Question 1

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short stories can be typified based on their conventionally literary concepts. This similarity is more so portrayed in his short stories “Rappaccini’s Daughter” and “Young Goodman Brown.”The two stories both deal with the themes of good and evil and a specific struggle with looming death and its fear. Understanding how the protagonists Brown (Young Goodman Brown) and Giovanni (Rappaccini’s Daughter) relate is the most efficient way of comprehending the similarities of the author’s contemporary ideas. The young men each begin a journey of understanding life, and at its peak, they both reject their beloveds as theyundergodifferent but somewhat similar metamorphosis.

Both Brown and Giovanni’s journeys leadtostrifein understanding the sense of balance between good and evil. In “Young Goodman Brown,” Brown journeys through a forest meeting all his upstanding community members in supposed acts of corruption. Before embarking on the journey, he leaves his wife, believing her the purest thing in his life. However, when he meets her in an ‘evil’ gathering, he surmises she is not as refined as she renders. He concludes, “There is no good on earth, and sin is but a name.” As the story began, Brown had a definitive version of who was evil and who was not, but as it progresses, his opinion change to a level of paranoia. He considers all around him as the devil’s agents, including his beloved.

Giovanni, too, suffers this same predicament. His eminent interactions with Beatrice solidify her as pure of heart from her mannerism and speeches. He becomes deeply infatuated with her to the point of obsession. However, on glimpsing her true nature, he abandons all reason and resorts to identifying her as the reincarnation of evil. In his words, he says, “Behold! This power have I gained from the pure daughter of Rappaccini!” This satirical statement refers to his killing of any living thing he touches. His change of heart becomes catastrophic, considering death befalls their relationship. From these depictions, one concludes that the two protagonists began their journeys believing in the purity of their relationships. Still, after a brief glimpse into reality, they end up abandoning all their notions.

Similarly, the two men’s opinions on the concepts of evil and right are driven by other beliefs. Giovanni, before conversing with Baglioni, had a definite idea about Beatrice’s nature despite her shortcomings. Nevertheless, after conversations with members of his circle, his opinion changes gradually to the point of him being hateful towards his beloved. In the end, as Giovanni spoke to Beatrice, one could hear Bagnoli’s words behind his utterances. In his words, “Thou hast made me as hateful, as ugly, as loathsome and deadly a creature as thyself–a world’s wonder of hideous monstrosity!” one can see glimpses of Baglioni’s Indian woman gifted to Alexandra. In the end, Giovanni becomes worse than Beatrice with poison in both his heart and body.

Brown, on the other hand, reaffirms his position on good and evil based on his perception of others. His belief in Faith’s purity enhanced his strife for being a good man. He says, “she’s a blessed angel on earth; and after this one night, I’ll cling to her skirts and follow her to Heaven.” As seen, Brown believes in being good but not for himself but as a way to appease his wife and community members. As such, after glimpsing those he thought pure consorting with the devil, his first decision was joining them. In the end, he becomes the worst of them as he not only partakes in the evil but also spends his entire life judging his companions based on that night’s events. Observing these two narrations, the two men live a life filled with a consciousness of other’s opinions and acts. As such, they do not make ethical decisions of their own and stick with them.

Finally, the protagonists’ interaction with death looms over them all their lives leading to their doomed lives and consequent penalties. Giovanni’s fear of Beatrice is not because of her poisonous nature but because he fears she cost him his soul. He, therefore, leads a life in fear of turning evil and being rejected in the afterlife, which in turn leads him to become worse. Brown, too suffers this predicament as he abandons all else, including his wife, in fear of interacting with evil. As both stories conclude, the fear of death has corrupted the main characters to the point of despair and disillusionment with death. As such, summing up that Giovanni and Brown’s interaction with death and piousness turns them into hateful, reserved, and fearful men are correct.

 

 

Question 2

Sufficient time to notice walls is the primary step of assimilating paradise with prison. This statement has never been as accurate as it is in Melville’s short story “Bartleby, the Scrivener.” The text is filled with instances of walls, whether literal, metaphorical, or empirical, with each wall carrying deeper meaning. Melville builds a world where these walls have different but profound implications on his characters. While some of the walls are self-constructed, some get described as eventual and inevitable in the text’s world. An understanding of these walls is thus crucial in understanding their effects on the different characters.

The walls create boundaries and disconnect the characters. The lawyer and Bartleby work in the same office but are separated by an installed folding screen. This temporary wall separates the two individuals that they cannot see each other. The primary reason for this installation is the lawyer’s fear of interacting with his scriveners, especially Bartleby, whom he considers disturbed. He says the folding screen “might entirely isolate Bartleby from mysight, thoughnotremovehimfrommyvoice.” This temporary wall portrays the human aspiration to isolate themselves, struggling with awant for social cordiality. For Bartleby, his phrase ‘I prefer not to’ serves the same purpose by allowing him the means to deny his boss and lash out without taking responsibility for his actions. Therefore, walls facilitate separation of characters, obligations, and attachment by enabling association without intimacy or accountability.

Also, the walls represent a disassociation with society; hence, an out of synchrony with the natural environment. Bartleby’s office has a window that is shielded bynewly constructed buildings, which deny him a view of the backyards. Therefore, throughout his employment, Bartleby stares at this wall with nothing else to view. The situation recurs in the whole of Wall Street and later in prison when he is incarcerated. This continuous shielded nature of Bartleby symbolizes human isolation from nature and those around them. This human life disconnection is an allusion tothe everyday situation of not only Wall Street but the whole world. Focusing too much on the wrong aspects of life ensures the characters’ psychotic issues. Therefore, as people build more walls, physical and metaphorical, their association with nature and each other diminishes as Bartleby’s did with time. This disassociation often leads to psychotic behavior as all characters in the book prove.

Bartleby’s mental and physical walls lead him to the observed dissociative behavior. A repetitive routine and viewpoint by this character is the primary tipping point of his psychotic issues of depression, agoraphobia, and anorexia. His first job as a clerk in an office where letters die invoked in him a gloom view of life as he continuously interacted with mortality and end of phenomena. The narrator goes further ahead in describing the dead letters as dead men. He says, “Dead letters! does it not sound like dead men?” A change in employment did not help as he moved to a working place where he repeated the same impassive chores. His view of life thus remained stagnant and empty, just like his office, prison, and mental walls. As such, he begins acting in a similarly impassive unresponsive manner. He continuously reiterates the same phrase his whole life. Also, he starts preferring private companies facing walls as they were the only constant thing in his life.

Nevertheless, from a different perspective, the walls may have made Bartleby more intune with his inner self. His words “I prefer not” can be interpreted as a depiction of his being a freethinking man who makes rational choices. As such, his decision not to take part in life’s intricaciesis his way of establishing his place in life as one who is neither provoked nor reactive.The narrator describes it as “his great stillness, his unalterableness of demeanor under all circumstances.” He is unmoved even when fired, opting to remain in the office. In the prison conversation, he confirms he knows where he is, subsequently referring to his knowledge of himself. Therefore, he becomes established as a man not manipulated by his environment as he chooses to guide his life and not submit control to others.

The narrator, too, is transformed after a robust interaction with Bartleby. When the text begins, he finds Bartleby as irritating and uncontrollable, but at its end, he understands and even pities him. The statement “I am a rather elderly man” establishes the narrator as well versed with all sorts of people, no matter their peculiar behavior. However, as one progresses, it gets found that his experiences with Bartleby are the primary reason for this metamorphosis. Bartleby stating his refusal in a steady speech devoid of malice at first bewilders the narrator. Later, it inspires kindness and admiration from his, although from an ignorant comprehension of Bartleby’s commitment. He believes Bartleby’s behavior is meant to set him on the right path, albeit there being no evidence proving it. Nevertheless, these beliefs remold his life choices into the open-minded, compassionate elderly narrator,met at the text’s onset.

 

 

Question 3

Emily Dickson and Walt Whitman are arguably America’s most influential and symbolic poets. While Whitman’s poems are more personal and emotional, Dickinson shows a more universal and nature factual ideology. Nevertheless, they share several attributes in themes, imagery, and styles, albeit with different outcomes. These qualities maketheir comprehension ambiguousfor different individuals as they encourage openness and diversity. As such, understanding how the two authors employed thematic concerns, imagery, and styles can be achieved by comparing Walt Whitman’s Song of Myself with several of Dickinson’s pieces.

The themes in Whitman’s poems are all associated with the democracy of self, individualism, nature, eroticism, and the natural world and body through a lighter, optimistic viewpoint.The romanticized tone ensuring one embraces the eventuality of nature, whether positive or negative, facilitates this optimistic tolerance. In the poem Song of Myself,Whitman praises nature’s wonders and the joys of experiencing them. As such, it celebrates the mentioned thematic concerns at their purest form of exploration. For instance, in the description of life and death, Whitman writes, ‘And as to you Death, and you bitter hug of mortality, it is idle to try to alarm me.” He emphasizes his lack of intimidation by it yet pays note to its bitter side. Furthermore, he sees positivity in death by associating it with rebirth and universal continuity. As such, Whitman’s themes are often fluid and well organized with precise supposition(s).

Dickinson, on the other hand, explores themes in a multifaceted sprawling manner. They possess great individuality that is rooted and representative of personality illogicality and fluctuation. For instance, in the poem,I felt a Funeral in my Brain;she continuously expresses the eventuality of death. Throughout the poem, the narrator never argues the factuality of death or even makes efforts to discuss it. Instead, the narrator continues her life with a logical personality of living without considering death as no one asks for it. Therefore, while Whitman’s themes are represented in a whimsical romanticized manner, Dickinson is the exact opposite. Her poem number 340, like many of her other pieces, is filled with factual and personal illustrations, albeit in emotional illustrations, similar to Whitman’s. As such, the themes in her poems are more composed and condensed.

In imagery, both authors employ personification, metaphoric language, and repetition as ways of emphasizing the imagery and meaning behind their poems. In the poem A Bird came down the Walk, Dickinson describes the bird’s experience in a definitive manner full of visual, tactile, and auditory imagery. The poem describes how the water splashes, the bird’s interaction with thebeetle, and the visual appearance of these events. Whitman, too, similarly describes the meaning of grass. He notes, “This grass is very dark…Darker than the colorless beards of old men.” This statement gives a visual image of the grass’s appearance. As seen, the two authors have mastery of imagery, with each employing it to pass across their ideas in a manner most desired.

Finally, Whitman and Dickinson’s poetic styles differ significantly. Dickinson’s poems are relatively tiny and confidently structured with a fierce articulation of a narrator’s experience. Also, her poems rhyme in a slant manner, as observed in all her class read poems. Her poems appear in narrative four-line verses in alternations of iambic tetrameters and trimeters, as seen in the discussed poem, number 340. Whitman’s poetry, on the other hand, has no rhyme or definite structure hence breaks from tradition. The poem Song of Myself goes on continuously without any set of lines, poem length, or stanzas. Nevertheless, the two authors had a similarity in their use of modern concepts all over their poems hence their similar classification.

Question 4

The pieces of literatureby Walt Whitman and Henry David Thoreau contain reliable opinions on life, death, and existence. Their poetry romanticize self-reliance and the significance of returning to simple everyday ways of living as the best means of existence. This transcendentalist way of existence and the metaphoric arguments of endorsing the idea are the epitomai of their works of literature.Their poems,Song of Myself (Walt Whitman) and Walden (Henry David Thoreau), both evangelize these ideas hence have a similar engagement of themes, metaphors, and arguments.

Primary thematic concerns of both authors show value for individualism, self-reliance, and humans’ return to nature, as seen in the transcendentalist philosophies in their poems. In Song of Myself,mundane aspects of life are portrayed as the first derivatives and instigators of life. In a statement such as “And limitless are leaves stiff or drooping in the field. And brown ants in the little wells beneath them,” this author shows how the little things are the best aspect of life. Similarly, he solidifies ideas in statements like, “and that all the men that ever born are also my brothers, and the women my sisters and lovers.” Here he shows how society is equal or needs equity of individuals if nature’s simplicities get considered. All these are based on transcendentalist philosophies of equity without the self-reliant individual being corrupted by other complications of society.

Thoreau, too, shows this thematic aspect of transcendentalism in Walden. In the poem, it gets argued that simplifying the life of individuals through nature is the only way to limit challenges to individuals. The poem solidifies that in an environment deviating of nature, the individual “has no time to be anything but a machine.” As such, to eliminate this situation, Thoreau argued that individuals must abandon conventional modes and create a clear vision for themselves through the mundane aspects of life. This author, like his counterpart, explored transcendentalism and its significance on the individual’s life throughout the poemWalden.

The arguments behind this transcendentalist approach by the authors have significant similarities. The two authors both argue that individuals exist to increase social morality primarily. In the line “I celebrate myself, and what I assume you shall assume, For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you,” Whitman interlinks individual behavior with societal wellbeing. To this author, the self is both collective and individual, as everything is indistinguishable and interconnected. Walden, too, argues similarly. The author stresses the importance of spiritual growth over worldly pleasures. Thoreau in the text describes everything to the minute detail showing how the little intricacies of life spark the most significant achievements and fulfillment. To achieve this happiness and fulfillment, individuals ought to enjoy the minor aspects of life, according to both Thoreau and Whitman.

The metaphoric language in the texts is an integral part of successfully achieving these arguments. For instance, Thoreau’s statement, “Feel the spring influence with the innocence of infancy, and all his faults are forgotten,” encourages forgiveness as a way of living. Like this statement, Thoreau uses actual events in life to allude to emotions and life philosophies he considers parallel with nature and simple living. Furthermore, he shows how human beings are different from nature since, unlike it, they never take this opportunity of rebirth. Whitman, on the other hand, uses simplistic metaphors to achieve a similar effect as his counterpart. For instance, he says, “And parted the shirt from my bosom-bone, and plunged your tongue to my bare-stript heart.” While this statement is metaphorical, it is a simple conveyance of personal vulnerability in literal intellectual language. The result of both authors’ metaphoric language is it solidifies the relationship between the universal and the individual.

 

 

Works Cited

Dickinson, Emily. A Bird, Came down the Walk – (359) by Emily…www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/56593/a-bird-came-down-the-walk-359.

Dickinson, Emily. “I felt a Funeral, in My Brain, (340) by Emily…” Poetry Foundation, Poetry Foundation, www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45706/i-felt-a-funeral-in-my-brain-340.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. “Young Goodman Brown.” Short Stories and Classic Literature, Colombia University, www.columbia.edu/itc/english/f1124y-001/resources/Young_Goodman_Brown.pdf.

Hawthorne, Nathaniel. “Rappaccini’s Daughter by Nathaniel Hawthorne.” Google Docs, 17 June 2004, www.columbia.edu/itc/english/f1124y-001/resources/Rappaccinis_Daughter.pdf.

Melville. Bartleby, The Scrivener: A Story Of Wall-Street. www.moglen.law.columbia.edu/LCS/bartleby.pdf.

Thoreau, Henry David. Walden. www.walden.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/Walden02WhereILived.pdf.