Current Search: Honors Student Theses (x) » Symbolism in literature (x)
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- Title
- " Hover through the fog and filthy air": weather witching in Macbeth.
- Creator
- Clifford, Brooke., Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College
- Abstract/Description
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This paper examines early modern climatology in order to analyze a correlation between weather, witchcraft, and their combined effects on Shakespeare's Macbeth. Contemporary climactic patterns including hailstorms, tempests, and other unusual phenomena drastically affected not only England but much of Europe. Religious and scientific texts of the period examined links between weather phenomena and witchcraft, suggesting that the weather afflictions were caused by witchcraft. Shakespeare...
Show moreThis paper examines early modern climatology in order to analyze a correlation between weather, witchcraft, and their combined effects on Shakespeare's Macbeth. Contemporary climactic patterns including hailstorms, tempests, and other unusual phenomena drastically affected not only England but much of Europe. Religious and scientific texts of the period examined links between weather phenomena and witchcraft, suggesting that the weather afflictions were caused by witchcraft. Shakespeare incorporates this suggestion into Macbeth, as well, but takes the connection even further ; the witches in the play not only use their weather magic to afflict Scotland but also control the events of the play.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2012
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3359303
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and literature, Symbolism in literature, Witchcraft in literature, Witchcraft, History
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- "One face, one voice, one habit, and two persons!": twinship and doubling in Twelfth Night.
- Creator
- Puehn, Amanda M., Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College
- Abstract/Description
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This thesis considers the relationship between scientific advances, identity formation, and literature in an early modern print culture. As medical theorists made their discoveries and defended their work they did so within the literary world; turning to the printed word to cultivate their personal identity and rebut dissenting colleagues. Subsequently, playwright William Shakespeare employed common medical knowledge within his plays. Twelfth Night presents male and female twins within the...
Show moreThis thesis considers the relationship between scientific advances, identity formation, and literature in an early modern print culture. As medical theorists made their discoveries and defended their work they did so within the literary world; turning to the printed word to cultivate their personal identity and rebut dissenting colleagues. Subsequently, playwright William Shakespeare employed common medical knowledge within his plays. Twelfth Night presents male and female twins within the scope of a comedy that plays upon the issues of cross-dressing and mistaken sexual identity. During the Renaissance, it was believed that male and female seed was co-present in every person and through dominance a distinct sexual identity was developed. This thesis argues that while Shakespeare initially convoluted this by allowing one of the twins to cross-dress; he resolved the anatomical doubling by presenting both characters together on stage at the close of the play.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2010
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3335455
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Symbolism in literature, Identity (Psychology) in literature, Sex role in literature, Literature and medicine, History
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- "Our fellows in mortality": kindness to animals in Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure.
- Creator
- Brockway, Jessica L., Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College
- Abstract/Description
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In Jude the Obscure, Thomas Hardy depicts characters who are especially sensitive to the suffering of all living creatures and thus engages his novel in the topic of animal rights. In this project I examine the human-animal relationships in Hardy's novel in terms of the ideas of two different philosophers: Peter Singer and Cora Diamond. I argue that, while Singer at first seems to provide a useful model for understanding these relationships in Jude, Diamond's account of these relationships is...
Show moreIn Jude the Obscure, Thomas Hardy depicts characters who are especially sensitive to the suffering of all living creatures and thus engages his novel in the topic of animal rights. In this project I examine the human-animal relationships in Hardy's novel in terms of the ideas of two different philosophers: Peter Singer and Cora Diamond. I argue that, while Singer at first seems to provide a useful model for understanding these relationships in Jude, Diamond's account of these relationships is ultimately a more helpful tool for understanding Hardy's ideas about animals. Diamond helps us see that Hardy believes people should help all living creatures in pain, no matter the cost to themselves, not because they recognize their suffering, but because they recognize a shared commonality with all sentient creatures.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2010
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/3334248
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Criticism and interpretation, Criticism and interpretation, Animal rights (Philosophy), Human-animal relationships in literature, Symbolism in literature, Animals and civilization
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- The " living presence" and the "ideal character": sex, fantasy, and photographs in Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure.
- Creator
- Taylor, Margaret, Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College
- Abstract/Description
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In my thesis I will argue that the source of the major conflict in Jude the Obscure - the traumatic relationship between Sue and Jude - is Jude's viewing of his cousin's photograph early in the novel. Because of his tendency to idealize the individuals around him, Jude projects a desired image onto a photograph of Sue before meeting her in real life. This projection takes on an aspect of reality for Jude which he can not escape, despite Sue's efforts to disillusion him and introduce him to...
Show moreIn my thesis I will argue that the source of the major conflict in Jude the Obscure - the traumatic relationship between Sue and Jude - is Jude's viewing of his cousin's photograph early in the novel. Because of his tendency to idealize the individuals around him, Jude projects a desired image onto a photograph of Sue before meeting her in real life. This projection takes on an aspect of reality for Jude which he can not escape, despite Sue's efforts to disillusion him and introduce him to her actual self. Since his projection starkly contrasts to Sue's actual being, not only does Jude believe that the two are compatible when they are not, but he believes that Sue's attempts to disillusion him are in fact deceitful. Thus the initial impetus of the photograph eventually leads to their conflicted relationship and the tragedy of the novel overall.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2009
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/210004
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Symbolism in literature, Imagination in literature, Despair in literature
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- " Merely to officiate light": the subordination and glorification of God the Son in Paradise Lost.
- Creator
- Cruikshank, Kathryn H., Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College
- Abstract/Description
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This thesis considers the role and function of God the Son within the anti-Trinitarian system John Milton envisions in his epic poem, Paradise Lost. In the poem, God the Father frequently acts independently of His Son, and the divine attributes that traditionally describe the Son, including His timelessness, no longer apply to the character Milton constructs. Despite this apparent degradation, Milton still elevates the Son and considers Him to be a character worthy of our respect. To account...
Show moreThis thesis considers the role and function of God the Son within the anti-Trinitarian system John Milton envisions in his epic poem, Paradise Lost. In the poem, God the Father frequently acts independently of His Son, and the divine attributes that traditionally describe the Son, including His timelessness, no longer apply to the character Milton constructs. Despite this apparent degradation, Milton still elevates the Son and considers Him to be a character worthy of our respect. To account for this seeming paradox, I propose a reading of Paradise Lost that does not dismiss Milton's heretical belief in a subjected Son, but rather uses it as a way envision a new form of power. To do so, I compare the relationship between God the Father and His Son in terms of light and sun imagery, to demonstrate how power is divided and distributed between the two, according to the scientific principles of Milton's day. In addition, I consider how Michel Foucault's concept of the docile body both applies to the Son and explains His deference to the Father. Through these analyses, I hope to demonstrate that the Son's power exists as the result of properly exercising His free will, a will that would not have been His own had He been one with His Father.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2009
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/209988
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Religion, Symbolism in literature, God in literature, Religion and literature, Criticism and interpretation
- Format
- Document (PDF)
- Title
- The celebration of uncertainty through gothic moments in Emily Brontèe's Wuthering Heights.
- Creator
- Copeland, Kimberly., Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College
- Abstract/Description
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While critics have argued that the Gothic moments in Emily Brontèe's Wuthering Heights merely illuminate the psyches of her characters, I show that these moments allow Brontèe to reveal a unique tension and overflow of emotion that arises between her two main protagonists. Blurring the lines between fantasy and reality, these displays --scenes of ghostly hauntings, bloody violence, and excessive emotion--create a desirable uncertainty about the limits of life and love in this novel. This...
Show moreWhile critics have argued that the Gothic moments in Emily Brontèe's Wuthering Heights merely illuminate the psyches of her characters, I show that these moments allow Brontèe to reveal a unique tension and overflow of emotion that arises between her two main protagonists. Blurring the lines between fantasy and reality, these displays --scenes of ghostly hauntings, bloody violence, and excessive emotion--create a desirable uncertainty about the limits of life and love in this novel. This uncertainty constitutes an escape from and an alternative to the conventional romantic relationship prescribed by social and narrative standards in which two people fall in love, get married, have children and die. In my thesis, I argue that the revelation of this desired uncertainty is made possible by Brontèe's use of Gothic devices and could not have been as successfully achieved by any other literary mode.
Show less - Date Issued
- 2009
- PURL
- http://purl.flvc.org/FAU/209987
- Subject Headings
- Criticism and interpretation, Symbolism in literature, Gothic revival (Literature), English fiction, History and criticism
- Format
- Document (PDF)