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Relationship of literature and society essay
Relationship of literature and society essay
Literature And Society
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How does Kate Grenville express the theme of conflict in her novel ‘The Secret River’? The theme of conflict is manifested in a variety of forms through different characters and groups. Grenville illustrates inner conflict particularly through the protagonist, William Thornhill. In part one, ‘London’, Grenville exhibits Thornhill’s conflict with his sense of belonging and identity through the line ‘He was still only sixteen, and no one in his family had ever gone so far’. Restricted by his social position, Thornhill struggled to see how he could escape and climb out of the squalor of Southwark. Thornhill was so terrified of remaining locked up in the chains of poverty that ‘he swore to himself that he would be the best apprentice… that when freed in seven years he would be the most diligent waterman on the whole of the Thames’. Grenville expresses …show more content…
In part one ‘London’ when William is ferrying the supercilious gentry, whom he had a strong sense of ‘hatred’ for, back and forth the river Thames, a women exposes the bottom of her leg sensually teasing William. The surge of anger he feels as the ineffectual man flaunts his wife, shows the rigid class system that condemns William to a life of poverty and backbreaking labour. Furthermore the dichotomy between upper class and lower class is evident through Thornhill’s boss Lucas when ‘Thornhill squints up into the brightness where Lucas looked down upon him’. Although, Thornhill might’ve felt a sense of power and superiority when he was assigned convicts Ned and Dan because he has people working for him and consequentially is now on the ascent up the social order, Captain Suckling’s treatment of him, as ‘he shooed Thornhill away with both hands as if he were a dog’ enforced that Thornhill would always be the felon from England many years ago regardless of his present
First, the author uses conflict to show what the characters have to overcome throughout the course of the story, such as Mrs. Baker forcing Holling to do chores at school and
"Eventually the watcher joined the river, and there was only one of us. I believe it was the river." The river that Norman Maclean speaks of in A River Runs Through It works as a connection, a tie, holding together the relationships between Norman and his acquaintances in this remote society. Though "It" is never outwardly defined in the novella there is definite evidence "It" is the personality of the people and that the river is running through each individual personality acting as the simple thread connecting this diverse group of people.
... when the grocery store owner called him a thief William began to lose faith in the system. After that there was the Nazi surplus store owner who thought the two were so much alike, the restaurant that wouldn’t give him breakfast because he was three minutes late, the plastic surgeon that made abundantly more money than he made saving people’s lives, and the highway construction that was a result of greed and not necessity.
Firstly let us consider conflict. In each act of the play, we see the overpowering desire to belong leading to a climax of conflict amongst the characters, which has the consequence of exclusion. Conflict is a successful literary technique, as it engages the audience and focuses our attention on the issue of conflict and exclusion, brought about by the characters’ desires to be accepted by their community.
One of the strongest of these critics is George Brimley, who, in his article entitled “Dickens’s Bleak House” published in The Spectator in 1853, writes that “Bleak House is, even more than its predecessors, chargeable with not simple faults, but absolute want of construction”(161). He finds that the structure of Bleak House fails because there is no connection between actors and incidents. Brimley points to the interest of Richard Carstone in the Chancery case. The case only serves to draw out Carstone’s personality faults that would have been drawn out in any other interest he may have had. The Chancery case, then, is trivial for it fails to exert any real impact on the characters...
Mr. Rochester, St. John Rivers, and Jane Eyre are all marked by their internal struggle between succumbing to feelings and relying on sound judgment. Each character approaches the issue differently, as Mr. Rochester follows his feelings, St. John acts only on judgment, and Jane tries to find a healthy and harmonious blend. In this way the struggle between feelings and judgment is contrasted and highlighted by each character's differences.
Characters in D.H. Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover struggle to escape the inescapable confines of money, class, and power.
The physical and social setting in "Mrs. Dalloway" sets the mood for the novel's principal theme: the theme of social oppression. Social oppression was shown in two ways: the oppression of women as English society returned to its traditional norms and customs after the war, and the oppression of the hard realities of life, "concealing" these realities with the elegance of English society. This paper discusses the purpose of the city in mirroring the theme of social oppression, focusing on issues of gender oppression, particularly against women, and the oppression of poverty and class discrimination between London's peasants and the elite class.
George Orwell once said, “[p]olitical language . . . is designed to make lies sound truthful and murders respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to a pure wind.” (1) This phenomenon describes the Victorian court system fairly accurately. Thus, it is unsurprising that in Bleak House, Dickens chooses to satirize this practice through his own usage of language. In Bleak House, Dickens provides a social criticism of the Victorian court system through the Chancery Court with his use of language surrounding it.
The presentation of childhood is a theme that runs through two generations with the novel beginning to reveal the childhood of Catherine and Hindley Earnshaw, and with the arrival of the young Liverpudlian orphan, Heathcliff. In chapter four, Brontë presents Heathcliff’s bulling and abuse at the hands of Hindley as he grows increasingly jealous of Heathcliff for Mr. Earnshaw, his father, has favoured Heathcliff over his own son, “my arm, which is black to the shoulder” the pejorative modifier ‘black’ portrays dark and gothic associations but also shows the extent of the abuse that Heathcliff as a child suffered from his adopted brother. It is this abuse in childhood that shapes Heathcliff’s attitudes towards Hindley and his sadistic nature, as seen in chapter 17, “in rousing his rage a pitch above his malignity” there is hyperbole and melodrama as the cruelty that stemmed from his abuse in childhood has been passed onto Isabella in adulthood.
Although the shame in being beguiled by Darcy’s fortune forces the townspeople to resort to prejudice towards Darcy’s character, Darcy makes no effort to prove himself otherwise. In fact, his “manners gave a disgust, which turned the tide of his popularity” (7). Apparently, the towns people have the propensity to judge those who are higher in class but show arrogance; thus, it is necessary for Darcy to change his attitude, otherwise he is condemned to constant prejudices against him.
Wilde’s strategically uses each of the characters to represent the manner in which those, who were in the upper class, would behave. As the play begins we are instantly battered with the satirically condemning wit that is Oscar Wilde. Algernon requests his servant, Lane, to produce the cucumber sandwiches for the arrival of Lady Bracknell. Lane and Algernon have idle chatter and end up on the subject of marriage. After Lane exits the room and Jack insists, “Lane’s views on marriage seem somewhat lax. Really, if the lower orders don’t set us a good example, what on earth is the use of them? They seem, as a class, to have absolutely no sense of moral responsibility”. This is Wilde’s analysis on the absurdity of the upper class and also gives us an improved view of the character Algernon. Algernon is a constituent of the affluent. He assumes less responsibility than his counterpart Jack,...
Mrs and Miss Bates are genteel people and of genteel birth. They are well educated and well spoken and readily invited into the Woodhouse circle. This high class is illustrated at Boxhill during Mr Knightley’s vehement reprimand of Emma’s cutting remark: ‘she has seen you grow up from a period when her notice of you was an honour.’ Of course, they have since slipped in monetary value, but retain their social position nonetheless. Mrs. Elton has the money, but not the connections or character to be considered genteel. Her marriage to a vicar as Mr Elton has raised her a class, but she has clearly not had the breeding to be comfortable in such high society, as she shows by continually dropping Maple Grove into conversations, and justifying her talents: ‘well, my friends say…’ Harriet Smith obviously is not genteel by birth, being the ‘natural daughter of somebody’ but Emma invents her parentage for the sake of the love games. The original modesty and humility that Harriet enjoys are accentuated and extended under the careful care of Emma. Th...
While she is buying flowers for her party, Mrs. Dalloway has an existential crisis regarding the meaning of life and the inevitability of death. She reflects on the atmosphere of the London streets and her old suitor Peter Walsh as she reads some lines from Shakespeare’s Cymbeline. Mrs. Dalloway’s existential crisis demonstrates situational irony since the concept of life and death is quite deep and complex, yet she seems to live a shallow life consisting of throwing parties and picking which flowers to buy. Although she is contemplating her own mortality, Woolf’s word choice, such as “consoling,” suggests that death is positive and liberating, applying a light tone to a dark situation, adding to the irony. Mrs. Dalloway describes the trees,
There are many major themes of the book, but revenge is the most imminent theme, the factor that leads the protagonists to their dismal fate. Bronte proves there is no peace in eternal vengeance, and in the end self-injury involved in serving revenge’s purposes will be more damaging than the original wrong.