Irony In Jane Smiley's Poem 'Halloween'

The witch is a recurring symbol found in literature and popular culture from the earliest of times. She lived on the fringes of society, outcast and was treated with fear. The fear was the result of her being the ‘other’ to the power yielded by man, patriarchy and society. She was the other to all the ideals of womanhood that society had marked for women. Her power lay in her disruption of these authorities and her refusal to be controlled. The women not in accordance with the societal concepts were demonised as witches and stripped of her identity as a person, a woman.

Women were the primary targets of witch hunts, a craze that gripped medieval Europe between the 1600’s to the 1700’s. Women’s bodies and sexuality were repressed due to it’s dangerous threat to the medieval society. Women’s bodies were tortured and mutilated to prove the authenticity of witchcraft. The evolution of

Celebrated on October 31st, the festival of Halloween (also known as Samhain) includes dressing in costume, trick or treating, and decorating. Tracing back in history Halloween is considered to be one of America’s oldest holidays, and is still celebrated today. Halloween is believed to come from Celtic rituals. Celtics believed the cosmological myth of Saman (Lord of the Dead). Saman would call on the souls of the people that passed away that year to take them to the afterlife or underworld; the Celtic underworld identifies with the Christian Hell. In order for the spirits to believe they were on their own, the living would wear costumes and mask their identities, along with fairies, witches and demons. This functions as a cosmological myth because it provides a creation story and framework in which this universe occupies and includes many other realms of existence. Another tradition that followed was to give food to the Saman, to persuade him to be more tolerant while he judged the dead ancestors of the living, which he would chose to take to the underworld. In this essay I will further investigate what the origins of Halloween consist of and how it offers reasoning for trick-or-treating. Also I will examine how trick-or-treating, which is still continued today, is connected to ancient Celtic festivals.

Use of Irony in Crime and Punishment and A Doll's House There are many links between Crime and Punishment, by Fyodor Dostoyevsky and A Doll's House, by Henrik Isben. Each character goes through many ironic situations. Throughout both of the works dramatic, situational, and verbal irony are used.

The Witch (2015): Puritan Fears and the Unnatural Nature of Witchcraft The modern film The Witch by Robert Eggers is set in the 1630’s in New England and follows a Puritan family in their struggles against witches and witchcraft after being banished from the Commonwealth. The story depicts the fears of

The horse beneath was gradually turning restless. Nathaniel also was becoming impatient, but it would all be worthwhile. It was the first Friday of October, that's when the creature always came out. It'd made a habit of following the same pattern, a yearly ritual. Through the town, crashing through the

"Will that be all, Mother?", asked her daughter, hauling the last of the ground roots and herbs inside the dungeon rooms and setting hem on the floor near her mother's feet, Abigail smiled, nodding a little at the girl. "What's all this for anyway? You turned into a witch?",, Abigail laughed. "You wish, my darling. But no, it's for something rather special, I have to call upon something, and I've been told this-", she gestured to the candles, chalk and herbs in Mason jars around her, 'was the only way to do it.". Her daughter, smirked, looking around the room, "I would stay, but- witchcraft isn't really my thing.". Abigail shrugged, "Understood.". She one she shouldn't have bragged to Maxim earlier about her wonderful daughter, but how

This paper will be a unique interpretation coupled with an analysis of rhetoric in A Thousand Acre’s by Jane Smiley. This non-fiction novel is told in third person omniscient and is focused on the point of view of one of the main characters, Ginny Cook. A Thousand Acres was a modern-day retelling of Shakespeare’s King Lear; set on a large farm and small town in Iowa. This setting is important to the plot because it is more realistic compared to a far away mystical land that is detached from its audience. Smiley uses various rhetorical and literary techniques within her book to engage readers while still keeping to the basic storyline previously written by Shakespeare. Smiley’s use of language positively aids the imagery and emotions seen

To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel by Harper Lee where a young girl named Jean Louise Finch, or Scout, talks about her life in Maycomb, Alabama. The story is set during the hardest part of the 1930s; the Great Depression. In the story, many holidays are talked about, including Halloween. The mention of Halloween in the novel helps develop the characterization of Boo Radley and Bob Ewell.

3. LISTENER RELEVANCE: When we think of Halloween, we think of haunted houses, scary stories, and costumes of all sorts, candy, witches, black cats and more. But some of us have probably wondered where the history lies behind it all.

Dread filled her with every word from his mouth, her eyes darting from him to Hansel and Gretel at the way the two of them seemed to come to life at the mention of witches, a maniacal light in each of their eyes that was almost as frightening as the idea of the creatures themselves, and she wondered briefly if they were stable enough to handle the mission. She shook her head, feeling guilty for having the thought. None of them were stable. That’s why they were chosen, and of all of them the two had the most experience in this particular

It was all going well before Alexis and Alice left. Their mom told them they could go by themselves since they both had phones. They were going as a devil and angel. They were so excited to finally go trick or treating by themselves. The clock struck 6 p.m. and

The inside was so lurid with fake blood everywhere on the walls and on the ground. As I had spun around the corner a mannequin like a person standing to wait to pounce on its prey. BAH! They said intimidating me with fright, The adrenaline flew over my veins like a carp through a river, but I couldn’t move a single muscle, not even to scream. The absolute horror completely paralyzed me, and the more I thought about running away, or simply moving a bit, the more I felt discouraged and utterly terrified. I didn’t remember being that scared in my life. And that was just the beginning. That idea only made it worse.Throughout the park, monsters stirred around waiting for there prey to be feared. A choked cry for help came from a woman 10 ft away in agony of fear. “Clowns” Jacob exclaimed “they have returned for Halloween night, we must escape to another part of the park” Jacob proclaimed. We had traveled far from Jester town but soon found our way into fearytale land where all your fairytale characters come back to life scarier than before. Bloody little red riding hood limped from her broken ankle as The big bad wolf pondered around looking for his prey. Cinderella dressed so

“Dexter, I love you so much. So, so much, and I probably always will […] I just don’t like you anymore. I’m sorry.” (210).

“In the year of 1989, there was a street named Elm, in the state of Wyoming. Few chose to live on that street, and they all knew about the haunted house, up on the hill, on the west side of town, coming off of Elm. Once, I spent the week with some friends and, Halloween came upon us, while I stayed with them.” I was telling my first-grade brother and his friends stories to scare them out of their wits. Besides, no one wants little kids tagging along with you to go trick or treating, when you could go with your friends to Haunted Houses, and not ones set up by the town hall. “We were just about to pass the house, not thinking anything of it, when we heard a moan coming from Old Man Reaper’s house.” Their eyes grew wide with fear. Mr. G.