Mac Flecknoe

Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales are some of the most widely read and anthologized pieces of medieval poetry. These tales are generally celebrated and enjoyed because of the author’s use of wit and satire, as Chaucer often uses word play and characterization to deliver hard-hitting, yet entertaining truths about his time period. This is the case in “The Miller’s Tale,” which portrays the story of a carpenter with an adulterous wife and the shenanigans that take place during and after one of her affairs. After closely examining “Absalom’s Revenge,” the last section of this tale, it is clear to see that Chaucer uses language, puns, and other writing techniques to provide a commentary on the lewdness of some who lived during the Middle Ages.

This transfer of the power of voice to Penelope’s perspective plays out similarly in Waddington’s diction choices as pitched against those of Tennyson. While “Ulysses” refers in detail to its hero’s “drunk delight” and “roaming with a hungry heart,” the same marvels are offered less glory or attention in the words of Waddington (Tennyson 16, 12). These events are mentioned, but in passing, not in Ulysses’ terms of conquest and action. While Ulysses takes the place of a passive character and only performs deeds in coming home and “climbing the stairs,” Penelope fills the seat of active rescuer and change-maker as she weaves his story (Waddington 25). Thus it is within Waddington’s diction choices for the actions of Penelope, not Ulysses, that her stanzas best reflect the gallant rhetoric akin to Tennyson’s work. From when “her stitches / embroidered the / painful colors / of her breath,” to her creation of Ulysses as “a medallion / emblazoned in / tapestry,” Penelope’s labors in the retelling of her husband constitute the most dynamic language in the work (Waddington 37-40, 30-32). Here, the facade of incapable “blind hands” falls away to reveal Penelope’s potency to create a new myth (Waddington 33).

The use of simile in the last stanza ‘matchstick hands as pale as the violet stems they lived among’ is used to compare a frog to violet flowers, which are very delicate and easily broken. The innocence of childhood is painted through this visual technique as the narrator only sees the frogs being very delicate, but to the readers the simile also creates a vivid image of the condition of the ‘Frogs’/ the French. The use of first person helps to create a reminiscent tone about the narrator’s experiences, and further helps to stress the ideas of childhood innocence and the influence of war on children because the poem is written from a child’s perspective. The use of enjambment generates a conversational and personal tone, emphasizing to the readers the reality of the themes discussed throughout the poem. The use of symbolism of frogs as pets and also representing the French highlights the idea that adults saw ‘Frogs’ as insignificant or unworthy to speak about, whereas the children could not understand this adult thought, and they placed exemplary regard to the wellbeing of the

To the casual reader, the writing of Flannery O'Connor can seem cold and void of emotion. Her storylines are like a misty fog in the dead of winter, enveloping the reader with a harsh even violent atmosphere. Her short stories regularly end in traumatic, freak deaths or, at the very least, a character's emotional destruction. An analysis of “Greenleaf,” “Everything that Rises Must Converge,” or “A Good Man is Hard to Find,” will leave the reader feeling empty. The imagination of the reader is not engaged on any level. There is an under current of anti-religion which is intensified by cruelty. O’Connor’s writing is filled with symbolism which is camouflaged by her writing style. Although her writing style is not considered by experts as

This metaphor powerfully inverts the traditional notion of a heroic knight, placing emphasis both on Crichton Smith 's own failure and upon the comparison of the tenement to a prison tower. In addition to this, the poet also indicates that he visited his mother on 'each second Sunday ' which again uses alliteration to draw our attention to the infrequency of his visits. These techniques are skilfully employed to given a clear indication of the poet 's own guilt. And the main focus of this guilt can be clearly seen in the final image of the stanza.

Throughout the sixteenth century Satire was used as a method of both exposing and correcting vice. Isabella Whitney, the first known woman in England to publish a volume of poetry, wrote several satirical works. Throughout the duration of this course, although on the syllabus, satire was never discussed. Whitney used satire to write her two final poems “A Communication Which the Author had to London Before She Made Her Will” and “The Manner of Her Will, and What She Left to London and to All Those in It at Her Departing” which were published as the final two poems in her second volume, A Sweet Nosegay. They were written as a critique of modern London at the time. Although very little is known about the life of Isabella Whitney it is very possible to assume that her works, including these two, are autobiographical. These two works, regarding Isabella Whitney’s “last will and testament” to London should be included in L309 because of the different perspective that could be gained through; reading a work in which the speaker is portrayed by the poet, acquiring a female perspective, hearing the view of a member of the lower class, and the additional perspective it could add to the discussion regarding satire, or start the discussion in the case of this semester.

Literature of the English Restoration offers the example of a number of writers who wrote for a courtly audience: literary production, particularly in learned imitation of classical models, was part of the court culture of King Charles II. The fact of a shared model explains the remarkable similarities between “The Imperfect Enjoyment” by the Earl of Rochester and “The Disappointment” by Aphra Behn—remarkable only because readers are surprised to read one poem about male sexual impotence from the late seventeenth century, let alone two examples of this genre by well-known courtly writers. In fact, Richard Quaintance presents ten more examples by lesser-known poets as he defines the literary sub-genre of the neo-Classical “imperfect

Gulliver’s Travels was written during the 18th Century and mocks the governing spirit among the English and people of Europe of that time, and even extends to all of mankind. Swift uses metaphors to expose society of its pretensions and reveals his disapproval of their behaviour. Swift’s clever use of satire achieves this by not directly addressing the flaws of the English but by doing so in a veiled manner,

Mary Wollstonecraft’s epistolary essay “A Vindication of the Rights of Men” acts as a direct, scathing response to Edmund Burke’s opinionated piece regarding the French Revolution, “Reflections on the Revolution in France”. This essay will examine the use of satire as a mode in the opening sections of Wollstonecraft’s “Vindication”, as well as comparing her lexical choices to those of her addressee, Edmund Burke. The Oxford English Dictionary states that “satire” is “… [A] work of art which uses humour, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize prevailing immorality or foolishness, esp. [sic] as a form of social or political commentary.” Humour is too exaggerated to relate to Wollstonecraft’s work, but ridicule as a

Complaint poems were often aimed in the sixteenth century at correcting the problem of which the poem's speaker complains; 'in some of these poems the complaint merges with satire to urge correction of man's foolish and vicious behaviour.' Wyatt's 'complaint' poems show an attempt to change the laws of Courtly love and to employ the Renaissance philosophy of 'old freedoms regained,' thereby classifying them as satirical.

In “The Fatal Sisters” Thomas Gray has created a monologue pregnant with references to history, geography, and mythology. These reappearing references and allusions enrich the text, as they allow a closer look at the political situation surrounding eleventh century Britain.  The poems’ sixteen stanzas exhibit an ABAB rhyme scheme, which provides for systematic organization and positive aesthetic effects.  Closer examination of the setting, tone, and imagery of the poem permits insight into the text’s content and artistic genius.

Analyse the passage (John the Savage in the hospital); discern presentation of satire and how it is wrought.

Sir Thomas Wyatt’s defence covered two major areas; the possible insulting of the king and conspiring with Catholics in a newly decided protestant country. His 1541 defence guards his actions on both parts, however due to the lack of historical evidence it is impossible to know if this defence was ever used, even if we do know he somehow did manage to get himself off the charges. Nevertheless, it offers great insight to the mind and feelings of an otherwise elusive and ambiguous historical figure. It is this, that being Wyatt writing about his own biography, that offers vital importance to his poetry, and more importantly his satires like ‘Myne Owne John Poyntz’. Through Wyatt’s own work we can examine the possible emotion, and tie it down to its own specific historical moment.

“A Satire against Reason and Mankind” is a poem written by John Wilmot the Second Earl of Rochester. Two things are argued against in this poem. First, mankind and its base nature that causes men to exploit each other for seemingly no reason. Second, mankind’s ability to reason which causes them to compare themselves to God. However, at the end of the poem Rochester offers a chance for himself to be proven wrong, but only if a just man can be found. This idea of a “just man” is not Rochester believing mankind can improve, but rather it is him supporting his own argument because he knows that this man does not exist. When this “just man” is described he directly contrasts with human nature and shines a light on man’s true baseness and shows

“A Good Man is Hard to Find”: Comparing Flannery O’Connor’s Literary Technique to Grotesque Medieval Literature