Understanding the social life of a certain time can give the reader a greater knowledge base to understand the story. ... Before buying the arsenic, she came out form her isolation to date with Homer Baron, a northerner who was contracted by the town to pave the sidewalks and after she bought it, the town stopped seeing Homer Baron "A neighbour saw the Negro man admit him at the kitchen door at dusk one evening. And that was the last we saw Homer Baron" this passage makes the reader supposes that Emily killed Homer Baron with the arsenic. ... On a table is the grooming set for Homer ...

• Word Count: 1289
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

This piece not only shows paternalism, but can also have a critique on the pompousness and pride of those in a position to view themselves as paternalistic. ... When troops trudged home after the war, they're also tainted with the images of war, much like Gawaine trudged home with the knowledge that the magic word had no effect on slaying dragons. ...

• Word Count: 529
• Approx Pages: 2
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Although the narrator is the protagonist of this story, the man he hires to be his scrivener, Bartleby becomes the most important example of the effect communication can have. ... It can be presumed that Bartleby's blunt and honest demeanor left the lawyer with the impression that Bartleby could be trusted. ... The lawyer discovers that Bartleby is living in his office when he states, "he made my office his constant abiding place and home" (Melville 24). ... When the lawyer tried to communicate with Bartleby that he had to leave-offering the ideas of new occupation or place of r...

• Word Count: 755
• Approx Pages: 3
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

This portrays the father as someone who has no clear decision made in life for what he plans to do, even when he goes to one person's home or another's. ... A reader can derive fundamental meanings in many ways from the story, and the author's duty is to lead and direct the thoughts and moods of a piece in the course of their choosing. ... By molding the mood, and other writer techniques into the setting, a precise combination of all the ideas portrayed in the literature can stand out by taking a closer look at the details left unnoticed by the casual reader. ...

• Word Count: 497
• Approx Pages: 2
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

After completing the story, my hopes of the kind of man Nick Adams would grow to be began to dwindle because whether you are only a little child or even a grown man, the matter of witnessing a death is not one that can be dealt with easily. ... Regardless of Nick's close experience with death, he was still not prepared for the ultimate devastation a human being can undertake---a broken heart. The story, Ten Indians, begins with an older Nick than the previous stories, along with a few of his friends coming home after enjoying a fabulous Fourth of July evening. ... Subsequent to his arr...

• Word Count: 1254
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Also, the reader discovers additional information in paragraph eight lines nine and ten. " eat white bread or brown, whichever can be got with least thought or trouble, and would rather starve on a penny than work for a pound." ... "For a long while he used to console himself, when driven from home, by frequenting a kind of perpetual club of the sages, philosophers, and other idle personages of the village- In the group, the members sat on the Inn porch and engaged in deep conversation. ... Because Rip always chooses to do the chores of others, the dilapidated Van Winkle home never gets fixed ...

• Word Count: 1162
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

I also think it is very attractive how he adds that he would love to add more emotions to the story but he can not do it because the story is not his story and does not want to "intrude", it shows he respects the story and makes us readers feel that he is a reliable narrator which sometimes can be an important aspect the readers a looking for in a narrator. ... We can identify with the way he wrote this because in a way we all have retold a story in one or another point of our lives. ... "Well, here's the kicker part, probably by now many of you have that one vacation near to the end she...

• Word Count: 890
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

We tend to think of heroes as imaginary super-heroes with super powers, or the heroes we find everyday in our police stations, fire stations, schools and homes, or those special people who have a vision for the way the world should be when it comes to caring for others. ... When reading the short story "A & P" you begin to think the main character Sammy is a bit of a Looney, but has the reader you can visualize every detail about the three beauties that walk into the A&P shop that evening. ... In the short story Harrison Bergeron, Harrison thought he could show the world that the ...

• Word Count: 912
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Shortly after, Tyler moved to Montreal, where her husband was completing his residency while she published her first novels, If Morning Ever Comes and The Tin Can Tree. ... Perhaps one of Tyler's greatest family novels is If Morning Ever Comes, a story about a home that is "cluttered with people and objects and becoming the place characters often leave and always miss" (DISCovering Authors). ... In Tyler's second novel, The Tin Can Tree, the feeling of stagnation of life and a person's sense of identity create a depression among the characters, as symbolized by the photographs...

• Word Count: 834
• Approx Pages: 3
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

The beginning of the story starts out as a normal day the villagers at time square waiting to get the lottery over so they can get back to their daily activities. "In some towns there were so many people that the lottery took two days and had to be started on June 2nd. but in this village, where there were only about three hundred people, the whole lottery took less than two hours, so it could begin at ten o'clock in the morning and still be through in time to allow the villagers to get home for noon dinner." ...

• Word Count: 903
• Approx Pages: 4
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

"Eveline" conveys how the domineering nature of society and family can draw one to flee their own country seeking of refuge from this very oppressiveness. ... He eerily stalks her every day, he waits from behind his window to see when she leaves her house so he can follow her, always keeping in mind how "[he] did not know whether [he] would ever speak to her or not or how [he] would tell her of [his] confused adoration.... On the morning of Araby, the narrator asks his uncle for money for a train ride to the bazaar, and his uncle says he will give it to him after he returns hom...

• Word Count: 1081
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Seeking and Maintaining Balance: Rohinton Mistry's Fiction. (Critical Essay) Abstract: Balance is an important quality in the fiction of Rohinton Mistry, as suggested by the title of his second novel, 'A Fine Balance.' Mistry was born in India, a member of the Parsi community, and immigrated to Canada in 1975. Mistry's short story collection 'Tales from Firozsha Baag' and his two novels, 'Such a Long Journey' and 'A FIne Balance' focus on the Parsi community in India rather than on the immigrant experience. The Parsis and India become metap...

• Word Count: 4675
• Approx Pages: 19
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Seeking and Maintaining Balance: Rohinton Mistry's Fiction. (Critical Essay) Abstract: Balance is an important quality in the fiction of Rohinton Mistry, as suggested by the title of his second novel, 'A Fine Balance.' Mistry was born in India, a member of the Parsi community, and immigrated to Canada in 1975. Mistry's short story collection 'Tales from Firozsha Baag' and his two novels, 'Such a Long Journey' and 'A FIne Balance' focus on the Parsi community in India rather than on the immigrant experience. The Parsis and India become me...

• Word Count: 4673
• Approx Pages: 19
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

This situation occurs because Robert is an old friend of the narrator's wife, and she arranges for him to stay at her home for a visit following the death of his wife. ... I can honestly say that this story has really made me more aware of just how serious prejudice can be and how much of an impact it can have on a person. ... The reason this is so important is because of how completely different the scenario is; we can begin to see growth. ... The message here is so powerful; that you can gain and learn so much when you overcome your fears and judgments. ... The importance is letting go ...

• Word Count: 1441
• Approx Pages: 6
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Also, women had a standard position at home, but now they are allowed to have any freedom reflected on their clothes, jobs, and identity overall. ... The word "death" can be best defined as, a permanent ending of something or someone loving and irreplaceable. ... Through the story, many of the townspeople's comments about Emily, who is so innocent but yet might be insane, can be portrayed as gossip. ...

• Word Count: 1189
• Approx Pages: 5
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

Within the contents of this tale, a young lad named Robin sets off from his home in the country, on a journey to the little metropolis of a New England colony in search of his uncle Major Molineux. ... Robin's character represents the epiphany of self-guided acknowledgement that the ego must be abandoned first and foremost before any progress can occur. ... "My Kinsman, Major Molineux" displays this great battle between the ego and the true self, and provides a conclusion that defeat of the ego is possible, but only when one can step out of the light and into the darkness of a reality ye...

• Word Count: 1004
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

By using her strength, perhaps she can remedy the isolationism and lack of communication that runs rabid throughout Winesburg. ... Such narrowly focused action can be potentially dangerous, and in Winesburg, it is the source of the people's grotesqueness and ultimate unhappiness. ... Eventually, our isolationism became obsessive to the point that America refused to join World War II until they were attacked on a home front, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. ...

• Word Count: 1325
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

The pattern of these symbolic representations and familiarity suggests that Oates understands how boys can have an adverse effect upon an adolescent girl. ... The representation of how Connie mirrors light imagery and therefore innocence can be observed early in the story. ... For example, when Arnold first appears at Connie's home, he talks about his car and how it has new paint, but just to illustrate how evil he his, Arnold's name appears on his car in "tar-like black letters"(11). ... Even the bright gold color can only manage to "catch the sunlight opaquely"(10), as if wha...

• Word Count: 1509
• Approx Pages: 6
• Grade Level: Undergraduate