Literature Essays

It’s often said that Science Fiction is the literature of change. When a culture is undergoing a lot of changes due to scientific advances and technological, and developments expects to undergo more, it’s hardly surprising if stories about these changes become popular as a way of expressing people’s feelings (optimistic …

Odysseus is known to be a great leader and these leadership qualities are presented in how he always looks out for his men. Although sometimes the advise he gives them is ignored and this reflects on the men’s stubbornness. This behaviour is seen before the attack of the Cicones. Odysseus …

An epitaph is an inscription upon a tomb, in few verses for the casual observer to read carefully. It is usually carved in stone and is very synthetic. The Elegy is much more lengthy than an epitaph. The two genres differ not only in lengths, but also in subject matter, …

The very first time I watched ‘The Truman Show’ I thought, wow! What a great film, and never thought in too much detail about it. My subconscious concentrated on the obvious, and without realising, I’d missed a lot of the main points that would have helped my understanding of the …

From the opening scene of the play, the ghost of Hamlet the King of Denmark is a figure that is shrouded in mystery. Only appearing in the dead of night, and moving “like a guilty thing”, it’s intentions remain uncertain until Act 1 Scene 5. Despite giving it’s reasons for …

‘Jane Eyre’ has been described as “no more than a typical romantic novel” but if it is read deeper, qualities unusual in a romantic novel are uncovered. Qualities that are more associated with “gothic novels” of the time. These lead me to believe that ‘Jane Eyre’ was not just “a …

At the time when Virgil was writing the Aeneid, Rome was going through a time of great political and social change, where Augustus Caesar had seized power through the destruction of the Roman Republic, and had himself installed as dictator and sole ruler of Rome. Virgil evidently through his writing …

Macbeth in my opinion is portrayed as a victim in many ways. He can be seen as a victim of His own ambition, and as a target for evil of the Weird Sister’s. But was Lady Macbeth a factor in pressuring Macbeth into the decisions he made? The play opens …

In this essay I will compare three film versions of the ghost scene from Shakespeare’s play, ‘Hamlet’. They are; Mel Gibson version made in 1990, Kenneth Branagh’s version produced in 1996 and Ethan Hawke’s version from 2001. In my opinion the Mel Gibson version has the best interpretation of the …

The twelfth chapter, although seemingly unimportant- yet a necessary reintroduction of Basil Hallward- in fact reveals a great deal about the way in which he sees Dorian. ‘Sin is a thing that writes itself across a man’s face. It cannot be concealed’ is a clear example of traditional Victorian values …