Essays on World Literature

[Assignment]

There has been a major push in the past few decades towards diversity in the literary canon, which was for a long while dominated by similar voices with similar origins. This push toward diversity has taken many forms: the integration of more female voices; the inclusion of more writers of color, regardless of their origin; and the inclusion of works of literature from non-Western cultures that have for too long been ignored. This last point has become known by the name multiculturalism, and though there is agreement throughout the academic community that this addition of previously un-acknowledged voices ...

1. What is Cheah's response to the idea that "literature seems to have little pertinence in our era of economic globalization"? Why does he think that it does (26)? Cheah argues that cosmopolitanism is defined as an activity wherein the reader must participate, and use his imagination to construct meaning. Cheah states, “World literature is an important aspect of cosmopolitanism because it is a type of world-making activity that enables us to imagine a world” (26). Thus, in spite of economic globalization, literature, to Cheah, retains its significance because it transcends national boundaries. 2. What reasons does ...

[Assignment]

For those accustomed to reading modern dramas, Kalidasa’s Sankuntala and the Ring of Recollection is both familiar and strange. In terms of format, the general arrangement of dialogue interspersed with stage directions is the same in plays from the modern era; the nature of the stage directions, which use miming actions instead of utilizing set pieces and props, seems strange to modern sensibilities, as does the prologue, which breaks the fourth wall and has the director addressing the audience directly as an introduction to the play. In the content of Sankuntala, even more is unfamiliar. This is ...

[Assignment]

The question of why a work deserves inclusion in the literary canon is especially interesting when it comes to world literature. Many of the world’s earliest texts arose out of an oral rather than a written tradition, giving them a form and tone very different than modern works considered to have literary merit. With these works, literary value is determined less by the words themselves and more by the ideas and themes that are developed and their relationship to the culture. In the case of The Epic of Gilgamesh, is inclusion in the canon is due to ...

The value of literature in human life cannot be overestimated. This kind of art is one of the most ancient and important for humankind. Though this type of art has a connection with such term as fiction, it still has quite a real basis. Literature has arisen much earlier than it was given a definition and typology. The man, who existed before the literature, had already used its main elements even earlier than ten thousand years ago, which played a very important role in the life of the whole humankind. Using the words that were written on stones, people ...

The Epic of Gilgamesh is regarded as one of the earliest extant written works and is in many ways the foundation for every story that would come after it, from the Biblical story of Noah and the flood to today’s action-adventure superheroes. The Epic of Gilgamesh tells a tale of gods and monsters, and of two heroes—King Gilgamesh and his companion, Enkidu—whose impossible feats of strength, bravery, and cunning would fit easily alongside those of figures like Perseus and Hercules. Like the myths of other well-known heroes, Gilgamesh and Enkidu undertake quests, first killing the Humbaba, ...

There can be no denial about the fact that poetry has immense power to inculcate the masses with the revolutionary thoughts that have the potential to bring out the immoralities or shortcomings of the society. The literary artists grip over the form of art to appeal to the readers of their poetry and incite their minds with the revolutionary thoughts that have the capacity to bring change in the society or the system. As such, one can look into specific texts that embody this passion of subversive attitude. The paper aims to explore the potential of the form of ...

English 64.01

A Research Proposal: Revolutionary Poetry A General Framework There can be no denial about the fact that poetry has immense power to inculcate the masses with the revolutionary thoughts that have the potential to bring out the immoralities or shortcomings of the society. The literary artists grip over the form of art to appeal to the readers of their poetry and incite their minds with the revolutionary thoughts that have the capacity to bring change in the society or the system. As such, one can look into specific texts that embody this passion of subversive attitude. Nazim Hikmet’s ...

The best recipe for a dish to be delicious is preparing it with love – Tita, the heroine of “Like Water for Chocolate” by Laura Esquivel, is sure. That is certainly the formula Esquivel resorts to creating her novel, where love is a key ingredient, and the food for thought produced by the book is savory, hot and rich. “Tita remembered that Nacha had always said that when people argue while preparing tamales, the tamales won’t get cooked. They can be heated day after day and still stay raw, because the tamales are angry. In a case like that, ...

1. Why Hedda Gabler and not Hedda Tesman? Hedda belongs to the bourgeois class of her society. Using Hedda Gabler instead of Hedda Tesman is meant to show the audience how Ibsen's main protagonist prefers to identify herself. Hedda is the daughter of a general who ends up marrying into a lower class thereby lowering her social status. However, she still wants to identify herself as an aristocrat. People in Hedda's society enjoy privileges according to their social status. Belonging to the bourgeois class means that she does not enjoy as many benefits as she would enjoy under the ...

Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s Love in the Time Cholera and Yasunari Kawabata’s Snow Country are two novels that redefined the contours of Latin American and Japanese literature. Kawabata’s writing style and magical realism went on to win him a Nobel Prize in Literature while Marquez became one of the best writers of the 20th century. In both texts by Kawabata and Marquez there is a constant struggle between tradition and modernity. Water is a significant recurring motif in Love in the Time of Cholera inasmuch as it reflects on the struggle of the main characters to balance ...

China, just as every big country, has a great number of unique traditions and customs, which are preserved by people, who live in this country. Culture includes elements, which built its identity and create a certain image. Accordingly, these elements might be as follows: food, religion, language, forms of art etc. As for the language, it is believed to be one of the most difficult languages to learn and I completely agree with it. Chinese is the only remaining pictographic language and it includes quite a number of symbols representing different notions. Cuisine is represented by a variety of ...

As suggested by the Berman, the twentieth century might be supposed as "the third and last phase" in the improvement of the condition we consider as "modernity." Though he allows that this creating world society of modernism accomplishes stupendous triumph in art and thought, there is a price to be yielded. Culture and identity, for so long perpetual from the backing to the grave, are no more assurances in the period of urban evolution, movement, industrialization, and aggregate war. As the present day open extends, it develops into a large number of segments, talking incommensurable private dialect; the idea ...

Dante's Inferno is considered an epic allegory about an individual's journey through hell. There are a total of nine circles located within the Earth that are explored by Dante Alighieri. Each encompasses the concept of death, among other subjects. Alighieri explores death as a punishment for sin. One Thousand and One Nights is a collection of stories and folk tales that offer a variety of themes and narratives. From themes such as justice to that of death, each of the stories are dramatic, suspenseful and are spread across numerous fictional genres. One key theme in the collection is death. ...

Assignment

The Norton anthology of World Literature is a book that represents continuity and also change. The material range of Norton is incredibly in terms of the place and time. Listing the sections makes the sheer vastness clear. This is from India’s classical Age, the Roman Empire towards the Christian Europe, China’s middle period, Islamic literature and the rise of Islam, the Golden Age of the Japanese culture, and the formation of Westernized literature.

The Anthology nature favors short prose and poems. The book is notable for the kind of supplemental material that is extensive. Norton tries to introduce ...