Summary of literary texts and key concepts of literature

About the poet: William Shakespeare   (1564 -1616)   was an English poet, playwright and actor,considered the greatest writer in the English language and the world's greatest dramatist.   He is often called the national poet of England  , mostly known as the "Bard of Avon".   His oeuvre, including   collaborative projects , consist of nearly   39 plays ,154 sonnets   , two long   narrative poems , and a few other verses, some of dubious authorship. His plays have been translated into almost every major language. . About the Poem: " The quality of mercy " is a quote by     Portia   in  Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice ,  occurs during Act 4, Scene 1, set in a Venetian Court of Justice. It is the famous speech where Portia begs   Shylock   for having mercy on the Merchant. The speech is regarded as one of the greatest speeches in Shakespeare’s entire   literary works. Summary: Th e speaker (Portia) justifies the fact that the quality of mercy i

  In India, the Bhakti and Sufi Movement started to spread during the medieval age. Needless to say,  they involved and utilized a diverse range of expression. Both movements dissociate themselves from the shackles of organized religious, rigid traditions and strike a note of protest against the hypocrisy and orthodoxy of Brahman pundits and Moulvis in their poetry and songs. “Unity of being” and unconditional love between God and the worshiper were the key concepts in the movements. The fundamental equality of all human beings irrespective of the racial or gender discrimination made these movements truly revolutionary for their times. The movement was against the Brahmanic authority, against temples and priests and scholars and fossilized customs. Mahadeviyakka, the poetess and saint, who was born in Sivamogga in the twelfth century expressed her strong desire to release herself from all earthly bonds and exerted to reveal the ambiguity of her complicated relationship with the w

The short story How Much Land Does a Man Need? begins with the conversation of two sisters on the advantages of the life of town. The elder sister who is married to an affluent tradesman and enjoys the luxuries and diversions of the city life came to pay a visit to her sister who is married to a peasant in the village. When they are having tea, the elder sister starts to brag about her comfortable life. She brags about the expensive attires she and her children wear, the delicacies they have in their meal and how thrilled she is to have diversions like theatres and promenades. Being piqued, the younger sister defends the blissful life of a peasant. She affirms that she would never exchange the way of her life with her for anything .Disparaging the life of a tradesman, she argued that they may live a life full of hardship, but they are free from anxiety. Her sister may live an opulent life now, but gain and loss are the two sides of the same coin. Therefore, if they lose all their w

About the poet: William Butler Yeats (1865-1939), the national poet of the Republic of Ireland, was one of the finest poets of the twentieth century. He was a lyric poet, a mystic, a mythologist all at the same time. He was a poet with a distinctive form of prophetic vision and a unique political ideology. Born in Dublin, Ireland, the poet was immensely influenced by the Irish heritage, contemporary politics and nationalism. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1923.   The poem, The Wild Swans at Coole , is an ideal expression of the serene beauty of Coole Park accompanied with a drastic undercurrent nostalgia .It explores the relation between man and nature. The themes of decay and mortality have been juxtaposed with the images of tranquility, beauty and the unvarying circle of the flying swans. The swans symbolize eternal youth, love and permanence in the world of decay and dejection. Summary of the poem: The foliage of the deciduous trees is having the utmost

  Ecofeminism or ecological feminism is a form of literary criticism stemmed from Feminism that explores the relations and similarities between woman and nature. The term was coined by French feminist   Francoise d’ Eaubonne in 1974.Ecofemism approach   aims to detect a certain similitude regarding the ill-treatment and oppression done by the patriarchal society in case of both women and nature. Women are as subjugated, exploited, and exploited by the phallocentric society as the environment, more precisely, the Mother Nature.   In the story of A Flowering Tree , ‘a sisterhood between a woman and a tree’ has been established subtly by the author who presented a metaphorical tale under the translucent cover of a folklore. The entire story reiterates the fact that one should treat a delicate flowering tree and woman with utmost care. There is also an implication that suggests a similarity between a flowering tree and a childbearing woman. The metaphorical ‘flowering tree’ is adroitl

ABOUT THE AUTOR : A. K. Ramanujan (1929-1993) was a prolific and versatile writer of Indian origin. He was a scholar at Indiana University during1960. He worked as a professor of Dravidian Studies and Linguistics at the University of Chicago. His oeuvre Includes remarkable works like Samskara, The Interior Landscape, Speaking of Siva, Relations and many more. ABOUT THE STORY: A Flowering Tree"   is folklore of Kannada, translated in English by   A. K. Ramanujan   in his book   A Flowering Tree and Other Folk Tales From India, published in 1997.. The story was the result of the endeavour of  Ramanujan and his fellow folklorists who collected different versions of the story available in the region for twenty years. Despite its ancient origin, the story offers a feminist perspective, attempting to establish a sisterhood between women and nature. As a typical folklore,   A Flowering Tree   is an amalgam of two distinct components: unreasonable storyline (a girl turns into a t

Baul is a folk-sect, who especially lives in West Bengal and Bangladesh. They do not have any organized religious affiliation, though they may be Hindu Vaishnav or Muslim Fakir. Therefore, their belief is an amalgamation of Hinduism, Sufism, yoga, and tantra. Bauls don’t belong to any particular religion mainly because of the rigid, orthodox aspects associated with each religion. Many Hindus,Muslims and people of marginalized and untouchable class converted into Bauls only to escape the tortures inflicted upon them, by people in the name of religion. Therefore, one is not born Baul ,but rather becomes Baul. It is also believed that the Bauls are the successors of an Iranian Sufi sect called ‘baal’. Though there have been no substantial evidences to validate the fact. Most popular and accepted belief about the origin of the Baul tradition lies in the Vaishnava Bhakti tradition. They practice sahajiya philosophy. The term sahajiya means simple. They prefer to explain the human co