Archive for the ‘Literature’ Category
Bartleby: Between Good and Evil
It is quite clear that the narrator’s “world of lies” in Herman Melville’s “Bartleby, the Scrivener” refers to the uncertainty about authority in the nineteenth century society becoming liberated from Puritanical morality. Both the narrator and Bartleby are products of a modern ideology rooted in strict conventions and narrowly defined roles. They are introduced as [...]
July 5, 2007
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The Custom House Sketch: A “Corridor” to Interpretation
As Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote of the illuminating powers of one of his co-workers at the Custom House, The Custom House essay may be viewed as an illuminating attempt to make the ambiguous The Scarlet Letter “as clear as daylight” (1169). The man, whom Hawthorne described as “the Custom House in himself” (1169), served as the [...]
July 5, 2007
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The Renaissance Fool: Deconstruction of Social Order
With the progression of labor from the feudal estates to the newly developed urban centers, the ability for people to possess their own material property agitated the once rigid distinctions of social segregation. While many of the serfs were forced to continue working on wealthy landowners’ estates, skilled craftsmen acquired the option to become independent [...]
July 5, 2007
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