Essay on Mayor of Casterbridge Tragic Hero

In contrast, by appearance of a horny sexual character, Joyce, viewers are positioned to see the danger of a woman as she rallies support which turns into a mob after she fails to proceed what she wants – sexual intercourse. However, the actions of main character, Edward, and the clothes worn him and more importantly, an awkward looks of him with scissors for hands positions the viewers to see him as a person who can't and never will fit in ordinary suburbia. Burton’s use of these characters is to convince viewer that whether conformity is good or bad, distinct individual is always to be left behind.

Fitting with the common theme between the two novels of the judgment of others, each heroine falls victim to a horrible misjudgment of the character of another. After discovering that the engagement between her brother and her friend Isabella has been broken, Catherine finds she has grossly misjudged her friend’s character, and thinks, “She was ashamed of Isabella, ashamed of ever having loved her” (Northanger 150). Elizabeth, on the other hand, finds her attachment the Wickham wholly inappropriate after receiving her letter from Mr. Darcy. After digesting the shocking contents of the letter, Elizabeth “grew absolutely ashamed of herself.—Of neither Darcy nor Wickham could she think, without feeling that she had been blind, partial, prejudiced, absurd” (Pride 156). And indeed, as suggested by Elizabeth’s mention of Darcy, this misjudgment goes on to affect each girl’s attachment to her future husband.

The way princes “ran off with parlormaids” suggests a juvenile love that forms when parents and society disapproves of it which generates a little drama to the reader before Larson begins to give more examples of different affairs. The manner in which “bank presidents seduced typewriters” offers more mature prospect and “seduced” denotes a more surreptitious, more serious relationship to add more tension. By adding “when necessary” and projecting a final example of an affair, Larson displays how enticing and potentially risky these involvements are, even to people considered rational and professional like attorneys and doctors, to amplify the building drama. The parallelism of the list of scandalous affairs emphasizes Larson’s word choice of how Holmes “reveled” in his “possession” of a secluded woman in a faux innocuous affair demonstrates how Julia was just a mere toy to him that belongs to him “as if she were an antebellum slave” for his amusement and use which elevates the tensions the reader feels

Women have been the victim of unfair stereotypes and placed at different standards than men since the beginning of time. The Ruined Maid by Thomas Hardy and One Perfect Rose by Dorothy Parker take an in depth look at how women are viewed by the opposite gender. Although they take a different approach and have contrasting poetry styles, the theme that is portrayed is prominent for both. Hardy’s poem portrays a woman living in the Victorian Era where the norm was to be married and faithful. The character ‘Melia lives in an individualistic way and is not only unmarried, but has participated in sexual activities before marriage. With this liveliness comes riches and prosperity, but also social backlash. One Perfect Rose tells the story of a woman who receives a rose as a gift from her love interest. The unnamed persona is displeased with this rose because it is typical and thoughtless. The classic gift that men give to women is a rose, which is looked at as a romantic gesture. This poem’s purpose is to show the audience that not every girl’s dream gift is a “perfect rose.” The Ruined Maid by Thomas Hardy and One Perfect Rose by Dorothy Parker explore how two women break away from typical stereotypes and long for a more unconventional way of life.

The progress between Elizabeth’s and Darcy’s relationship, in Jane Austen’s novel Pride and Prejudice (1813) illustrates and explores several the key themes in the novel. Their relationship highlights class expectations, pride and prejudice, and marriage, and how they play a major role in determining the course of their association. These are outlined through their first prejudiced dislike of each other when they first meet, the stronger feelings for Elizabeth that develop on Darcy’s side, her rejection in Darcy’s first proposal, then her change of opinion and lastly the mutual love they form for one another. Pride and Prejudice is set up as a satire, commenting on human idiocy, and Jane Austen

Many wifes throughout the years have endured countless amounts of persecution from their husbands, but some men take it to a whole new level. Two male authors, Henrik Ibsen and Robert Browning, brought female hardships to light in the nineteenth century. Ibsen’s 1879 play, A Doll’s House, was so controversial at the time that he was forced to write a more pleasant ending in which Nora returned after having left Torvald. Browning’s poem, “My Last Duchess”, written in 1842, showed the immoral perspective of a Duke who had his wife murdered merely because she did not preserve her pleasant personality singularly for him. It was influential writers such as these who eventually gave feminism a kick start. The two husbands in these stories share a vast amount of similar characteristics. Despite the fact that Torvald loved his wife, and Duke had murdered his, both of them exhibit extreme authoritative and egoistic behaviors.

In the poem Ballad of Birmingham, by Dudley Randall, the author gives a poetic account of a bombing that occurs in a church in 1963. The poem was written in the form of a ballad to convey the mood of the mother towards her daughter. The poet also gives a graphic account of what the 1960's were like. Mr. Randall uses tone, irony and metaphor to describe the events of the mother’s decisions, as well as her concern for her child’s well being.

For example in the prologue of the story, Douglas initially includes in his introduction of the governess the detail that she was the “youngest of several daughters of a poor country parson” (James 4). Douglas’ mention of this minor fact is crucial to understanding the fundamental psychology of the governess. By considering the fact that the governess was raised in an environment of an “English middle-class class-consciousness” it is shown that a result of this is the development of “her somber and guilty visions and the way she behaves about them.” Inevitably, her upbringing through the taboos of the Victorian-English time period has ultimately led to her “inability to admit to herself her natural sexual impulses and the relentless English ‘authority’ which enables her to put over on inferiors even purposes which are totally deluded and not at all in the other people’s best interests” (Gale 3).

In this story, the characters cope with good and evil differently. Mrs. Hopewell’s perennial optimism is balanced by her daughter’s self-chosen misery. Mrs. Hopewell doesn’t understand her daughter and is insensitive to Hulga’s bitterness at her maiming. Hulga sees herself a liberating people from their illusions, believing she has none of her own. Hulga has a wooden leg, which is her most valuable possession because it is her mark of her difference. She prizes this because she considers herself more intellectual than all of the “good country people” around her, especially her mother, their neighbors and finally Manley Pointer, a Bible salesman. Mrs. Freeman sees through the illusions of the Hopewell household. She knows her place in the economy of the household and hers if the final comment in the story.

       As the tale begins we immediately can sympathize with the repressive plight of the protagonist.  Her romantic imagination is obvious as she describes the "hereditary estate" (Gilman, Wallpaper 170) or the "haunted house" (170) as she would like it to be.  She tells us of her husband, John, who "scoffs" (170) at her romantic sentiments and is "practical to the extreme" (170).  However, in a time

The mid 1950’s and early 1960’s is considered one of many imperative turning points in history. The Civil Rights movement was a time where African Americans were fighting against the government for the same rights as White Americans. Alabama was basically the battle ground during the Civil Rights movement. Ballad of Birmingham is a look into the effects of racism on a personal level. The poem is set in Alabama during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s wear African Americans were hosed down, beaten, and put in jail because they were fighting for freedom and their rights. In Ballad of Birmingham, Randall wrote this poem mostly in iambic tetrameter, though some of the feet actually transition from an iambic to a trochaic and back. Randall

How does Hardy use poetic techniques to detail changes in his relationship with his wife over time in ‘Neutral Tones’ ?

Yaeger takes issue with Tanner’s contention that extramarital desire functions in the 18th and 19th century novel as “an attack” on the rules governing “the opposed demands of private desire and public law,” rules that are “mediated” by the institution of marriage. (Tanner 13) While Yaeger agrees with Tanner that adulterous behavior by literary heroines does challenge one expression of patriarchy, Yaeger characterizes this challenge as only “mildly transgressive,” noting that “adultery remains well within the arena of permissible social trespass.” According to Yaeger, Edna’s falling in love with Robert Lebrun is an act of social misconduct that is easily imagined by, and indeed is anticipated by, the bourgeois Creole society she inhabits. Thus, Tanner errs when he equates adultery in the novel with “the possible breakdown of all the mediations on which society itself depends”; rather, Yaeger notes, for Edna “the thought or practice of adultery…is actually a conservative gesture within the larger scheme of things, another mode of social acquiescence.” Indeed,

Living almost a century apart, Jane Austen and Thomas Hardy each explore similar themes of love through strong female characters. While society strove to keep women’s value directly tied to their marital status, Austen and Hardy wrote the stories of characters who defied these expectations. Bathsheba Everdene of Thomas Hardy’s Far From the Madding Crowd is a fiery young woman who inherits a farm, and Elizabeth Bennet of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice is an educated woman who prides herself on speaking her mind regardless of the consequences. Both women are of marrying age, and both novels feature their romantic exploits. Besides their differing socio-economic and temporal settings, Bathsheba’s and Elizabeth’s behaviors indicate that they are facing similar feelings and conflicts when it comes to issues of love and marriage. Bathsheba goes to greater lengths to defy societal pressures than Elizabeth does, but Bathsheba’s circumstances warrant the effort. The real difference between these characters is the way in which they are written. One could not know how similar Bathsheba’s thoughts and feelings are to Elizabeth’s, because the reader rarely sees through Ms. Everdene’s eyes. Bathsheba Everdene is the greater feminist heroine when taken alongside Elizabeth Bennet; however, Hardy writes her story almost exclusively from the perspective of his male characters, leaving her represented as two-dimensional in comparison to

Her relationship with the wealthy, charming Rodolphe Boulanger is a diversion from tedious country life as well as an intentional subversion of the establishment of marriage and an attempt to undermine her husband’s authority. After her first conjugal transgression, Emma distinctly feels “the satisfaction of revenge” and “savoured [sic] it without remorse, without anxiety, without worry” (161). Though her husband Charles is guiltless of cruelty or vice he is representative of a patriarchy that is entirely neglectful of the emotional, psychological, and intellectual needs of women and assertive of its superiority and power. She is expected to fulfill the duties of a simple-minded, submissive, and sexless creature who is devoted to the comfort of her family and upkeep of the home. By pursuing a sexual relationship with Rodolphe, Emma invalidates the authority of the prohibitive government institution over her actions and demands autonomy in the face of a banal provincial life.