Critical Analysis Of Starkie

Mr Hyde is the epitome of the human unchained from the moral restraints. “Mr Hyde broke out of all bunds and clubbed him to the earth.” This powerful formulation of the phrase establishes the idea of a human transgressing all rational boundaries, violating brutally the social principles. The writer constructs him not as a man, but as a moving shadow of no reputation and as an outsider to the concept of society. The pure core that remains inside of human cloaks. A breath that reminds people of their genesis and their meaning. Intentionally Stevenson degenerates all mortal concepts of society before the mystic revelation that he achieves with his

Gary Disher’s socially provocative Australian historical drama novel The Divine Wind (1998) set in the Australian pearling town of Broome, provides a thought-provoking and contemporary outlook on racial prejudice, isolation and the loss of rights to adulthood during the onset of World War11. Disher establishes this through a range of characters of differing ages and cultural backgrounds, evoking a war-devastated Australia and its effects on young adults forced to leave their childhood behind. Written as a series of melancholic recollections, the seemingly simple novel conveys the messages of a violent history, as it explores the complexity of the relationships between racially diverse characters during the onset of WW11. The novel follows a young and ambitious Hartley Penrose who faces challenges with discovering his maturity/identity, serving as a transition from his past to his future. The Divine Wind utilizes the characters’ ideas, experiences, beliefs, and values to explore the central themes, the racial prejudice between the white race and other ethnicities, the regional and urban divide and the growing up and loss of rights to adulthood. The Divine Wind utilizes conventions and ideas from the drama genre to communicate these central themes which are still prevalent in today’s modern society.

Sassoon and Owen as poets and Barker as a novelist, explore through their works of literature the changing and challenging notions of masculinity experienced as a result of The Great War. Furthermore, all three writers suggest that the often overlooked reality of the conflict was the creation of a subversion of the stereotypical ‘heroic soldier’. Replacing this image through their work, with that of the truth, we see an exploration of the emasculated and dehumanised shell that many men truly became as a result of what they experienced in service. This extends throughout their texts, to

This inescapability of destruction with war is highlighted at the beginning of the novel, when the protagonist, Billy Prior, despite being ‘haunted by the suffering he sees,’ is determined to return to the front lines in France. Standing on a beach in`Scarborough, he is presented to the reader as a character haunted by his experience and therefore inexplicably damaged despite his current lack of physical injury. The beach itself is likened to the ‘The Front,’ highlighting Prior’s inability to escape from the war, his thoughts drifting from the scene in front of him to his memories and the realities of conflict. German snipers were told to, “Look for the thin knees”. Prior is constantly confronted by the realities of being killed or injured upon returning to the front and yet is still determined to go, suggesting either that war is about power rather than war itself and that man who fight in war so entranced by the power available that they do not wish to stay away, or that the young men are so changed by the war that they are incapable of living a mundane life afterwards.

The year is 1984, Winston Smith, the story’s desolate protagonist, resides in a totalitarian dystopia of London, which is known only as Oceania by it’s gloomy inhabitants. Throughout George Orwell’s 1984, a battle for sense of individuality is the focal conflict for Winston. Over the course of the novel, Winston will undergo trials and tests to his underdeveloped strength of self and individuality. Orwell displays the primitive nature of self betrayal through such conflict, which results in completely altering Winston’s principal desires. The characters of 1984 experience varying levels of betrayal, ranging from mere acquaintances to intimate relationship treachery. Orwell stresses the ease of betraying oneself while crafting an appeal of betraying others.

Winston’s role in George Orwell’s novel, 1984, is not solely that of our protagonist, but of a tragic hero as well. Winton’s story is not unusual, but that of a tragic hero. Not only does Winston possess the typical path of a tragic hero, but he possesses a tragic flaw as well. 1984 shows the rise and fall of an ordinary man named Winston in a the dystopian and totalitarian future of Oceania.

Insecurity runs rampant through the men in The Sun Also Rises. Those who fought in World War I have been emasculated either physically or mentally, while non-veterans also feel a sense of inadequacy. Robert Cohn, the sole Jewish and non-veteran character, is the frequent target of scorn from a group of men who have all been to war together and share similar values. His belief of love and honor representing pre-war ideals is looked down upon by others. Cohn is secluded because he does not fulfill the role of an ideal man; yet, neither does anybody in the central group. Cohn puts on a masculine façade to cover up his internal issues just like the other men of the novel, but only he is criticized for being weak. Thus, Robert Cohn personifies the shortcomings of non-archetypal men, demonstrating the irony of his alienation amidst similarly unmanly characters.

Virginia Woolf, in 1929, described Mary Wollstonecraft’s remarkable “form of immortality” through the memorable conceit that “she is alive and ac-tive, she argues and experiments, we hear her voice and trace her influence even now among the living.”1 A strong sense of unfinished business hovers about Wollstonecraft’s legacy – the effects of a life cut short and a political agenda not yet met, but also of something less straightforward, emanating from the combined – but disjunctive – force of her life and work as well as yoked with the seductive fiction that revolution and romance have some natural and dangerously volatile affinity. For “even now,” at the beginning of the twenty-first century, Woolf’s perception of an embodied, social and affective

The most powerful texts often introduce unfamiliar concepts to intrigue and even shock the reader. The novel ‘Beasts of No Nation’ by Uzodinma Iweala (2005) and the television drama ‘Blue Remembered Hills’ by Dennis Potter (1979) are no exceptions. The former portrays the account of a child soldier in an unnamed war-torn African country, whilst the latter depicts a day in the life of seven children in the West Country during World War Two. Through these characters and events Iweala and Potter explore aspects of human nature, war and childhood. But above all, emphasis is placed on the revealing of truth,

The book is narrated directly to the reader as a sort of historical memoir and details fragmented thoughts and memories as Offred experiences the extreme

Ernest Hemingway gives a vivid picture of the characters and how they fit into the war. Book One has introduced to us a few characters, these including Frederick Henry, Rinaldi, the priest, and Catherine Barkley.

The Victorian period can be described as one of imperial expansion abroad and social upheaval at home. Evidently, millions left Britain’s shores either as ambitious merchants, ruthless warriors, or peaceful settlers consumed by desire to attain a safe haven. In this unique assignment, our core focus revolves around the representation of different colonial territories and their influences in Conan Doyle’s The Sign of Four and Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Beach of Falesa.

The Champion by Maurice Gee is a truly exceptional novel which describes the hardship of war. This book tells the story of Rex Pascoe, a young kiwi lad, and Jackson Coop, an injured black American solider during the Second World War. This book is set in ‘’smalltown New Zealand’’ in the 1940’s. The theme shown by Maurice gee is don’t judge people until you know them, this book also teaches about the evil of racism, and stereotyping.

Wenner explores the geographical ramifications of Highbury from a broader scope by appointing Emma Woodhouse as the central figure of the allegorical nation-state Highbury is meant to represent. She argues, despite Jane Austen’s seeming ignorance of the real-world events happening at the time the novel is set, that there exists an implicit acknowledgement of Austen’s political awareness in a time of English triumph and “nationalistic pride” (Wenner 56). The ethnocentric ideals of the characters are exposed in the way ‘outsiders’ pose threats, or rather “bring the plot complications” (58). Highbury, in the context of Emma, acts as the heart of the narrative, with foreign places floating in the periphery of the novel’s geographical centre. The

There have been Australian Aborigines living in Australia from a long time before the Europeans found the land of Australia. However, Australian history often begins from the time James Cook came and the British began to colonise. Then, in Australia, the number of whites increased and the European culture spread. As a result of this, Australian Indigenous people lost their lands, were not included in the society which whites created. It is thought that literatures often reflect at that time of the world, such as society, politics and incidents and are impacted by authors’ thoughts. This presentation will highlight four Aboriginal authors who contributed to express their unknown history in their writings. Firstly it will introduce Kath