AD's English Literature

Paradox of Tragedy: Understanding the Pleasure Amidst Pain and Suffering The paradox of tragedy lies in the fact that a drama dealing with pain, vice, misery and often culminating in death is not only able to interest us but even give us pleasure. Comedy posses not such riddle since is deals with an ostensibly happy tale; often ending in mirth and the pleasure of the audience is commensurate and therefore needs no explication. But critics from Aristotle onwards have felt obliged to explain the phenomenon of audiences’ pleasure being inversely proportional to the suffering of the protagonist of the play in the case of tragedy. Decoding Aristotle's Concept of Catharsis in Tragedy The earliest specific answer to this problem is that offered by Aristotle in which he affirms that by arousing pity and fear tragedy affects a catharsis or ‘purgation’ of these and kindred emotions. As Aristotle did not elaborate on the concept of catharsis laid down in his celebrated definition of tragedy ...

Short notes on History of English Literature A Set of 26 Objective Questions & Answers Dickens set so personal a stamp on his books that at every turn he seemed to be an innovator. Dickens’ novels reflect the contemporary Victorian urban society with all its conflicts and disharmonies, both physical and intellectual.  The stories of Dickens reflect the social evils of the Victorian Age. Lamb seldom permitted his profounder views of life to appear above the humorous, pathetic and ironical surface of his writings. ‘Above all Charles Lamb was a refined humanist whose smile could be both satirist and tender.’‘Lambs’ essays are lyric poems in prose.’

Short notes on History of English Literature A Set of 26 Objective Questions & Answers 26 multiple choice questions (MCQs)  1. Keats was a romantic poet who believed in the importance of ___________. (a) sight (b) taste (c) touch (d) smell (e) all of the above 2. Keats has been called ‘a mystic through the medium of the senses’ because ___________. (a) he believed that the senses were the gateway to a higher reality (b) he was interested in the physical world (c) he was a poet of nature (d) all of the above 3. Shelley’s weaknesses as a writer include ___________. (a) rhetorical abstraction (b) intellectual arrogance (c) movements of intense self-pity (d) all of the above 4. In the best of Shelley’s poetry, there is ___________. (a) splendour of movement (b) realization of visionary intensity (c) both (a) and (b) (d) none of the above 5. Shelley was inspired by love that is not limited to mankind only. This is evident in his poem ___________. (a) "Ode to a Nightingale" (b...

The Moral Core: Crafting the Fable and Preserving Unity In his Epistle dedicatory William Congreve gives an account of the plot – pattern of his second play, The Double Dealer : “I design the moral first and to that moral I invented the fable, and do not know that I have borrowed one hint of it any where. I made the plot as strong as I could, because it was single because I would avoid confusion and was resolved to preserve the three unities of the drama” The statement involves the three main points:  I . The plot of the play as a moral at the centre of it.  II. The fable that makes the plot is Congreve’s invention. III. The plot is an affair of a single story, the structure adhering to the rule of three unities. Maskwell's Deception: The Triumph of Poetic Justice The first point is to be discussed first. The moral of the play seems to have much to do with the concept of ‘poetic justice ‘, as introduced by Rymer who in Tragedies of The Last Age declares: “Literature shou...

Dr. Johnson'  Methods Dogmatic and Magisterial Dr. Johnson is one of the greatest of literary critics of England. As a critic, his popularity and authority veined with the size of romanticism because his views and opinions suffer form a number of prejudices and limitation. He was a man of his age. He belongs to the school of ‘classic’ or ‘judicial’ criticism as against the ‘Romantics’ or Aesthetic criticism of the next generation. We find him judging by set rules, “rules of old discovered and not devised” in the tradition of Dryden and pope. It is this habit of applying timed rules to the poet vender discussion that makes Johnson the” last great English critic who treated poets, not as men to be understood, but as school boys to be corrected”. His judgment remain essentially dogmatic and traditional and we find him disturbing praise a blame to poets, “with the confident assurance of a school master looking over a boy’s exercise” (John Bailey). His Prejudices and Limitations His Cr...

Is J. M. Synge’s "Riders To The Sea" Dramatic? J. M. Synge's "Riders to the Sea": A Discussion on Its Relatively Passive Plot Introduction The contentious issue of whether J. M. Synge's "Riders to the Sea" is lacking in dramatic action or the characters --- themselves entirely passive , is usually resolve in contrary manners by contradicting critics since there is no human conflict nor is there major dramatic action occurring on the stage - has often led to the opinion that it has a relatively passive plot. Now first what is a passive plot? In literature, a passive plot refers to a narrative structure that lacks significant external action or dramatic events, focusing instead on internal struggles, emotions, and character development. It may prioritize exploring themes and the human condition over traditional plot progression and conflict. Understanding the Plot of "Riders to the Sea" J. M. Synge "Riders to the Sea" is a one-...

Introduction Emily Dickinson was pre-eminently a lyric poet. Her output of lyrics is indeed amazing. Her lyrics cover a wide range of subjects, such as love, pain and suffering, death, nature, etc. The range of her moods in these lyrics is also very wide - from ordinary joy to a feeling of ecstasy, and from mild regret to deep despair. There is hardly any mood that does not find expression in these poems.