Saturday 26 June 2021

ELIZABETH GASKELL'S NORTH AND SOUTH


"A really remarkable picture of the reality, as well as the prosperity, of northern industrial life, and an interesting examination of changing social conscience".
Joanna Trollope

Elizabeth Gaskell's compassionate, richly dramatic novel features one of the most original and fully-rounded female characters in Victorian fiction, Margaret Hale. It shows how, forced to move from the country to an industrial northern town, she develops a passionate sense of social justice, and a turbulent relationship with mill-owner John Thornton. North and South depicts a young woman discovering herself, in a nuanced portrayal of what divides people, and what brings them together.  Read here.



Friday 25 June 2021

GEORGE ELIOT'S MIDDLEMARCH

George Eliot, pseudonym of Mary Ann Evans, was an English Victorian novelist who developed the method of psychological analysis characteristic of modern fiction. Her major works include Adam Bede (1859), The Mill on the Floss (1860), Silas Marner (1861), Middlemarch (1871–72), and Daniel Deronda (1876).

Middlemarch is considered to be George Eliot’s masterpiece. The realist work is a study of every class of society in the town of Middlemarch—from the landed gentry and clergy to the manufacturers and professional men, farmers, and labourers. The focus, however, is on the thwarted idealism of its two principal characters, Dorothea Brooke and Tertius Lydgate, both of whom marry disastrously.

https://www.gradesaver.com/middlemarch

Saturday 19 June 2021

Thursday 17 June 2021

WILFRED OWEN - DULCE ET DECORUM EST


Wilfred Owen immortalized mustard gas in his indictment against warfare, "Dulce et Decorum Est." Written in 1917 while at Craiglockart, and published posthumously in 1920, the poem details what is, perhaps, the most memorable written account of a mustard gas attack.

The Latin title is from Horace (1st century BC)  and it means “it is sweet and proper”. This is followed by the phrase pro patria mori, or “to die for one’s country” in English.

The poem is known for its horrific imagery and condemnation of war. It combines two sonnets and is formed by 28 lines. Read here.


Wednesday 16 June 2021

BERTHA MASON IN JANE EYRE

 

Bertha Mason is a complex presence in Jane Eyre. She impedes Jane’s happiness, but she also catalyses the growth of Jane’s self-understanding. The mystery surrounding Bertha establishes suspense and terror to the plot and the atmosphere. Further, Bertha serves as a reminder of Rochester’s youthful libertinism (=the behavior of a libertine, a person who is unrestrained by convention or morality, one leading a dissolute life).

Yet Bertha can be interpreted as a symbol. Some critics have read her as a statement about the way Britain feared and psychologically “locked away” the other cultures it encountered at the height of its imperialism. Others have seen her as a symbolic representation of the “trapped” Victorian wife, who is expected never to travel or work outside the house and becomes ever more frenzied as she finds no outlet for her frustration and anxiety. Within the story, then, Bertha’s insanity could serve as a warning to Jane of what complete surrender to Rochester could bring about.

https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/janeeyre/symbols/

Monday 7 June 2021

British novelist, essayist, and social and literary critic E.M. Forster died on 7 June 1970. 

One of the most gifted writers of his time, he penned some of the best novels of the 20th century that were well-plotted and ironic and included themes of class and hypocrisy in English society. Read here

SUMMER HOMEWORK - 4^D LINGUISTICO



Tuesday 1 June 2021