In a writers essay, one can cover a specific piece of literature or the entire creation of a given writer. In such essays, students identify themes, motifs, symbols, key messages, stylistic devices, describe or compare characters, their traits and personal conflicts, reveal personal reactions, their interpretation and attitude towards the ...Read More
In a writers essay, one can cover a specific piece of literature or the entire creation of a given writer. In such essays, students identify themes, motifs, symbols, key messages, stylistic devices, describe or compare characters, their traits and personal conflicts, reveal personal reactions, their interpretation and attitude towards the written piece. When focusing on the entire creation of chosen writers, the typical characteristics of their style are uncovered along with the unique and original elements that set it apart. Additionally, the sources of inspiration, the influences, the evolution in time are analyzed. Review the essay samples below on certain writers and their works – pay attention to the topics, content organization, approaches to writing, etc.
Emily Dickinson uses the power of metaphor and symbolism in her poem "My Life had stood-" to express the way she felt about herself as a poet in a time when women were allowed far less independent thought and freedom of expression; she gives her...
Emily Dickinson’s poem, “My Life Had Stood – A Loaded Gun,” explores grim themes found behind the romanticized perception of love. In the beginning of the work, Dickinson shows the headstrong and volatile nature of the speaker. A man chooses this woman and accompanies her...
Emily Dickinson never became a member of the church although she lived in a typical New England Puritan community all her life. The well-known lines, “Some – keep the Sabbath – going to church – / I – keep it – staying at Home -”...
Emily Dickinson’s poetry covers a broad range of topics, including poetic vision, love, nature, prayer, death, God, Christ, and immortality. There is a unity in her poetry, however, in that it focuses primarily on religion. Full of contradictions and varying moods and perspectives, her poems...
Introduction Among different topics appearing in literary texts, death is one aspect that many writers will address. For ages, death has been portrayed as an ultimate bad character which is evil, disastrous but sadly inevitable. However in the poem “Because I Could Not Stop for...
To Emily Dickinson, a keen botanist, nature was a beautiful mystery, and throughout her life spent vast amount of time among plants, yet never felt connected to the natural world. Her writing reflects this lack of connection, and the inability to penetrate nature, when describing...
With a few straight lines, perhaps a dot, and an occasional squiggle, Word is born. Despite its humble beginnings, Word holds the possibility of greatness: the ability to cause war, to make peace, to express love, to describe fear. While many others are easily accessible,...
Over the past few decades, a considerable number of comments have been made on the idea of eternity in Emily Dickinson’s poetry. The following are several examples: Robert Weisbuch’s Emily Dickinson’s Poetry (1975), Jane Donahue Eberwein’s Dickinson: Strategies of Limitation (1985), Dorothy Huff Oberhaus’ Emily...
Aristotle’s passage Poetics (350 BC) was written the century after the composition of Sophocles Oedipus the King (428 BC). Despite their chronological separation, the two texts relate in incisive ways. In particular, Aristotle used Oedipus as the foundation for his explanation theory. For Aristotle, a...
Considered by many as the greatest of classic Greek tragedies, Oedipus the King (“Oedipus Tyrannus”) by Sophocles is set in the remoteness of ancient Greece and has come down to us in the form of a tragic myth allegedly inspired by true events and actual...
In his comedies, Shakespeare critically examines the nature of female and male friendships as they relate to sexual desire. Specifically, Shakespeare contrasts the strong, faithful bonds of female sisterhood with the chaotic, contentious character of male rivalries. Without men, the women of Shakespeare’s comedies are...
As critic Ronald Miller so eloquently declared, “The complex and subtle intellectuality of Shakespeare’s comic art was never better illustrated than by A Midsummer Night’s Dream and, in particular, by Shakespeare’s employment of the fairies in that play” (Miller 486). It may be added that...
William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is a journey through the three phases of a Shakespearean festive comedy. The audience is taken from unhappiness to confusion to finally reunion. Anything is possible in this story and the reader must engage in verisimilitude in order to...
When James Joyce was a teenager, a friend asked him if he had ever been in love. He answered, “How would I write the most perfect love songs of our time if I were in love – A poet must always write about a past...
The success of the narrative arc of both Sophocles’ tragedy Antigone and Shakespeare’s comedy A Midsummer Night’s Dream heavily rely on character interactions with the natural world. In each play respectively, the protagonists must purpose and negotiate elements of nature to achieve their particular objective....
Considered one of William Shakespeare’s greatest plays, A Midsummer Nights Dream reads like a fantastical, imaginative tale; however, its poetic lines contain a message of love, reality, and chance that are not usually present in works of such kind. All characters in the play are...
What motivates Puck in A Midsummer Night’s Dream? Also known as Robin Goodfellow, the spirit Puck is based on legend contemporary to Shakespeare (OED). His origins are as curious as his character: the Oxford English Dictionary traces the origin of Puck to “the pouke… commonly...
In Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, it is during Act IV that the four “lovers” awaken along the boundary of the woods in which they spent the prior evening and attempt to explain and understand the previous night’s happenings. This particular moment in the play...
In Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the concept of love and relationships are certainly at the forefront of the play. However, if one delves a bit further into the story, elements such as violence, death, and pain, which all strongly contrast with love, exist in...