Stream of Knowledge

Lord of the Flies by William Golding is one of the most popular and endearing books of the twentieth century.  In part a morality tale, in part an analysis of the human psyche, it is also a supremely interesting and exciting adventure story.  All of these combined elements make the book a true classic and a perennial audience favourite.  The book also demonstrates its significance to today’s audiences via the many references made of it in popular culture.  Artists as divergent as U2, who named a song after one of the book’s chapters, through to the creators of cult TV drama ‘Lost’ pay testament to the value and resonance of William Golding’s ‘Lord of the Flies’. Within its pages we see drama, tension, horror, cruelty and the extraordinary complexities that can occur when people are forced into unique situations.  This encourages the audience to philosophically engage with the book and look more deeply into it to find answers to the questions it poses “ That work was Lo

"Lily mused. 'Don't you think,' she rejoined after a moment, 'that the people who find fault with society are too apt to regard it as an end and not a means, just as the people who despise money speak as if its only use were to be kept in bags and gloated over? Isn't it fairer to look at them both as opportunities, which may be used either stupidly or intelligently, according to the capacity of the user?' 'That is certainly the sane view; but the queer thing about society is that the people who regard it as an end are those who are in it, and not the critics on the fence. It's just the other way with most shows - the audience may be under the illusion, but the actors know that real life is on the other side of the footlights.' (Wharton 69-70)” Edith Wharton’s House of Mirth is unique among its British counterparts. Wharton’s American “novel of manners” presents a distorted protagonist when compared to contemporaries such as

The two speeches I have selected from the play to conduct close analysis on are Lear's speech in Act I Scene I (Lines 121 - 139) and Cordelia's speech of Act V Scene VII (Lines 31-43). These two speeches are reflective of some of the strongest themes of the play: familial love, anger, wrath and, most of all perhaps, pride. The first speech is placed at the very beginning of the play just after Cordelia has refused to praise her father in the same over-effusive manner as her sisters, and Shakespeare conveys in a few short lines the almost uncontrollable anger of Lear: Lear: Peace kent! Come not between the dragon and his wrath. I love her most, and though to set my rest On her kind nursery We can note here the evocation of the dragon which, as Harold Bloom (1987: 90) tells us, is not only symbolic of the male, paternal anger but of the monarchy itself and recalls the Englishness of St. George. As if metonymic with the entire play, this symbol of roya

Jane Austen's novel, Pride and Prejudice presents five married couples. No two are alike. From the pure love which was experienced through Elizabeth and Darcy. To the love and attraction shared by Jane and Bingley. The convenience of marriage was portrayed through Charlotte and Mr Collins while Lydia and Wickham's marriage was based on their desire, attractions and financial status. Mr and Mrs Bennet's marriage was for their necessity. Austen reveals many messages through her characters on her major theme, being marriage. Elizabeth and Darcy share common interests that help reflect their love and marriage. During Elizabeth's stay in Pemberly while Jane is ill, Austen reveals to the readers, that Elizabeth and Darcy share a common interest. For example, Miss Bingley states that 'Miss Eliza Bennet is a great reader' p34. While in a conversation between Darcy and Miss Bingley, it is stated, 'What a delightful library you have at Pemberly,'

Laurence Sterne’s Tristram Shandy dominated the London literary marketplace during its serial publication from 1759-1767.  Like his contemporary writers, Sterne engages in debates concerning what we would now regard as the disciplinary boundary between literature and philosophy which has established its canonical status as a work of postmodern fiction.  It is difficult to ascribe, as many scholars have, to Tristram Shandy the title of ‘postmodern’.  To characterize this novel through a future literary movement which defines itself through the rejection of the principles of the previous movement is incongruous.  How can a novel which precedes postmodernism by over a century and a half reflect the cultural and political formations which sparked the movement itself?  However, Tristram Shandy does contain fictional and narrative elements which clearly invite comparison with the fiction of the postmodern movement. Born into the Augustan Age, Sterne’s discordant writing makes