I understand your sense of exclusion, of being cut off from a life here; and I trust

you will find access to us with my son’s help. But remember that words are

signals, counters. They are not immortal. And it can happen--to use an image

you’ll understand--it can happen that a civilization can be imprisoned in a

linguistic contour which no longer matches the landscape of . . . fact. 

Piece: Translations

Playwrite: Brian Friel

Period: Postcolonial

Literary Context: After Yolland expresses his sense of isolation, of being shut out from the community because he cannot speak Gaelic, Hugh offers a comment that places Yolland’s situation in the larger context of history

Historical Context: Loss of the Irish language is part of an inevitable cycle of cultural decline according to the circumstance of history.

Just as the glorious literature of Greece and Rome once represented the life of a thriving culture, Hugh claims it will vanish because the “linguistic contour” of Gaelic no longer matches the “fact” of British Imperial rule

I knew both these men intimately.

There was good mixed in with the bad

In Billy the Kid

And bad mixed in with the good

In Pat Garret. (89)

I’d shot him well and careful

made it explode under his heart

so it wouldn’t last long and

was about to walk away

when this chicken paddles out to him. . . . (15)

Piece: Collected Works of Billy the Kid

Author: Michael Ondaatje

Period: Postmodernism

Literary Context: Billy writes about one of the many men that he's killed, demonstrating his seemingly heartless nature and his regard for killing a man as if a form of art

Up with the curtain

down with your pants

William Bonney

is going to dance (63)

Piece: Collected Works of Billy the Kid

Author: Michael Ondaatje

Period: Postmodernism

Literary Context: Billy speaks to his lover Angie D, demonstrating his playful nature (stark contrast to his gunslinging harshness). Further illustrates the complexity of his character, also mingling with his attitude of a gentle lover ("she is so brown and lovely..how do I wake her?")

For I have known them all already, known them all--

. . . . . . . .

And I have known the eyes already, known them all--

. . . . . . . .

And I have known the arms already, known them all-- (49, 55, 62)

Piece: The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock

Poet: T.S. Elliot

Period: Modernism

Literary Context:

Historical Context:Illustrates the modernist preoccupation with altering the structure of poetry (through free verse) while expressing modernist themes (e.g, alienation, self-awareness, self-consciousness, social persona as a mask for interaction). 

If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood

Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,

Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud

Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues. . . . (21-24)

Piece: Dulce Decorum Est

Author: Wilfrid Owen

Period: Modernism

Literary Context:Description of death by chlorine gas

Historical Context: Provides a new perspective on war (rejects it as glorious)

Everything seemed possible, everything seemed right. Just now (but this cannot

last, she thought, dissociating herself from the moment while they were all talking

about boots) just now she had reached security . . . all of which rising in this

profound stillness (she was helping William Bankes to one very small piece more

134

and peered into the depths of the earthenware pot) seemed now for no special

reason to stay there like a smoke, like a fume rising upwards, holding them safe

together. Nothing need be said; nothing could be said. There it was, all round

them. It partook, she felt, carefully helping Mr Bankes to a specially tender piece,

of eternity. . . . Of such moments, she thought, the thing is made that remains for

ever after. (141-42)

Piece: To the Lighthouse

Author: Virginia Woolf

Period: Modernism

Literary Context: At a dinner party Mrs. Ramsay is given a glimpse of the world as a harmonious, unified whole (this type of experience strengthens her). Demonstrates subjectiveness and the significance of the ordinary

Historical Context: Demonstrates advancing interest in psychology with James' Oedipus complex and growing class tensions through Tansley, as well as a sentimental look at the prewar Victorian era, demonstrated as life inside the window

It was a question, she remembered, how to connect this mass on the right hand

with that on the left. She might do it by bringing the line of the branch across so;

or break the vacancy in the foreground by an object (James perhaps) so. But the

danger was that by doing that the unity of the whole might be broken. (73-74)

There is a code of behaviour, she knew, whose seventh article (it may be) says

that on occasions of this sort it behooves the woman, whatever her own

occupation may be, to go to the help of the young man opposite . . . as indeed it

is their duty, she reflected, in her old maidenly fairness, to help us, suppose the

Tube were to burst into flames. Then, she thought, I should certainly expect Mr

Tansley to get me out. But how would it be, she thought, if neither of us did either

of these things? (123)

[they] sport with infidel ideas which they had brewed for themselves of a life

different from hers; in Paris, perhaps; a wilder life; not always taking care of

some man or other; for there was in their minds a mute questioning of deference

and chivalry, of the Bank of England and the Indian Empire, of ringed fingers and

lace. . . . (11-12)

Indeed, she had the whole of the other sex under her protection; for reasons she

could not explain, for their chivalry and valour, for the fact that they negotiated

treaties, ruled India, controlled finance; and finally for an attitude towards herself

which no woman could fail to feel or to find agreeable, something trustful,

childlike, reverential; which an old woman could take from a young man without

loss of dignity, and woe betide the girl--pray heaven it was none of her

daughters--who did not feel the worth of it, and all that it implied, the marrow of

her bones. (11)

Again, if one is a woman one is often surprised by a sudden splitting off of

consciousness, say in walking down Whitehall, when from being the natural

inheritor of all that civilization, she becomes, on the contrary, outside of it, alien

and critical. (2.2686)

Indeed, since freedom and fullness of expression are of the essence of the art,

such a lack of tradition, such a scarcity and inadequacy of tools, must have told

enormously on the writing of women. Moreover, a book is not made of sentences

laid end to end, but of sentences built, if an image helps, into arcades and

domes. And this shape too has been made by men out of their own needs for

their own uses. There is no reason to think that the form of the epic or of the

poetic play suits a woman any more than the sentence suits her. But all the older

forms of literature were hardened and set by the time she became a writer.

(2.2684)

the perpetual admonitions of the eternal pedagogue--write this, think that. They

alone were deaf to that persistent voice, now grumbling, now patronising, now

domineering, now grieved, now shocked, now angry, now avuncular, that voice

which cannot let women alone, but must be at them, like some too conscientious

governess, adjuring them, like Sir Egerton Brydges, to be refined; dragging even

into the criticism of poetry criticism of sex. (2.2683)

For there is no friend like a sister

In calm or stormy weather;

To cheer one on the tedious way,

To fetch one if one goes astray,

To lift one if one totters down,

To strengthen whilst one stands. (562-67)

Piece: Goblin Market

Author: Christina Rossetti

Period: Victorian

Literary Context:Expresses the importance of the relationship between sisters and women, demonstrated in the similarities between the sisters and their reliance on one another

Historical Context: Demonstrates interest in not only morality, feminism and society but also internal depth and psychology. Although the women in the poem are highly identified with the domestic sphere and objectified, the poem combines the pure woman with the fallen woman, and transforms the home, not into a haven for men, but into a powerful, safe community for women.  Nowhere do we see any men, except for the unnatural male goblins, and even at the end, the husbands of Lizzie and Laura are kept out of the picture. 

Golden head by golden head,

Like two pigeons in one nest

Folded in each other’s wings,

They lay down in their curtained bed,

Like two blossoms on one stem. . . . (184-88)

[The goblins] elbowed and jostled her,

clawed her with their nails,

barking, mewing, hissing, mocking

Tore her gown and soiled her stocking. (400-03)

I learnt a little algebra, a little

Of the mathematics,--brushed with extreme flounce

The circle of the sciences, because

She misliked women who are frivolous. (1.403-06)

Piece: Aurora Leigh

Poet: Elizabeth Barret Browning

Period: Victorian

Literary Context:Aurora is dissatisfied with her education thus far, wishing to be a poet rather than merely a poetess

Historical Context: The fictional autobiography of an academically driven young woman is a new style of articulating the public debate of suffrage

By the way,

The works of women are symbolical.

We sew, sew, prick our fingers, dull our sight,

Producing what? A pair of slippers, sir,

To put on when you’re weary--or a stool

To stumble over and vex you. . . . ”curse that stool!”

Or else, at best, a cushion where you lean and sleep,

And dream of something we are not

But would be for your sake. Alas, alas!

This hurts most, this--that after all, we are paid

The worth of our work, perhaps. (1.455-64)

“Aurora, dear,

And dearly honoured,”--he pressed in at once

With eager utterance,--“you translate me ill.

I do not contradict my thought of you with another thought

Found less so. If your sex is weak for art

(And I, who said so, did but honour you

By using truth in courtship), it is strong

For life and duty. . . .” (2.367-75)

I too have my vocation,--work to do

. . . . . .

124

and, though your world

Were twice as wretched as you represent,

Most serious work, most necessary work. (2.455-59)

Never flinch,

But still, unscrupulously epic, catch

Upon the burning lava of a song

The full-veined, heaving, double-breasted Age:

That, when the next shall come, the men of that

May touch the impress with reverent hand, and say

“Behold,--the paps we all have sucked!

This bosom seems to beat still, or at least

It sets ours beating: this is living art

Which thus presents and thus records true life.” (5.213-22)

And I made a rural pen,

And I stained the water clear,

And I wrote my happy songs

Every child may joy to hear. (17-20)

Piece: Songs of Innocence and of Experience (introduction)

Author: William Blake

Period: Romantic

Literary Context: As a speaker "pipes" along, he is initially writing a song for his own pleasure but, as his dialogue with a boy on a cloud continues, his intention mediates between his own satisfaction and that of an audience

Historical Context:Blake’s “Introduction” suggests that there is some loss or diminution in the process of sharing that artistic creation--the waters must be “stained” (18) and the reed “plucked” (16) before the songs can be recorded--but the loss involved in this fall from melody into text is compensated

for in the shared pleasure the song now creates

Why is it more ridiculous for a man than for a woman to do worsted work and

drive out every day in the carriage? Why should we laugh if we were to see a

parcel of men sitting around a drawing room table in the morning, and think it all

right if they were women? (2.1612

Piece: Cassandra

Author: Florence Nightingale

Period: Victorian

Literary Context:Her recognition of the absurdity of the double standard of domestic live

Historical Context: Recognizes the constraints Victorian expectations of domesticity placed on her intellectual energies.

But if she has no intellectual hold upon her husband’s heart, she must inevitably

become that most helpless and pitiable of earthly objects--a slighted wife.

Conversation, understood in its proper character, as distinct from mere talk,

might rescue her from this. Not conversation upon books, if her husband

happens to be a fox-hunter; nor upon fox-hunting, if he is a book-worm; but

exactly that kind of conversation which is best adapted to his tastes and habits,

yet at the same time capable of leading him a little out of both into a wider field of

observation, and subjects he may never have derived amusement from before,

simply from the fact of their never having been presented to his notice.--How

pleasantly the evening hours may be made to pass, when a woman who really

can converse, will thus beguile the time. (2.1634)

Piece: The Women of England

Author: Sarah Stickney Ellis

Period: Victorian

Context:Though an advocate for female education, ellis took a less extreme approach towards feminism, seeing women as inspirers of virtue and the guardians of society. Believes in preserving the nuclear family and status quo of the time. 

Let us single out from any particular seminary a child who has been there from

the years of ten to fifteen, and reckon, if it can be reckoned, the pains that have

been spent in making that child proficient in Latin. Have the same pains been

spent in making her disinterestedly kind? And yet what man is there in existence

who would not rather his wife should be free from selfishness than be able to

read Virgil without the use of a dictionary? (2.1634)

Look at all the heroines, whether of romance or reality--at all the female

characters held up to universal admiration--at all who have gone down to

honoured graves, amongst the tears and lamentations of their survivors. Have

these been the learned, the accomplished women; the women who could solve

problems, and elucidate systems of philosophy? No: or if they have, they have

also been women who were dignified with the majesty of moral greatness.

(2.1633-34)

He is callèd by thy name,

For he calls himself a Lamb;

He is meek & he is mild,

He became a little child:

I a child & thou a lamb,

We are callèd by his name. . . . (13-18)

And because I am happy, & dance & sing,

They think they have done me no injury,

And are gone to praise God & his Priest & King,

Who make up a heaven of our misery. (9-12)

I assert for My self that I do not behold the Outward Creation & that to me it is

hindrance & not Action; it is as the dirt upon my feet, No part of Me. “What,” it will

be Question’d, “When the Sun rises do you not see a round disk of fire somewhat

106

like a Guinea?” o no, no, I see an Innumerable company of the Heavenly host

crying “Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty.” I question not my Corporeal or

Vegetative Eye any more than I would Question a Window concerning a Sight: I

look thro it & not with it. (qtd. in A Vision of the Last Judgement in Blake’s Poetry

and Designs 416)

Piece: Songs of Innocence and of Experience (The Chimney Sweeper's Poems)

But thou, my babe! shalt wander like a breeze

By lakes and sandy shores, beneath the crags

Of ancient mountain, and beneath the clouds,

Which image in their bulk both lakes and shores

And mountain crags . . . . (54-58)

As to the poetical Character itself, (I mean that sort of which, if I am any thing, I

am a member; that sort distinguished from the wordsworthian or egotistical

sublime, which is a thing per se and stands alone) it is not itself--it has no self--it

is everything and nothing--It has no character--it enjoys light and shade; it lives in

gusto, be it foul or fair, high or low, rich or poor, mean or elevated--It has as

much delight in conceiving an Iago as an Imogen. (2.1000)

Piece: Ode on a Grecian Urn

Poet: John Keats

Period: Romantic

Literary Context:Keats' letter to a friend, advocating for differentiating between lyric voices

Historical context: Does this in 'Ode' by entering the urn as a character

To be acting! After all his objections--objections so just and so public!

After all she had heard him say, and seen him look, and known him to be

feeling! Could it be possible? Edmund so inconsistent. Was he not

deceiving himself? Was he not wrong? Alas! it was all Miss Crawford’s doing.

(141)

Piece: Mansfield Park

Author: Jane Auster

Period: Romantic

Literary Context:When Edmund claims that he is only willing to perform in Lover’s Vows in order to spare Mary Crawford the shame of acting opposite a stranger, Fanny quite astutely realises that he is letting his feelings for Mary affect his judgement

Historical Context:Already an outsider because of her lowly position and humble nature, Fanny is further marginalized when Edmund makes a compromise and agrees to perform in the play he had formerly rejected as unsuitable

Since I have raised to myself so great an audience, I shall spare no pains to

make their instruction agreeable, and their diversion useful. For which reasons I

shall endeavour to enliven morality with wit, and to temper wit with morality, that

my readers may, if possible, both ways find their account in the speculation of the

88

day. (1.2472)

Piece: The Spectator

Authors: Joseph Addision and Richard Steele

Period: Restoration of the 18th Century

Literary Context: Expression that the essay is to provide both an exercise for morals and some entertainment

Historical Context: Allowed the periodical essay to become an important style of the period, largely due to the state of society at the end of the 17th century (middle class were gaining power and expanding). Authors found intersection between wit of aristocracy and sober morality of middle class.

whereas the maintenance of a hundred thousand children from two years old and

upwards cannot be computed at less than ten shillings a piece per annum, the

nation’s stock will be thereby increased fifty thousand pounds per annum . . . and

the money will circulate among ourselves. (1.2596)

Piece: A Modest Proposal

Author: Johnathan Swift

Period: Restoration of the 18th Century

Literary Context: A section of a parodied political pamphlet where he claims that his plan will be economically profitable

Historical Context: Shift from Horatian Satire to Juvenilian, which is more harsh and deep-cutting

would be a great inducement to marriage. . . . It would increase the care and

tenderness of mothers towards their children. . . . We should soon see an honest

emulation among the married women, which of them could bring the fattest child

to market. Men would become as fond of their wives, during the time of their

pregnancy, as they are now of their mares in foal . . . nor offer to beat or kick

them, (as is too frequent a practice) for fear of a miscarriage. (1.2596)

What dire offence from am’rous causes springs

What mighty contests rise from trivial things,

I sing--This verse to Caryll, Muse! is due:

This, ev’n Belinda may vouchsafe to view:

Slight is the subject, but not so the praise,

If She inspire, and He approve my lays. (1.1-6)

Piece: The Rape of the Lock

Author: Alexander Pope

Period: Restoration of the 18th century

Literary Context: Pope's piece is satirical in the sense that it addresses a serious topic with a light tone. Here, in the opening of the poem, Belinda awakens, protected by invisible characters

Historical Context: The theft of a piece of hair was taken much too seriously, causing a rift between two families

Whether the nymph shall break Diana’s law,

Or some frail China jar receive a flaw,

Or stain her honour, or her new brocade,

Forget her pray’rs, or miss a masquerade,

Or lose her heart, or necklace, at a ball. (2.105-09)

Piece: Rape of the Lock

Author: Alexander Pope

Period: Restoration of the 18th Century

Context: Pope mocks the sylphs, suggesting that they cannot take anything seriously

The King unseen

Lurk’d in her hand, and mourn’d his captive Queen:

He springs to vengeance with an eager pace

And falls like thunder on the prostrate Ace. (3.95-98)

Piece: Rape of the Lock

Author: Alexander Pope

Period: Restoration of the 18th Century

Context: Belinda plays a game of cards used as a metaphor for war

Was it for this you took such constant care

The bodkin, comb, and essence to prepare?

For this your locks in paper durance bound,

For this with tort’ring irons wreath’d around?

For this with fillets strain’d your tender head,

And bravely bore the double loads of lead? (4.98-102)

All Nature is but art, unknown to thee;

All chance, direction, which thou canst not see;

All discord, harmony not understood;

All partial evil, universal good. (286-89)

Piece: Essay on a Man

Author: Alexander Pope

Period: Restoration of the 18th Century

Context: Represents the poem as a philosophical essay discussing man and the universe, stating here that imperfection is only a perception

Is, to dispute well, logic’s chiefest end?

Affords this art no greater miracle?

Then read no more, thou hast attained the end;

A greater subject fitteth Faustus’ wit. (1.1.8-11)

Piece: Tragical Case of Dr. Faustas

Author: Christopher Marlowe

Period:Early Modern

Context: Sitting alone in his study, Faustus is displeased with his academia and wishes to accomplish more

Ah stay, good Faustus, stay thy desperate steps!

I see an angel hover o’er thy head,

And with a vial full of precious grace

Offers to pour the same into thy soul! (5.1.55-58)

Now draw up Faustus like a foggy mist

Into the entrails of yon labouring cloud,

That when you vomit forth into the air

My limbs may issue from your smoky mouths,

So that my soul may but ascend to heaven. (5.2.147-51)

Blazon

Definition: A listing of a beloved attributes (usually physical)

Piece: Amoretti

Poet: Edmund Spenser

Period: 16th Century

and by proof we feel

Our power sufficient to disturb his Heaven,

And with perpetual inroads to alarm,

Though inaccessible his fatal throne:

Which, if not victory, is yet revenge. (2.101-05)

Piece: Paradise Lost

Author: John Milton

Period: Early Modern

Context: Satan's motivation for constructing the downfall of man: pissing off God

Definition: Describing one thing by means to another (implicit)

Piece: On First Looking Into Chapman's Homer

Poet: John Keats

Period: 19th Century

Definition: Adaptation of the Petrarchan sonnet (rhyme scheme abab cdcd efef gg

Piece: Sonnet 73

Poet: William SP

Period: 18th Century

Definition: A Lament based on the greek poems of loss, inclusion of dieties and nymphs (often blamed for death)

Piece: Lycidas

Author: John Milton

Period: 17th Century

Definition: Component of the romantic narrative, characterized by a call to danger and retrieval of an important object

Example: Canterbury Tales, Chaucer, Medieval

Definition: Refers to a time of courtesy and courtliness, not necessarily about love

Example: Sir Gawain and the Green Night, 15th Century

Definition: Combination of morality and entertainment

Example: Cant Tales, Chaucer, Medieval

Definition: Group of characters providing commentary on plot

Example: Tragical History of Dr. Faustas, Marlowe, Early Modern

Stylistic feature of literary epic (PL) where one thing is compared to another on a large scale

Allegorical drama, examines individual

EG: Tragical History of Dr Faustas, Marlowe, EM

This desert soil

Wants not her hidden luster, gems, and gold;

Nor want we skill or art, from whence to raise

Magnificence; and what can Heaven show more? (2.270-73)

What if we find

Some easier enterprise? There is a place

(If ancient and prophetic fame in Heaven

Err not), another world, the happy seat

Of some new race called Man, about this time

To be created like to us, though less

In power and excellence, but favoured more

Of him who rules above. . . . (2.344-51)

a battle-blessed sword with strong-edged blade

a marvellous weapon men might admire

though over-heavy for any to heft

when finely forged by giants of old (1375-78)

Beowulf finds the giant sword, allowing him to defeat Hrothgrar's mother

Beowulf, Middle Ages

Hold now, Earth what men may not,

the hoard of the heroes, earth-gotten wealth

when it was first won. War-death has felled them

an evil befalling each of my people.

The long-house is mirthless when men are lifeless.

I have none to wear sword, none to bear wine

or polish the precious vessels and plates.

Gone are the brothers who braved many battles.

. . . . . . .

No harp rejoices to herald the heroes,

no hand-fed hawk swoops through the hall,

no stallion stamps in the keep’s courtyard.

Death has undone many kindreds of men. (1977-84; 1991-94)

For these precious things I look upon last,

I thank the Lord, eternal World-Ruler.

Bright is this boon my life’s loss has bought,

to lighten my death-day. Look to our people,

for you shall be leader; I lead no longer. (2464-68)

Beloved Beowulf, best of defenders,

guard against anger and gain for yourself

perpetual profit. Put aside pride,

worthiest warrior. Now for awhile

your force flowers, yet soon it will fail.

Sickness or age will strip you of strength,

or the fangs of flame, or flood-surges,

the sword’s bite or the spear’s flight,

or fearful frailty as bright eyes fade,

dimming to darkness. Afterward death

will sweep you away, strongest of war-chiefs. (1552-62)

“Would you grant me the grace,” said Gawain to the king,

“To be gone from this bench and stand by you there,

If I without discourtesy might quit this board,

And if my liege lady misliked it not,

I would come to your counsel before your court noble.” (343-47)

Gawaiin undertakes the challenge on King Arthur's behalf

Sir Gawaiin and the Green Knight, Middle Ages

And why the pentangle is proper to that peerless prince

I intend now to tell, though detain me it must.

It is a sign by Solomon sagely devised

To be a token of truth, by its title of old,

For it is a figure formed of five points,

And each line is linked and locked to next

For ever and ever, and hence it is called

In all England, as I hear, the endless knot. (623-30

“And Gawain,” said the good host, “agree now to this:

Whatever I win in the woods I will give you at eve,

And all you have earned you must offer to me;

Swear now, sweet friend, to swap as I say,

Whether hands, in the end, be empty or better.” (1105-09)

For that is my belt about you, that same braided girdle,

My wife it was that wore it; I know well the tale,

And the count of your kisses and your conduct too,

And the wooing of my wife--It was all my scheme! (2358-61)

Me thinketh it accordant to resoun

To telleth you al the condicioun

Of eech of hem, so as it seemed to me,

And whiche they were, and of what degree. (37-40)

Glose whoso wol, and saye bothe up and down

That they were maked for purgacioun

If urine, and oure bothe thinges smale

Was eek to knowe a femele from a male,

And for noon other cause--saye ye no?

Th’experience woot it is nought so. (125-30)

But Lord Crist, whan that it remembreth me

Upon my youthe and on my jolitee,

It tikleth me aboute myn herte roote--

Unto this day it dooth myn herte boote

That I have had my world as in my time.

But age, allas, that al wol envenime,

Hath me biraft my beautee and my pith--

Lat go, farewel, the devel go therwith!

The flour is goon, ther is namore to telle:

The bren as I best can now moste I selle. . . . (475-84)

I can do with my pencil what I know,

What I see, what at bottom of my heart

I wish for, if ever I wish so deep--

Do easily , too--when I say, perfectly,

I do not boast, perhaps.

. . . . . .

. . . . . .

At any rate ‘tis easy, all of it!

No sketches first, no studies, that’s long past:

I do what many dream of, all their lives. (60-69)

Part of Andrea's philosophy of art: his confidence in his his skills as draughtsman

(Andrea Del Sarto, Browning)

Though much is taken, much abides; and though

We are not now that strength which in old days

Moved heaven and earth, that which we are, we are--

One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield. (65-70)

Effects of aging

Ulysses, Tennyson, 19th Century

She answered, “Seven are we;

15

And two of us at Conway dwell,

And two are gone to sea.

Two of us in the church-yard lie,

My sister and my brother;

And in the church-yard cottage I

Dwell near them with my mother. . . .” (18-24)