Summary of literary texts and key concepts of literature

    Cleanth Brooks   (October 16, 1906 - May 10, 1994) was an influential American literary critic, professor, editor of the Southern Review, (in collaboration with Robert Penn Warren). He was one of the skilled and exemplary practitioners of the New Criticism. He is best known for his contributions to  New Criticism  during the 1920s and for revolutionizing the teaching of poetry in American higher education. His most characteristic book of close readings is, definitely, The Well Wrought Urn: Studies in the Structure of Poetry  (1947).  Modern Poetry and the Tradition  (1939), is another outstanding work that proclaims the centrality of ambiguity and paradox as a way of understanding poetry. His critical works helped to formulate formalist criticism, emphasizing “the interior life of a poem” and propounded the idea of close reading.   ‘The Language of Paradox’, is the first chapter of Cleanth Brooks’  Well-wrought Urn, (1947) starts with the author’s assertion: ‘...the language of p

  The poem, Small Towns and the River by Mamang Dai expresses the poet’s notion about the uncomplicated life   in the “Small Towns” of Arunachal Pradesh. The phrase “The River” refers to the river that flows through Pasighat, the hometown of the poet. The poet starts the poem in a pensive mood asserting the fact that the river always reminds her of death. Her hometown resides amid the serenity of nature surrounded by huge trees. The climate of the place remains almost the same during summer and winter. The dust hovers in the air and the wind resonates through the valley of the mountain. When someone died the other day, the community endured the pain and mourned the loss of a dear one in ‘dreadful silence.’ Life and death form the cycle of human life and death is inevitable. Only the rituals and customs of a community are permanent, like offering a wreath of tuberoses to honour the deceased.  The poet imagines that the river has a soul. In summer, it cuts through the dry chest of th

  About the poet: Mamang Dai(1957-present) is a poet and novelist writing in English from Arunachal Pradesh, India. She belongs to the Adi tribe, of Arunachal Pradesh. Her literary works include romantic poems and short stories along with provincial myths and folktales. She was  honoured with Padma Shri, in 2011.The prestigious Sahitya Akademi Award was conferred on her for her novel, The Black Hill, in 2017.Dai was corresponding with the  Hindustan Times ,  Telegraph  and  The Sentinel  newspapers and later became the President, Arunachal Pradesh Union of Working journalists. She is also actively engaged with World Wide Fund for nature in the Eastern Himalaya Biodiversity Hotspots programme. Bipin Patsani once commented on her graceful, lyrical style of writing in River Poems, that dai writes with ‘rare passion and flow, fresh and full of the essence of tribal myths, mountains and an intense emotional involvement with her land.’ Y.D. Thongchi, the president of Arunachal Pradesh Liter

  Humanism is, specifically, an European phenomenon, that includes worldly and secular philosophy. It is anthropocentric. It aims to ennoble and dignify man. It was the product of European Renaissance. The term ‘Renaissance ‘was coined by French historian, Jules Michelet in his Historie de France , published in 1855.It has been defined as the birth of the new world of culture, literature, art and science out of the dilapidated remains of   the dark medieval ages. In the 16 th century, the term humanism was coined to signify studia humanitatis. The humanists were concerned with moral, educational and political themes. They were influenced by classical ideas of Aristotle, Plato, Cicero. Later in the 19 th century the term was applied to denote the view of general nature, general values, and educational ideas to which the Renaissance Humanists espoused to.(M.H.Abrams) . The humanists were scholars of literae humaniores, precisely, the Greek literature, and they were Latin poets, dramati

  In his Poetics, Aristotle defined tragic hero as a person, who is an ‘intermediate kind of personage, a man not preeminently virtuous and just, whose misfortune, however,   is brought upon him not by vice or depravity, but some error of judgement’( Bywater’s translation). Oedipus enjoys great reputation and a prosperous life. But his life takes a drastic turn from happiness to misery.Oedipus suffers primarily, due to an error of judgement resulted from ignorance or moral shortcoming. In his Poetics, Aristotle asserts that the tragic hero ought to be a person whose misfortune is brought upon him, not by any vice or depravity, but by some error. Oedipus impulsively kills his father and inadvertently ends up marrying his mother.

    Gothic   romance is the type of novel that flourished in the late 18th and early 19th century in England and has had a considerable influence on the evolution of ghost stories, horror stories and fiction.  Gothic  romances were also known as the novel of terror for   its supernatural aspects and mysterious plot leading to the dark underworld where an innocent heroine is tormented by an uncouth and lustful villain. The setting of the novel is usually dark and gloomy, either medieval ruins or haunted castles. One of the prototypes of this genre is Tobias Smollett’s Ferdinand Count Fathom (1753) .The pioneer of this genre was Horace Walpole, whose novel The Castle of Otranto: a Gothic Story became very popular at that time. His legacy was carried on by novelists like Ann Radcliffe, in her The Mysteries of Udolpho, William Beckford (Vathek), Matthew Gregory Lewis (The Monk), William Godwin and other notable gothic writers. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, is considered the progenitor

  In the first chapter, Mary Wollstonecraft, discusses about the prevailing opinion of woman as a sexual character. The concept of virtue has been discussed in the beginning of the chapter. The author argues that woman’s character is often judged in terms of virtue, but it requires sufficient strength of mind to acquire true virtue. The women are not a swarm of ephemeron triflers and one should not disguise ignorance under the name of innocence. From their childhood, women are told to follow the example of their mother, in short, to adapt their weakness, softness of temper, outward obedience and childish behavior. If a woman is pretty, then she can do without all these, for at least twenty years of her life. According to Wollstonecraft, Milton was the first poet to offer a deprecatory description of ‘our first frail mother, as in his description it was implied that women are soulless creatures, designed by ‘sweet, attractive grace and docile blind obedience’ to gratify man’s senses. Sh