Richard Wright is one of the most prolific African American literary minds of the 20th century. Wright’s literature uniquely blends aspects of naturalism and idealism to convey important messages concerning the era’s social climate. Wright, who grew up in the south during the early 20th...
Colorism is defined as a form of prejudice typically from members of the same race in which people are treated based on their social economic status from cultural implications related to skin color. Within the idea of “race”, various groups of people compete with one...
Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring is regarded as one of the seminal works in environmental science literature. First published in 1962, the book was highly influential in launching the nascent environmental movement in the United States and throughout the world. In Silent Spring, Carson examines the...
Introducing Saul Bellow was a Canadian-American writer of Jewish origin who wrote about the disorienting nature of modern civilization, and the countervailing ability of humans to overcome their frailty and achieve greatness. Bellow interspersed autobiographical elements into his fiction, and many of his principal characters...
The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man by James Weldon Johnson divulges aspects of passing by a “mulatto” man that no other novel had confronted before. Though most novels during the time were treated by the author in a straightforward manner, Johnson undoubtedly strays away from...
The Dawn of Life and the Dusk of Death Every living thing on this planet are guaranteed two things: life and death. The duration of one is dependent on their fate and the date of their conclusion is undisclosed; the gift of one will eventually...
Character List Mick Kelly: A young girl who is always in her own world, constantly thinking about music and wanting to go to a different country. She lives in the same house as Singer, and many other characters. She is tall and thin with blonde...
“Ah, don’t say that. If you knew how I hate to be different!” (Wharton 69). Ellen Olenska in Edith Wharton’s Age of Innocence is, to Newland Archer, the perfect example of an exciting rebel to the mores of society in the New York aristocracy. He...
John Steinbeck’s novels The Grapes of Wrath and Of Mice and Men enable readers to capture a glimpse of the time of the Great Depression in the United States. In The Grapes of Wrath, the Joad family of Oklahoma, accompanied by thousands of other farming...
The first colony in North America was founded in 1607, Jamestown, Virginia. Many Europeans who settled down in this new colony were mainly trying to escape religious persecution. The pilgrims of the mayflower arrived at the place they were not aiming for but instead found...
There is much literature on the subject of World War II. Catch-22 by Joseph Steller, published in 1961, expressively describes this nerve-racking, gruesome, and turbulent era. The story is centered around a paranoid and homesick Yossarian who is fed up with his military career as...
In the book A Prayer for Owen Meany, there are many different characters that were appeared in the story. All of those characters have a very strong characteristic, and had a lot of thoughts on different things, and had their own ideas. Although not every...
Edmund Burke once said, “The greater the power, the more dangerous the abuse.” In today’s society, power is taken and used in manipulative ways by prominent people in the public eye. We see celebrities pay their way out of punishments all the time. Julian Hayden...
American popular culture pervades not only America itself, but many other cultures as well, and it says so much about the people and society as a whole that it attempts to define. American Indians are a group not usually connected with the network of popular...
W. E. B. Du Bois, in The Souls of Black Folk, seems to be speaking for a raceless society where the quality of one’s character was the sole basis for being judged. Yet this is not what Du Bois saw in his day and it...
In the novel Member of the Wedding, by Carson McCullers, the story of young Frankie Addams is told as she begins to navigate the world, documenting from her perspective, her exposure to harsh reality of the world as she begins to develop into a young...
“The Lesson” by Toni Cade Bambara, is a short story about a girl who is learning about the economic inequality that exists through her teacher, Miss Moore, who tries to challenge her cynical perspective on life. This story emphasises the main character, Sylvia’s, intense need...
There are different ways in which authors write their stories in which makes it easier for the readers to imagine. In A Clean, Well-Lighted Place, by Ernest Hemingway, the setting is a cafe somewhere in a Spanish country where two waiters waited for an old...
I’ve read quite a few books in my lifetime. There were a few I’ve loved, there were even a few I’ve absolutely hated. I can honestly say I’ve read more books that I hated than I actually write, mostly because reading just isn’t my absolute...
Each year, hundreds of people from Central America decide to migrate on a dangerous journey through Mexico to the United States. Every migrant who decides to travel to the United States goes knowing their life is at risk. They make this their journey hoping to...
In Raymond Carver’s short story “Beginners,” the use of alcohol is the most apparent and important image and helps show the characters’ true feelings about their love life. Through the characters’ consumption of alcohol, we are able to see their eventual confusion and simplification of...
Nourishment as a Symbol in The Grapes Of Wrath In The Grapes of Wrath, families traveling to California suffer starvation and exhaustion because of malnourishment. The Dust Bowl is a physical embodiment of their starvation. Possibly more important than the physical nourishment is the mental...
What if death was painless to bear? What if people never cared whether they lived or died? For protagonist Susie in The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold she struggles with her unexpected and unfortunate murder as she seeks closure and euphoria. King Hamlet in Hamlet...
In historian Paul E. Johnson’s Sam Patch, The Famous Jumper, the period is after the Revolution in America. The story starts in Pawtucket, Rhode Island with the main character being the famous Sam Patch who jumped off the Niagara Falls twice. The book guides us...
“The Scarlet Ibis” which is a short story by James Hurst and the movie, Simon Birch by Mark Steven Johnson are stories about two boys that are born with heart problems and have to face adversity. Simon Birch is a story about a boy who...
The American dream has been portrayed as something that can be accomplished by anyone in order to gain success in America regardless of race, skin tone, and cultural background as long as they have the ambition to acquire that success. What is not made public...
In a society, there are often multiple unspoken rules that members must adhere to in order to fit in. When an individual begins to deviate from these rules, it may be difficult to understand why. In the novel The Age of Innocence, the aristocratic Newland...
The 19th century was a time of great development, especially so in the realm of knowledge and representation of disability in literature. Although physical disabilities receive the majority of the attention, mental illness does appear in many works even though it may not be openly...
In Walt Witman’s “Leaves of Grass” section 32, he speaks of turning and living with animals. I find his work very intriguing, like reading a good novel, with loads of hidden meaning. He speaks of the animals, by saying they have no worries or emotions....
Joseph Heller’s most famous novel, Catch-22 was published on November 10, 1961. The novel was so successful the title even got a spot in the dictionary as a catchphrase. Catch-22 is a satirical war comedy that shows the times Heller had when he was in...
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