Essays on Poems

723

The Power of Voice in "My Last Duchess"

3 pages / 1747 words

“My Last Duchess” by Robert Browning is a Victorian poem that demonstrates the power of voice. This poem is narrated by the Duke of Ferrara who uses his voice to gain control of those around him. He even speaks for his deceased wife, only explaining...

My Last Duchess Robert Browning Voice

724

Exploring Love and Its Corruption: My Last Duchess, Andrea Del Sarto & Two in The Campagna

2 pages / 1059 words

In both My Last Duchess and Andrea del Sarto, Robert Browning explores the notions of love and its capacity to corrupt an individual’s character and potential through his signature diegetic form; the dramatic monologue. While the form of these two poems is based around an...

My Last Duchess Poetry Robert Browning

725

An Old Regret: Analyzing "Those Winter Sundays

1 page / 755 words

Robert Hayden described the relationship between his father and younger self in his poem “Those Winter Sundays.” Robert Hayden grew up in a poor neighborhood in Detroit, Michigan. Since his parents left him with family friends, he grew up with that family and didn’t know...

Poetry Those Winter Sundays

726

"Her Darling One Wish Would Be Heard": How Dramatic Monologue Illustrates Distorted Rationality in "Porphyria’s Lover" and "My Last Duchess"

2 pages / 970 words

Of the consequences of maintaining an obsessive nature, its ability to cloud rational judgements and encourage humanity to surrender to his darkest, innermost impulses serves as one of its most tragic aspects. Robert Browning explores this concept through his poems “Porphyria’s Lover” and “My Last...

My Last Duchess Poetry Robert Browning

727

The Theme of Recognition in Oedipus The King and The Odyssey

3 pages / 1205 words

The theme of recognition plays an important role in Homer’s The Odyssey and Sophocles’ Oedipus the King. Two key recognition scenes are that between Odysseus and Penelope and that between Oedipus and Jocasta. Many differences can be found between the two, and although they are...

Oedipus Rex Sophocles The Odyssey

728

Body Language: Injury and Identity in The Odyssey and Oedipus The King

2 pages / 883 words

In describing the characters of Odysseus and Oedipus, Homer and Sophocles both avoid defining these men by typical physical characteristics such as stature or distinctive facial features. Instead, these authors focus on detailing specific bodily wounds that function as embodiments of each character’s identity. Parallel...

Oedipus Rex Sophocles The Odyssey

729

Courage in The Face of Adversity in The Odyssey, The Epic of Gilgamesh, and The Winter's Tale

3 pages / 1469 words

From the substantial body of work that has been examined in-depth during the course, one particular theme that has arisen several times is that of ‘courage in the face of adversity’, such that major characters are confronted with tremendous hurdles that they are expected, and...

The Odyssey

730

Characteristics of Two of The Most Known Heroes in Literature: Beowulf and Roland

1 page / 1557 words

Beowulf and Roland are two of the most well-known heroes found within literature. While many know their names and their stories few realize what it is that qualifies them as literary heroes and the ways in which their hero stories compare. Joseph Campbell in his...

Beowulf The Song of Roland

731

A Synopsis of The Foundation Text of English Literature, Titled Beowulf

1 page / 2037 words

The foundation text of English literature, titled Beowulf (meaning “man wolf” when translated into the modern language), presents readers with a hero named Beowulf who fights three different battles, each with its own monster. Beowulf’s first battle awaits him when he travels to present day...

Beowulf Joseph Campbell

732

Bassani’s The Garden of The Finzi-continis: How Glass Captures and Protects The Beauty of The Past

1 page / 1585 words

Giorgio Bassani’s novel The Garden of the Finzi-Continis is told from the perspective of an unnamed speaker who is recalling his time spent with the Finzi-Contini family prior to the family members’ deaths in the Holocaust. This is an Edenic time, and one that the...

Garden Holocaust The Glass

733

Idea of Justice Deletes The Revegeful Thoughts

1 page / 871 words

The Iliad and The Odyssey portray a hierarchical, stringently ordered society, ruled by powerful kings, followed by the masses and sanctioned by the gods. At the murder of Agamemnon, a complete breakdown of the Greek social, governmental, and religious systems occurs, throwing Greek civilization into...

Justice Literature Review The Odyssey

734

"Homegoing" and "The Odyssey": Hope Towards Coming Back

4 pages / 1785 words

In her debut novel Homegoing, Yaa Gyasi explores the concept of a home as a function of both family and community: if specific characters are to truly establish a sense of belonging within a region, they must have not only the support of a powerful...

The Odyssey

735

The Role of Women in Medieval Literature

4 pages / 1636 words

Perhaps William Shakespeare is right: all the world may very well be a stage, with all the men and women being but mere players. What happens when, despite their exits and entrances, these actors play but one part? For lack of a complete character development,...

Geoffrey Chaucer Sir Gawain and The Green Knight The Canterbury Tales

736

Representation of Female Characters in Medieval Romances

4 pages / 1949 words

The manner in which amorphous female identities overlap and echo each other in Gawain and the Green Knight, The Wife of Bath’s Tale and La Morte D’Arthur may appear to represent the ambiguity of distinguishable female personalities in romances beyond their status as ideological representations...

Le Morte d’Arthur Sir Gawain and The Green Knight Wife of Bath

737

Christian Obligation and Religious Uncertainty in The Song of Roland and The Canterbury Tales

6 pages / 2957 words

The Middle Ages were marked by religious upheaval in Europe. Two new major world religions were coming to power: Islam and Christianity. The rapid success of Christianity led the Roman Catholic Church to become the dominant religious force in most of the western world, and...

Geoffrey Chaucer The Canterbury Tales The Song of Roland

738

The Seafarer: How to Preserve The Initial Sense While Translating

4 pages / 1825 words

Beginning at the time of early settlements in the 5th century and spanning until 1150 A.D., the English language and that spoken and written by the Anglo-Saxons during this time is referred to as Old English or simply, Anglo-Saxon. The influence of Christianity on Anglo-Saxon...

Poetry The Seafarer

739

Final Analysis of The Wanderer

6 pages / 2560 words

The Wanderer is a poem that laments both the temporality of human life and the material world, posing existential questions that only appear to be answered in the comparatively short conclusion though appeal to the Christian God. In part because of this structural oddity, critical...

Poetry The Wanderer

740

"Ulysses" and "The Seafarer": Erasing The Edge Between Life and Fiction

4 pages / 1650 words

Both Lord Alfred Tennyson’s dramatic monologue, “Ulysses,” and Ezra Pound’s 1912 translation of the Old English dramatic monologue “The Seafarer” depict a man’s musings about seaward journeys. Tennyson wrote “Ulysses” in the wake of his best friend Arthur Henry Hallam’s death. “The Seafarer” has traditionally...

Poetry The Seafarer Ulysses

741

Depicting The Time Gone by in The Seafarer and The Wanderer

5 pages / 2072 words

The poems The Seafarer and The Wanderer are both elegiac in nature: each speaker delivers a reflective monologue about their journey from the past they have lost to the solitary present they face, although there are limitations to the past’s disappearance, as it clearly lingers...

Poetry The Seafarer The Wanderer