LIT BINDERS

OSCAR WILDE  Oscar Wilde was born in 1854 in Dublin, Ireland, to prominent intellectuals William Wilde and Lady Jane Francesca Wilde. Though they were not aristocrats, the Wildes were well-off, and provided Oscar with a fine education. Oscar was especially influenced by his mother, a brilliantly witty raconteur, and as a child he was frequently invited to socialize with her intellectual circle of friends. Wilde entered Trinity College in 1871 and focused his academic studies on the classics and theories of aestheticism. In 1874, he transferred to Oxford and studied under the divergent tutorials of John Ruskin (a social theorist and Renaissance man) and Walter Pater (a proponent of the new school of aestheticism). Wilde negotiated their conflicting philosophies as his personal life developed. He also experimented with cutting-edge fashion and experimented with homosexuality. Upon graduating from Oxford, Wilde had a brief flirtation with Catholicism, but his independent orientation t...

The Faerie Queene is an epic poem written by Edmund Spenser in the 16th century. It tells the story of several knights and their adventures in the land of Faerie, which is ruled by the Faerie Queen, Gloriana. The poem is divided into six books, each of which tells a separate story, but they are all connected by the overarching theme of the struggle between good and evil. Book 1: The Redcrosse Knight (representing Holiness) must battle the dragon of sin and rescue the princess Una (representing Truth) from the clutches of the evil Archimago. Book 2: Sir Guyon (representing Temperance) must navigate the treacherous world of Faerie and resist the temptations of the wicked witch, Acrasia. Book 3: The story of Britomart (representing Chastity) and her quest to find her beloved, Artegall (representing Justice). Book 4: The story of Cambell and Triamond (representing Friendship) and their adventures in Faerie. Book 5: The story of Artegall (representing Justice) and his quest to rescue the pr...

BLANK VERSE vs FREE VERSE  Blank Verse and Free Verse are two important features in poetry. Blank verse refers to poetry written in regular metrical but unrhymed lines. Free verse refers to an open form of poetry that has no rhyme or rhythm. The main difference between blank verse and free verse is that free verse is not written in consistent meter patterns, rhyme, or any other musical pattern whereas blank verse is written in regular metrical patterns. What is Blank Verse Blank verse is poetry written in regular metrical but unrhymed lines. Blank verse is mostly written in iambic pentameter. Blank verse is also known as unrhymed iambic pentameter. This type of verse contains a consistent meter with 10 syllables in each line. The unstressed syllables are followed by stressed ones; therefore, it contains five stressed syllables. Blank verse is said to be one of the most common and influential forms in English poetry. Many of the English poems have been written in this style. Henry H...

THE LAST GROUP OF ROMANTIC POETS. Coleridge, Wordsworth, Southey, and Scott had mostly ceased to produce poetry by 1815. The group of younger men, the last out-and-out Romanticists, who succeeded them, writing chiefly from about 1810 to 1825, in some respects contrast strongly with them. Byron and Shelley were far more radically revolutionary; and Keats, in his poetry, was devoted wholly to the pursuit and worship of beauty with no concern either for a moral philosophy of life or for vigorous external adventure. It is a striking fact also that these later men were all very short-lived; they died at ages ranging only from twenty-six to thirty-six. Lord Byron, 1788-1824. Byron (George Gordon Byron) expresses mainly the spirit of individual revolt, revolt against all existing institutions and standards. This was largely a matter of his own personal temperament, but the influence of the time also had a share in it, the time when the apparent failure of the French Revolution had thrown the ...

JOHN KEATS AND FANNY BRAWNE  Throughout most of his life John Keats was confused by women, and saw little value in love and marriage. All this changed when he met Frances (Fanny) Brawne between August and December of 1818. While he was still confused by her, Fanny was a woman he could love, and whom Keats saw as an equal. The last three years of Keats’ life were a mixture of pain and pleasure as Keats fell in love with and then was forced to watch Fanny from afar as he lay dying. This gamut of emotions that John Keats felt for and as a result of Fanny Brawne can be readily seen in his many letters to her and his later poetry. Poems like “Bright Star” and “La Belle Dame Sans Merci” reflect the dual nature of Keats’s muse and his feelings regarding women in general, and the fact that these are still two of the most widely read poems by Keats is a testament to his truth and skill in conveying his emotions. In addition to the information and clues that can be gathered from his writings...

GULLIVER'S TRAVELS BY JONATHAN SWIFT Gulliver's Travels is a satire by Anglo-Irish writer and clergyman Jonathan Swift, that is both a satire on human nature and a parody of the "travellers' tales" literary subgenre. It is Swift's best known full-length work, and a classic of English literature. Summary: Gulliver’s Travels recounts the story of Lemuel Gulliver, a practical-minded Englishman trained as a surgeon who takes to the seas when his business fails. In a deadpan first-person narrative that rarely shows any signs of self-reflection or deep emotional response, Gulliver narrates the adventures that befall him on these travels. Gulliver’s adventure in Lilliput begins when he wakes after his shipwreck to find himself bound by innumerable tiny threads and addressed by tiny captors who are in awe of him but fiercely protective of their kingdom. They are not afraid to use violence against Gulliver, though their arrows are little more than pinpricks. But overal...