Essay Samples on Literary Criticism

Essay Examples
Essay Topics

Exploring Feminist Literary Criticism: Unveiling Mona Lisa Smile

Introduction Self-assessment and criticism help us improve our skills and the ways in which we communicate our ideas and perspectives with others. In this feminist literary criticism essay, I will be critiquing and analysis of the movie Mona Lisa Smile. Firstly, I will explain why...

The Handmaid's Tale': Analysis of Destructive Power of Sexism

The advocacy for women's rights began in the mid 1960's as the Women's Liberation Movement. Their main focus is the idea of women’s equality, the possibility that females can do and ought to be permitted to do anything males can do. Women's rights activists believe...

Gender Roles in 'The Handmaid's Tale': Rape Culture and Victim Blame

Margaret Atwood's novel 'The Handmaid's Tale' has many controversial gender roles that we are similarly still facing today in the twenty first century. Gender roles are clear traditional perceptions of what society expects the person to be and/or act based on their gender. The topic...

Feminism and Totalitarism in 'The Handmaid's Tale' Dystopia Novel

Dystopia is the opposite of the ideal society, which is a utopia, that often appears in literature and artistic creation. Dystopias are typically post-apocalyptic or totalitaristic, but there are other forms of dystopias as well such as feminist, cyberpunk, off-world, etc. With 'The Handmaid's Tale'...

"Rules of the Game" and "Everyday Use": Literary Analysis and Comparison

Conflict has always been a literary tool and is sometimes used to address the writer’s thematic concerns. In “Everyday Use” by Alice Walker and “Rules of the Game” by Amy Tan, conflicts between mother and daughter are used to address the characters’ cultural identities and...

“A Good Man Is Hard to Find”: Literary Analysis of Used Elements

“A Good Man Is Hard to Find” by Flannery O'Conner is a book that entails a discussion on relevant practices reflecting on basic life issues experienced. The story focuses on a grandmother that takes the initiative to convince the son Bailey and the wife to...

“A Good Man Is Hard to Find” - Summary of O’Connor's Beliefs

“A Good Man Is Hard to Find”: Summary of the Story “A Good Man Is Hard to Find” is a short story written by Flannery O’Connor in 1953. O’Connor was a writer who was known for her Southern Gothic genre of writing, and “A Good...

Literary Analysis of "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson Through the Marxism Lenses

Introduction When a government rules freely over the public, traditions develop in the minds of the working class. As stated by Cuddon, Marxist criticism is a “primarily concern with economic, political and philosophical issues” that explains a “capitalist theory and mode production” (Cuddon 527). In...

The Relationship Between Magical Realism and Feminist Movement

Magical realism is a literary genre that emerged more like a movement first associated with European paintings than Latin American writers. Unlike other genres, magical realism depicts a combination of realistic fiction and real-life moments. The Latin Americans invested in the genre to express their...

Feminism in Dystopian Novels: Parable of the Sower, Woman on the Edge of Time, and Binti

Essay grade Excellent

Feminism has been changing the way people think about gender since the 1960’s, and this change can be seen in the writers of different novels. Feminism and gender roles are portrayed in the characters in Woman on the Edge of Time by Marge Piercy, Parable...

Critical Analysis of John Milton's Poem "Lycidas"

Essay grade Satisfactory

In this paper, I will be critically analyzing Portrait of the Poet as Landscape by A.M. Klein. This poem in general discusses about finding the identity of the poet and his art. The poet states “Lycidas” which is a poem created by John Milton and...

The Role of Themes and Symbolism in "The Jilting of Granny Weatherall"

Essay grade Good

In literature, there are many different genres of stories one can read. From fiction to autobiographies, there is something for everyone to enjoy. While stories are enjoyable, sometimes it is important to slow down and look at the deeper meaning(s) behind what the author is...

Mythology as the Source of Imagery in T. S. Elliot's The Wasteland

The Wasteland was a famous poem from 20 centuries that was written by Eliot T.S. According to Eliot every poet takes ideas from his role models and transform them into something new. In the Wasteland the concept of intertextuality appears in themes of death, tragic...

The Wasteland: Criticism of the Humanity's Neglect of the Environment

The poem The Wasteland, provides a negative portrayal of the cultural and environmental state of the modern world. Through the use of polyphony, it compiles a shared sense of cultural doom, the landscaping which is utilized is often barren and dry, this indicates the view...

Analysis of the Feminist Approach in The Story of an Hour

Essay grade Satisfactory

Every death may have a variety of consequences on a person. People experience euphoria from it on occasion, but the great majority of the time they do not. Most widows would react negatively to the death of their beloved spouse, but Louise reacted calmly. In...

International Imitation Hemingway Competition: Literary Analysis

Modern American and British fiction have been altered due to the contributions of Ernest Hemmingway. Through his minimalistic writing style, Hemmingway instigated a conversation about masculinity, war, and the individual perspective of time. By addressing convoluted themes such as masculinity, Hemmingway created a shift in...

Comparison of Modernism and Postmodernism in Literary Criticism

Essay grade Excellent

Abstract This paper investigates the definition and the major principles of two successive literary movements namely modernism and postmodernism and the differences between them. Which Together, they were two important moments in critical thought in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Though the concept of modernism...

Overwhelming Criticism of Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

Critics have made a lot of accusations against the amount of racism and anti-feminist comments in Joseph Conrad’s novel, Heart of Darkness. These critics have well-crafted their arguments on why their point of view on the content of the novel is the correct opinion. Across...

Cranes By Hwang SunWon: Analysis of the Short Story

Essay grade Good

Have you ever felt that your opinions and beliefs opposed the wider set of beliefs held by your society? In the narrative “Shakespeare In The Bush”, Laura Bohannan explores this exact topic -- whether or not the opinions humans hold are universal in nature. Bohannan...

The Review of Cities of Salt in Ghosh's Petrofiction: The Oil Encounter and the Novel

Cities of Salt: Less Wish-Fulfillment, More a Wish for Fulfillment In his review of Munif's Cities of Salt, “Petrofiction: The Oil Encounter and the Novel”, Ghosh criticizes the ending of the novel as being “founded in pure wish-fulfillment”, criticizing that unlike in the real world,...

"Catcher in The Rye": Quotes About Innocence

Loss of Innocence Holden pesters Stradlater about Jane because he hasn’t seen her in years and represents Jane with innocence in his mind. I walked over to the window, but you couldn’t see out of it, it was so steamy from all the heat in...

Behind The Formaldehyde Curtain: Summary and Analysis

Essay grade Excellent

"Behind the Formaldehyde Curtain" is an essay written by Jessica Mitford in 1963, originally published in The American Way of Death. The essay exposes the American funeral industry's practices and procedures, including the embalming process and the sale of expensive caskets, and criticizes the industry's...

Charles Baudelaire's Une Charogne And Its Influence On European Literature

Literary history is reminiscent of an orchestra. Once a single entity, it further breaks down into families, pitch groups, and individual instruments. The sections play to different meters, harmonize chords at Adagio and Allegro, or stumble off a solo, flat note; such a cacophony demands...

Biographical Criticism In Terms Of Motherhood In "The Yellow Wallpaper"

Essay grade Good

Charlotte Perkins Gilman writes a very detailed short story that for some, may not be understood well. For most women, mothers more specifically, I think that her short story, The Yellow Wallpaper, becomes a familiar place that we’ve all been at one point or another....

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