This paper focuses on Mark Twain's writing style and characterization in his fiction. The settings and characters of his fiction are in particular focus, specifically how Mark Twain draws on personal experiences and memories to make his characters and settings more relatable and realistic. A brief biography of Twain's life is given before the author goes into the specifics of characterization and settings.

Examines the functions of messengers in six plays by Shakespeare.

The purpose of this thesis is to reveal the structural unity of The Brothers Karamazov through the isolation and analyzation of the various techniques used by Dostoyevsky to unify the novel. In order to retain more than a few impressions and remembrances of outstanding events, in order to retain the novel itself, the reader needs to be aware of the structure of the work. If the fullest realization of the novel depends upon the reader's perception of its structure, the structure becomes the important critical element.

Whatever are the other merits of Macbeth, it must be classed as one of the most penetrating studies of conscience in literature. Shakespeare does not attempt to describe in the drama how the ordinary criminal would react to evil, but how Shakespeare himself would have felt if he had fallen into crime. 1 The ramifications of this conflict between the conscience of a man of genius and the supernatural forces of wickedness, therefore, assume immense dimensions. "Macbeth leaves on most readers a profound impression of the misery of a guilty conscience and the retribution of crime . . . But what Shakespeare perhaps felt even more deeply, when he wrote this play, was the incalculability of evil--that in meddling with it human beings do they know not what."2 This drama displays an evil not to be accounted for simply in terms of the protagonist's will or his causal relationships to evil. It is an agency which is beyond the power of Macbeth's will; and his conscience, as powerful and imaginative as it is, can only warn him that he is involving himself in a force which will cause him unexpected and hideous mental pain. If there is a moral in …

The purpose of this study is to show how, in a world with a system of values based on love, the characters in the novels of John Steinbeck are alienated and reconciled.

One can compare Guthrie's fiction with a sampling of the primary source material, to determine in general his degree of historical accuracy. Then one can compare Guthrie's interpretation with the interpretations of some widely read historiographers, to determine points of agreement or divergence. Finally, Guthrie's interpretation of history can be studied in relation to the themes he develops in his fiction.

The purpose of this paper is to establish that Francis Thompson, the English poet who lived from 1859 until 1907, is a myth-maker. In doing this, it will be necessary to define the term "myth-maker." The theme will then be developed by considering it in relation to the following topics: a brief resume of the events of his life having a direct bearing upon his mythic system, difficulties the student of his work must face, proof that he is a myth-maker of noteworthy significance, a consideration of the nature of his myth, a discussion of his most notable mythic values, and a special look at his mythic development of "The Hound of Heaven."

This thesis discusses the view which Thomas Wolfe had of womankind. Primarily, this view is discerned and evaluated from Wolfe's fiction.

This study of the elements of the Byronic hero in Herman Melville's Captain Ahab includes a look at the Byronic hero and Byron himself, the Byronic hero and the Gothic tradition, the Byronic hero and his "humanities," and the Byronic hero and Prometheus-Lucifer.

On the premise that examination of a poet's language can provide a valid and significant approach to the study of a work of art, this thesis proposes to make such a study of Prometheus Unbound, the major poetical work of Percy Bysshe Shelley, with specific attention to his use of color language.

This examination of Kafka as philosopher will not concentrate on the selection of the "correct" approach to his work, but on his description of reality from all levels of approach. Socially, spiritually, psychologically, Kafka speaks not only as an artist, but also as a philosopher, who sees all levels of a man's existence as a part of reality. The definition of Kafka's prose as literature-philosophy will be based chiefly on an examination of his shorter fiction.

This thesis includes a study of common historical and biographical elements in the lives of Dryden and Byron, a comparison of the literary principles and achievements of Dryden and Byron, a study of the concept of the hero, and a comparison of the heroes of Dryden and Byron.

The purpose of this study is to examine the social criticism of Williams by careful analysis of six of his full length plays: The Glass Menagerie, A Streetcar Named Desire, Camino Real, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Suddenly Last Summer, and The Night of the Iguana. After the analyses of the plays, the final chapter of this study will deal with the playwright's comments on specific aspects of the social order and will not be confined to the six major plays under consideration.

This study concentrates on the personification of death in Middle English literature and examines some examples of the literature from the period.

Much of the scholarship that has been done on Philip Massinger mentions his political commentary only in passing; frequently the allusions have been used only to aid in dating the composition of the plays. There is no published work which gathers and discusses under one cover all of the political allusions in Massinger's plays. This study purports to fill this void. This investigation will enumerate and explain the meaning of all possible political allusions in Massinger's plays; it will also attempt to show the reasons why Massinger might have employed these allusions. When these purposes are fulfilled, knowledge of the plays and understanding of the playwright himself--his morality, his political affiliations, his public awareness--will be greatly increased.

This thesis presents original poems by the author, as well as a comparison of the religious sonnets by John Donne and Gerard Manley Hopkins.

This thesis is concerned first with, establishing an appropriate vacancy into which an individual critical method might fit, and second, with defending that method.

This thesis is concerned with establishing the basis for evaluating John Donne's sermon literature as a thematic whole. In order to demonstrate this thematic unity and continuity, this study shows how Donne employes several bodies of imagery which reflect his double vision of man and sin and provide the basis for discussing the basic dualities in the bulk of Donne's 160 extant sermons.

The thesis presents Mark Twain's 1601 in the form of a new edition comprising a critical analysis, a photographic copy of the only authorized text of the work, and a glossary.

This paper is a study of the effect of W. B. Yeats's contact with Japanese Noh drama on his work. The immediately discernible effect on his work can be seen, of course, in his adaptation of Noh dramatic form to his Four Plays for Dancers and The Death of Cuchulain. It is the thesis of this paper, then, that, despite many handicaps, Yeats's aesthetic background was not only sufficient to discover what suggestion did lie in the limited information available to him concerning Noh, but also sufficient for him to intuit much of what wasn't suggested.

The problem contained in this study was Stendhal's use of the Napoleonic myth in his novel The Red and the Black. This study dealt primarily with Stendhal's purpose in using the myth as a basis for his novel and with the extent to which the principal character, Julien Sorel, patterned himself after the myth.

This study examines the representation of religion in Ernest Hemingway's fiction. In most of his stories, references to the church are adversely critical. No protagonist finds solace in conventional religious faith.

Unable to rationalize man's interpretation of God, Clemens took a different view of Satan. He wrote four minor pieces that illustrate his attitudes toward Satan. He began to act as a pen for the narrator, Satan. Clemens allowed his Satanic characters freedoms that he would not allow other characters, and opinions that he restrained from writing as his own. But an older Clemens tossed convention aside as he assumed Satan's identity and wrote imaginative and unrestrained ideas on God, Satan and man.

English-language studies of Hermann Hesse have failed to adequately explore the role of dreams and visions in his major novels. This study attempts to summarize the present state of Hesse criticism in this area and to make a systematic study of the role of dreams and visions in each of his major novels.