Category: literary criticism
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Anatomy of a mythological hero
But whilst for Freud heroism revolves around human parental relationships, for Jung it revolves around the relationship between the conscious and the unconscious.
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A Feminist Reading of Jason & his Heroic Argonauts
Haynes also reminds us that there were few things that alarmed Greek men more than a clever woman and arguably, Medea is cleverest of all.
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Two Versions: which do you prefer?
Two different voices were required – which do you prefer and why?
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The Hermeneutics of Allegory – Homer’s Odyssey in Context
Naturally, it’s important to understand what a piece of literature or poetry or art might mean (symbolically) – but then comes the next question – what am I meant to do with that?
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Psychoanalysis and Critical Literary Theory
There are several important ways in which both Freudian and Jungian psychoanalysis can serve as a model for literary analysis as for example looking for the subversive in women’s literature – i.e. that which is not explicitly stated (for any number of good reasons) but nonetheless is still present. Most certainly if Austen felt so…
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Beginnings and Endings in Renaissance Drama
The ‘Argument’ and ‘Prologue’ in Jonson’s Renaissance comedy, Volpone, likewise works similarly to the Greek chorus – the ‘Argument’ preparing the audience for key moments to come by summarising the plot and, as did the ghostly chorus in Kyd, implying that justice will be done when at the end ‘all are sold’. The Prologue adds…
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The Institution of Marriage in English Renaissance Drama
Understanding the institution of marriage in this way, it becomes readily apparent that the romantic love that we in the 21st century so favour in relationships was not a key factor in the Renaissance equation.
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The Plusses and Minuses of New Criticism
Further, if we accept that a text is an ‘aesthetic object’ (however TS Eliot and others might have us define that) then if we are to take anything valuable away from our ‘aesthetic experience’ , we need to focus on what it tells us about ourselves.
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The Birth of Tragedy and other Cultural Lies
For Nietzsche, transformation was not simply a matter suspending audience disbelief, but instead allowing the audience to actually enter the world of the Greek god Dionysus, in whose realm lies all primordial truths and with it, the tragic suffering inherent in comprehending these truths.
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Structuralism and the ‘New Perspective’ on Literature
As a feminist looking at texts through structuralist eyes, I am also able to hone in on sex-inflected signifiers pointing to specific patriarchal cultural values I am keen to eliminate.