning, revenging, talking with ghosts or committing suicidal acts represent passages in the circularity of life, based on various cultural or religious beliefs.
The Christian tradition implies a funeral ceremony for the dead people. Hamlet’s father did not benefit of such a ceremony after he was murdered by his brother, Claudius, who later took his throne and his wife. Nevertheless, prince Hamlet is permanently mourning him through his acts, through his perceived madness, illusory estate, and mixed thoughts: revenging ...

In “Young Goodman Brown,” Nathaniel Hawthorne introduces a strong theme of Puritan religious beliefs. His narrative vehicle for this is Satan who, throughout the story, destroys the protagonist’s faith. “Young Goodman Brown” is of the more well-known stories exploring 17th Century Puritanism and, even on a first read, it is clear why. Hawthorne depicts the chosen situation carefully and convincingly to the reader, not only entertaining them but also informing them as well. Certainly the element of this story that stands out the most dramatically is that of Satan and the means he adopts to manipulate the protagonist. Numerous strategies have ...

"Young Goodman Brown" - Symbolism

In Nathaniel Hawthorne's short story "Young Goodman Brown," the titular character is a pious, faithful man in Salem, Massachusetts who leaves his wife to run a mysterious errand out in the forest.. Along the way, he encounters many different people and situations along the way, eventually resulting in a horrific dream that shows the fallibility of humankind and the ineffectiveness of Christianity. Hawthorne tells the tale of a naive, faithful young man who begins his fall from grace and acknowledging the presence of evil in the world, especially in other people. The story is rife with symbolism, and ...

Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow Wallpaper was published in 1892. The story introduces a candid female protagonist who’s isolation from society, and from her writing, drives her insane. Written from a first person perspective, the story allows the reader to become personally involved with the narrator. Gilman uses symbolism throughout the story, two examples of which are the wallpaper and the wallpaper pattern. The story reveals interesting clues about how mental illness was treated at the time, and how women in particular were repressed by society. Through the use of a first person narrator and symbolism, Gilman ...

Classical English literature studies

Comedy – a professional entertainment consisting of jokes and satirical sketches, intended to make an audience laugh. Late Middle English (as a genre of drama, also denoting a narrative poem with a happy ending, as in Dante’s Divine Comedy): from Old French comedie, via Latin from Greek kōmōidia, from kōmōidos 'comic poet', from kōmos 'revel' + aoidos 'singer'. ("Comedy: Definition Of Comedy in Oxford Dictionary (American English)").
Aristotle defines comedy as an imitation of men, who is worse than the average, but not in their perversities, but in hilarious sense. Comedy, as a genre ...

Horror through Imagination: How do Stephen King, Edgar Allan Poe, and Shirley Jackson create suspense in their stories “Harvey’s Dream,” “The Cask of Amontillado,” and “The Lottery”

Introduction

Suspense is a literary style that is adopted by most authors to invoke the creative minds of the audience. Therefore, the authors intentionally fail to draw a conclusion to an event in a story, but instead live it upon the audience to think. On the other hand, mystery is an occurrence that is beyond human understanding, and in most cases it is associated with murder. This essay is anchored on these ...

The short story under consideration presents the third-person narration, which allows the author for creating a special atmosphere and involving the reader into the actions. Eudora Welty switches from description of the surroundings to the main character’s thoughts and speech. It facilitates conveying the meaning of the story, which is obviously associated with love and sacrifice. Through the story, Eudora Welty demonstrates how love can make people overcome obstacles and even sacrifice something for the sake of the beloved.
The story was first published in 1941 which is a relevant piece of information, since the main character of ...

Plot:

The story begins with families gathering in the center of town; children are piling up rocks and women are catching up on gossip. The town is preparing for a lottery, and Mr. Summers is making sure everything is in order, including the black box and slips with different family’s names on them. While people begin to get pull tickets from the box for the lottery, a couple guys talk about how other towns are doing away with the lottery, and whether their town should or not. Bill Hutchinson’s wife Tessie draws the “winning ticket”. What she wins ...

Valentine by Carol Ann Duffy

Valentine by Carol Ann Duffy is a freeverse poem written in the first person. The voice seems to be that of the poet, speaking to her lover. However, the poem is universal in that the ‘I’ and the ‘you’ characters featured could be of either sex.
On the surface, the poem is about the presentation of an unusual gift on St. Valentine's Day. However, the deeper level explores the love between two individuals. Valentine uses the onion as a strong central image and metaphor for love. This concept is then expanded on throughout the poem.
Duffy uses the poem’s ...

[Interpretive Question: Why does Adrienne Rich enjoy her moments with her lover when she seems to be against the practice of cohabitation?]
Adrienne Rich’s poem, “Living in Sin”, explores her viewpoints regarding cohabitation, or the mutual decision between lovers to share a single house even if they are not yet married. This poem is not only romance-based, but also suggests implications on the problems concerning cohabitation and having sex outside of marriage, more particularly from the side of a female lover. These conflicts involve the poet’s belief on society’s discrimination against cohabitation, her own sense of moral ...

Background and Setting

“Trifles” is a one-act play written by Susan Glaspell in 1916. Glaspell brought base for her play from a real murder story of a former John Hossack, the case that she had covered when she was a journalist with Des Moines Daily News Paper. In that case, the victim’s wife, Mrs. Margaret, was suspected as a murderer. Based on this story, she built a story for her one-act play, “Trifles.” The action of the play revolves around a murder of a farmer Mr. John Wright. Someone put him to death by strangling him by a rope. His wife was sleeping next to him when he was murdered, ...

The novel At Fault, published in 1890, brought its author, Kate Chopin, a great deal of attention and appreciation from critics, especially for the impressive realism with which she built her characters. Some were extremely powerful and bold, too bold for that time, like the protagonist, and others were very straightforward, uniquely American, like the half-black half-Native American, half-black Joçint.
The mythical and historical association of Native Americans to nature is livelier than ever in Chopin's character, who has no desire of following the path set for him by his father and is drawn to the woods. He ...

Throughout Clarice Lispector’s novella, The Hour of the Star, colors and sounds are used to convey a feeling or message. The story is a very sad story about a young misfortunate girl from North-east Brazil who is suffering from tuberculosis. The story is told through the perspective of a male writer who is struggling with the young girl’s suffering. Lispector used an array of colors and sounds to entice emotion from the reader. This use of colors and sounds were both well-developed elements in the book, and these elements will be discussed throughout this essay.
The primary sound “bang” was ...

Introduction

The poem “To be of use” by Mercy Piercy had the theme of hard work. The idea that the poet conveyed was premised on how people should work hard because it is rewarding and satisfying. The poem talks about the sacrifice that people make so that there is food and that people remain happy. Those who work hard have a tendency of being loved and please everybody because they notice the void that would be present if the work is not done. They then enjoy the benefits of their sweat, and the poem observes that it is a good feeling. Moreover, ...

The novel A Good Man is Hard to Find written by Flannery O’Connor tells a story about a family that is going out on vacation. The story uses a couple of literary aesthetics to tell the story. One theme that stands out is his evident use of religion, and Christianity for that matter. Through the Grandmother and the misfit, one gets to see how a Christ- like incarnation and the grace of God are brought out. There is recognition of divine powers in the story but then one is not mislead when looking at the Misfit as an anti- Christ figure. Nevertheless, ...

- Introduction
Return on investments (ROI) is one of the most crucial calculations that organizations’ management need to make as a way of ensuring that their businesses have a long-term viability. Thus, it is becoming crucial for businesses not only to identify their operations profitability but also to measure the efficiency of their investments in providing a return. However, the metric’s application varies with different business types, and that forms the objective of this study in establishing the various ROI standards that are applied by companies with a focus on the service oriented businesses. (Vinci, 2010) In that respect, the analysis ...

Presentation and Analysis of two literary works – Reflections on the way both literary works ‘The Road not Taken’ and ‘A Worn Path’ representing different writing kinds, a poem and a short story respectively, approach the same thematic core, the one of a Journey’s Symbolism – Comparison and contrast of both works in terms of their context, writing style, underlying meaning
[The author’s name]

Abstract

This paper will present you with a comparison and contrast of two literary works. Both the literary works which have been chosen, belong to the same theme, the one of a journey’s symbolism. The first work which will ...

Joseph Conrad and William Faulkner are two of the most prominent writers of the modern literary era. In fact in an event held in the year 1957 at the Virginia University, Faulkner openly stated that his works were influenced by Conrad’s writing style. Faulkner have rated ‘ A Heart of Darkness’ as one of his favorite books, and reportedly when he travelled through Kent he remarked to his mother about the serenity of the place, and commented that ‘ no wonder Conrad writes such fine books from here’. Such was the admiration he carried for Conrad. Both of them wrote ...

“When we read Dickenswe are reading all sorts of other things at the same time—plot, character, moral dilemma, historical predicament, and so forth—but we can see all these in their full complexity only if we attend to the illuminating play of style” (Alter 1996). Indeed, Charles Dickens is a master of style and a versatile genius. He weaves magic with his words that takes the readers into a rapturous world of imagination. The power of his words and imagination manifested in his depiction of simple stories and building of characters make him one of the most popular English novelists of ...

This paper entails an anthology of three poems. These poems include Langston Hughes’s Poem As I grew older, Shakespeare’s Sonnet #4, and Emily Dickinson’s "Nature" is what we see. These three poems are crafted by poets with great experience about life and nature. The overarching message that is presented in these three poems is that life is difficult and has numerous challenges. Every opportunity that comes our ways should be exploited to its fullest. Our lives should be simple so that we can sustainably protect resources for future generations.
The rationale of this anthology is ...

‘Light in August’: Alienation, Violence and Permanence in Faulkner’s South

William Faulkner’s Light in August is a story rich in typically Southern themes told in a new literary style. Faulkner’s literary consciousness had its roots in the storytelling tradition of the Old South and yet expressed a 20th century sensibility. Light in August stands as one of Faulkner’s greatest achievements because it evokes the impact of history on the present, a common theme in his fiction, and examines the duality of human nature. Faulkner’s great genius lay in his ability to blend a Modernist style of writing with a natural feel for Southern storytelling. The result, as with Light in August, ...

Langston Hughes short story “On The Road” is about a black man who travels across the country on railways. He arrives by freight train and begins to look around for fold and shelter, by finding none finds himself going from door to door. This is one of the constant symbols in Hughes story, doors. Doors represent in this story the greater powers that be that prevent the speaker, Sargeant from attaining his freedoms society keeps him from having. The story was written at the time when the civil rights movement was heating up, and the doors that prevent Sargeant from ...

On first reading William Blake’s poem, “The Tyger,” it appears to be a simple poem about the giant cat, the tiger. The first clue that this poem is about more than just a tiger is that it is full of questions. “What immortal hand or eye/ Could frame thy fearful symmetry?” asks Blake at both the beginning and the end of the poem (3-4, 23-24). The tiger, as Blake describes it, is full of “fire,” has “dread feet,” and a “dread grasp” (6, 8, 12, 15). It is a fearsome animal.

The most important questions in the poem are, “Did he smile ...

In Ann Beattie’s “Janus,” Andrea, a talented real estate agent, experiences a great deal of anxiety and unhappiness, despite her success. This success seems to be entirely dependent on the strategic placement of a bowl within the home she is selling. This bowl is inextricably tied to Andrea’s life and her sense of fulfillment – always empty and perpetually plain. Like Andrea, the bowl is “a mutt who has no reason to suspect he might be funny” (Beattie, p. 64).

These issues are related to her marriage; despite having a husband, Andrea has a lover, from whom she got the bowl; she tries to ...