Cousin Phyllis is one of Elizabeth Gaskell’s later works and one in which she returns to the rural Cheshire of her youth. Cousin Phyllis was first published by George Smith in his Cornhill Magazine in four monthly parts from November… Read More ›
Novel Analysis
Analysis of Rudyard Kipling’s Captains Courageous
This short novel is one of the products of Rudyard Kipling’s residence in the United States from 1892 to 1896. What Kipling described as a “boy’s story” was first published in serial form in McClure’s Magazine in the United States… Read More ›
Modernism
The modernism movement has many credos: Ezra Pound’s exhortation to “make it new” and Virginia Woolf’s assertion that sometime around December 1910 “human character changed” are but two of the most famous. It is important to remember that modernism is… Read More ›
Analysis of Louise Erdrich’s Love Medicine
Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award in 1984, Love Medicine began as a short story. Its author, Louise Erdrich, in close collaboration with her husband, Michael Dorris, planned it as a novel, yet many readers view it as… Read More ›
Analysis of Margaret Atwood’s Works
It is difficult to find appropriate words to define Margaret Atwood’s (born November 18, 1939) significance in Canadian culture and literature. Atwood is a prolific writer who not only blazes a trail for contemporary Canadian writers but also helps Canadian… Read More ›
Critical Analysis of Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God
Published in 1937, Their Eyes Were Watching God is Hurston’s most widely read and discussed book, considered by many to be her masterwork. The novel, which takes place in the South, chronicles the lives of the protagonist, Janie, her three… Read More ›
Critical Analysis of Jane Austen’s Emma
SYNOPSIS Volume 1 Emma is the story of the wealthy, beautiful, spoiled only daughter of an aging widowed hypochondriac, Mr. Woodhouse. Nearly 21, she runs their large house, Hartfield, in Highbury, Surrey. The novel opens with the marriage of her… Read More ›
Critical Analysis of Sense and Sensibility
SYNOPSIS Volume 1 Old Mr. Dashwood of Norland Park in Sussex and his heir, his nephew Henry Dashwood, have died. Henry married twice. By his first marriage, he has a son, John. John and his four-year-old son, Henry, are in… Read More ›
Critical Analysis of Pride and Prejudice
“It is a truth universally acknowledged that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife” [3]. So begins Jane Austen’s arguably most enduringly successful novel—one that has been translated into at least… Read More ›
Analysis of Tolkien’s The Hobbit
The origin of The Hobbit (1937) is well known. One day in the late 1920s, Tolkien was grading essays when he came across a blank page and absently wrote the sentence “In a hole in the ground there lived a… Read More ›
The Lord of the Rings Character Analysis
Analysis of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring Analysis of The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers Analysis of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King Aragorn (Strider, Elessar) Aragorn is the… Read More ›
Analysis of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
Analysis of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring Analysis of The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers Synopsis for The Return of the King Book 5: The War of the Ring Chapters 1–3: The Brink… Read More ›
Analysis of The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
Analysis of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring Synopsis The Two Towers Book 3: The Treason of Isengard Chapters 1–2: Pursuit to Rohan In a chapter entitled “The Departure of Boromir,” book 3 begins where book… Read More ›
Analysis of The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
The Lord of the Rings is the crowning achievement of Tolkien’s literary career, and the one narrative by which he is chiefly remembered and admired. In the more than 50 years since the trilogy’s initial publication, it has been republished… Read More ›
Analysis of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four
Nineteen Eighty-Four is Orwell’s final and most famous full-length work of fiction, published in 1949. In Animal Farm, Orwell had realized his goal of making political writing an art. (Although later generations would judge that he had already achieved that… Read More ›
Analysis of Charles Dickens’s Hard Times
Dickens’s 10th novel, serialized weekly in Household Words (April 1–August 12, 1854), unillustrated. Published in one volume by Bradbury & Evans, 1854. This controversial book, the shortest of Dickens’s novels, takes up the issues of industrialism and education and offers… Read More ›
Analysis of Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations
Dickens’s 13th novel, published in 36 weekly parts in All the Year Round (December 1, 1860–August 3, 1861), unillustrated. Published in three volumes by Chapman & Hall, 1861. A Bildungsroman narrated in the first person by its hero, Great Expectations… Read More ›
Analysis of Toni Morrison’s Tar Baby
Tar Baby (1981), Morrison’s fourth novel, changes location from the geographical boundaries of the United States to the larger context of the Caribbean and Europe. In part, the novel is the story of two families, the Streets and the Childs,… Read More ›
Analysis of Toni Morrison’s Sula
Sula (1974) is Toni Morrison’s second published novel. Like The Bluest Eye, the novel is a story of two girls coming of age. As children, the two girls in question, Sula Peace and Nel Wright, function as two halves of… Read More ›
Analysis of Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon
Like Morrison’s first two novels, The Bluest Eye and Sula, Song of Solomon (1977) is a coming of age story. Unlike her first two novels, Song of Solomon centrally is the saga of a young man. In fact, Song of… Read More ›
You must be logged in to post a comment.