Strange And Secret People Summary

The topic of spirituality, divinity and otherworldly phenomena is quite common in medieval literature and there is a multitude of contexts, in which these topics are addressed. The protagonists of those texts find themselves in a balancing act between the secular world and a supernatural world, where they need to overcome struggles to master the difficulties of their worlds’ dualisms. Be it an otherworld of fairies or the christian hereafter, those worlds and the mundane conducts often influence each other reciprocally in the stories of medieval literature.

The book I would like to tell you about is called Among the Hidden. The author of this book is Margaret Peterson Haddix. In this book, there is a boy named Luke Garner who has never been able to leave his backyard. He has only been able to quickly peak through blinds for fear of being seen. Until the day the workers started cutting the trees down, Luke was able to experience a little fresh air while rough-housing with his brothers in their isolated backyard farmland. The reason for this is because of the population law. The government believed that there wasn’t enough food to feed the growing population, so they made the law that there is only a maximum of two children allowed in each family. That meant that Luke was an illegal third

The narrator in Louise Erdrich’s The Strange People is characterized as a doe, a “lean gray witch” (i, 20) and finally, a “shadowy body.”(i, 25) Her own actions ultimately trigger this transformation, and are further emphasized through three jarring shifts within the poem. Despite portraying the narrator as prey in the beginning, she is not faultless. By placing double meanings on the word “burning,” (i, 6) it allows the self-destructive actions of the narrator to be evident. Also, by juxtaposing the cold and warmth described in the poem, the reasoning behind the doe’s self-destructive actions is explained, and ultimately paints her in a more nuanced light. Even so, her self-destructive actions highlight the consequences resulting from her attempt at self-preservation. She transforms into a “lean gray witch” to save herself, and yet it destroys her self-identity. The poem exposes the bleak yet nuanced consequences of destructive desires and self-preservation, and how even when necessary and justified, leads to the unfortunate loss of one’s identity.

Fairy takes are the primary information of the culture. They delineate the roles, interactions, and values which are available to us. They are our childhood models, and their fearful, dreadful, content terrorizes us into submission- if we do not become good, evil will destroy us; if we do not achieve the happy ending, then we will frown in the chaos (34-35).

In the 17th century, it was not unheard of to have people involved with or speaking of the supernatural world. The idea of having the supernatural as part of the everyday life of a regular person emerged from Europe in the 15th century and traveled to the colonists in North America during the migration to the Americas. Most people in agricultural America used certain types of witchcraft to better their crops. Yet, many other people just used the supernatural world to blame disastrous events on something other than what was in their present world. In the situation of religion, Joseph Glanvill stated that if one doubted the reality of spirits, such as the witchcraft and demons, they

People’s personalities are not always what they seem. That is the case in Shirley Jackson’s short story “The Possibility of Evil.” The main character is an elderly woman who seems sweet and kind; however, she reveals that she is not sweet and kind. Miss Strangeworth’s character can be analyzed by considering what she does, what the narrator says about her, and how other characters interact with her.

In all of human history, people have written about inhuman beings, many of which include gods, demons, wizards, sorcerers, sorceresses, and witches. Nowadays mystical beings are seen everywhere in media. Most of society stopped believing in these creatures years ago, but for 17th-century Salem, witchcraft became a living nightmare (Fremon, 1999).

This essay is to explain why of all the characters of the short stories we read that Miss. Strangeworth is the worst character and why. These characters come from the short stories And of Clay We are Created, To Build a Fire, The Possibility of Evil, The Interlopers, Two Friends and How Much Land Does a Man Need? The characters in these stories are unique in the ways that they could be evil, such as having the ability to change something for the better but instead not doing anything at all. Miss strangeworth is the worst of all because she is two-faced, selfish, and very judgemental.

During the Stamford witch, the faith-based belief system and social structure of 17th-Century Puritanism were continuously at odds with the logic-based legal system of the Stamford community. Puritans “…considered religious belief a complex and demanding matter and urged believers to seek the truth by reading the Bible and listening to sermons by educated minsters…” (Foner, 65). Moreover, Puritans believed that extraordinary events that took place carried supernatural significance and were caused by

The specific audience for the excerpt Los Olvidados: On the making of invisible People, is obviously Latino’s community and also Americans because in this analysis the author is explaining who Latinos are dying because of English, loosening their cultures, being invisibles for other communities; this next textual evidence is the clue: “Latino invisibility is the principal cause of illness by English. When I write of Latino invisibility, I mean a relative lack of positive public identity and legitimacy.” (Perea, 196)

In the Elizabethan times magical beliefs played a tremendous role in their daily life, unlike most of us today. At the time supernatural was referred to as fairies; a human sized, malicious mermaid; giants, hags, and goblins. Fairies were the most feared practice of adopting A human baby and replacing it with changeling; usually hideous, deformed (Mabillard). Most fairies visited at night and after taking your child they would reward the elizabethans with a clean house according to Papp and Kirkland. Although we don't have fairies, there are some today who do understand those in the Elizabethan era, regarding those who believe in the presence of evil and the

The supernatural has always fascinated and continues to intrigue mankind. In many of Shakespeare’s plays, he uses the supernatural to strengthen a particular scene or to influence the impression the audience has about someone or something. This was not strange or uncommon in Shakespeare’s time. In fact, during the 1500s, many people still believed in witches and witchcraft. Even in today’s society, with such advanced science and technology, many people are still influenced, if not dictated by the supernatural. For example, religious people have the belief that their saviour, Jesus Christ was a man of many miracles; one of which was he turned water into wine. Despite the fact that it

In order to fully understand how supernatural themes played such a large role in Romanticism, we must further explore what Romanticism really is. This spiritual and artistic movement rejected rationalism, and emerged as a reaction against ‘the age of enlightenment’, which put strong emphasis on reason and logic. Thus, for the Romantics, literary creation was what the artist produced after reconstructing or developing a new interpretation of the world around him. It was the offspring of imagination applied to the writer’s impressions of real life. Authors such as Coleridge, Blake, and Shelley, believed that literary creation was the product of transforming reality into something beyond reason, but not beyond the

For many Victorians, the obvious answer was to turn to science. Science was methodical, made sense and was rapidly improving the quality of life. Trains were speeding up travel, many goods were produced more easily and cheaply because of factories and doctors were discovering more efficient ways to deal with disease. Moreover, science provided a system of dealing with the world that left very little in doubt. Where faith required blind belief in abstract and elusive things, the scientific method presented a way of examining the world that produced definite, provable answers. Victorians turned to science as a way to rediscover Truth.

In “The Faerie Queene”, Spencer Edmund produces an allegory. His intention was to relate England in the 1590s to a mythical land in which each character had a symbolic meaning as well as the events they were undergoing. He lived in an era where Roman Catholicism was replaced with Protestantism and he dedicated himself to unconsciously teach and educate his readers the Catholic Church was corrupted and was the wrong religion to follow. For this reason, he gave each character a common role who would relate to anyone in England and showed the readers how his role in the story symbolized good or evil. The themes he expressed in his books talked about his interpretation in religion, politics, symbolism, and his dedication to make his allegory as influential as possible.