Enam's Note

Main Theme of the Poem ‘The Altar’ by George Herbert ‘The Altar’ written by George Herbert (1593-1633), a major English religious and metaphysical poet, demonstrates Herbert’s rich poetic skills. It is both an act of devotion, and a visual focus for that devotion, like a painting or a crucifix above the altar. It is, in essence, a work of art, by the artist, Herbert, who uses rhyme instead of mortar (চুন সুরকী) and words instead of stone.  So it richly repays careful study of many facets like, the shape of the poem, allegorical and highly metaphoric use of the words, the biblical allusion etc. The poem falls in the category called ‘Pattern poem’ or ‘shape poem’ since it's shape echo's the meaning of the verse. The practice of writing such poems was adopted from the ancient Greeks and was very popular at the time when Herbert was writing. By constructing the poem in the shape of an altar Herbert mirrors the work of God as creator: as God created the physical world and everyth...

Write a critical note on the treatment of love in Andrew Marvel's poetry. or Critical appreciation of Marvel's "To His Coy Mistress /The Definition of Love". Andrew Marvell (1621-1674), a 17 th century poet, presents the idea of love in his poems very beautifully. His poems cover both the physical and the spiritual aspects of love. Now we are going to discuss him as a love poet in our following discussion.             Marvell presents the physical love in “ To His Coy Mistress ” in which love has been sexualized.  In the poem the lover convinces his beloved, who is reluctant to grant his sexual favour for her coyness. So the lover, who may be the poet himself, builds up a strong argument which no sensible man can reject. The speaker uses gentle wit and thinly veiled innuendo to encourage his lover to seize the moment and act on their desires. To him human life is very much transient and within the transie...

Question: How does Lawrence establish the superiority of novelist over the saints, scientists and the philosopher in his easy “Why the Novel Matters”? D H Lawrence D. H. Lawrence (1885 - 1930), a British novelist, establishes the superiority of novel and novelists criticizing the parson, the philosopher and the scientist in his great essay “Why the Novel Matters”. The author, to prove the supremacy of novel, sings the victory of life and puts the most importance on life as well as a man being alive. Now we will see how the author convinced his reader in favour of his statement in our following discussion. In order to establish the superiority of the novelists, the author criticizes the parsons who always prefer after life and “talk about souls in heaven”. They give more importance to “soul” than body in order to keep it in happiness in paradise. To them body is like an empty bottle. As they think: “The years drink up the wine, and at last throw the bottle ...

“The Garden Party” is an interesting short story by Katherine Mansfield (1888-1923) from her short story collection " The Garden Party and Other Stories ". The major theme of the story is the Class consciousness and class distinction. In the story depicts how the class conscious the well-to-do family overlooks the poor endangered neighbour.  The central character of the story is Laura Sheridan ,the youngest member of rich Sheridan family, the daughter of Mrs. Sheridanand Mr. Sheridan. The whole story moves around her telling her inner psychological conflict. She is very soft minded and very sympathetic to the lower class people unlike the other members of the family.  Laura, a budding rose, has carefully been protected from the reality of the world.She has never experienced poverty, hardship, labour, let alone death. When Laura and Laurie were small children, they were confined to a " desert island "(the Sheridan estate).  As the narrator comments: ...

Question: Write down the main them of the short story Evline. Eveline, a famous and integral tale from James Joyce’s short story collection “ Dubliners ” (London, 1914), is the first story in the collection focusing on a female protagonist . The story presents a glimpse of women plight in Irish society during the close of nineteen century . The story also introduces us a unique style for its era, “ the stream of consciousness ”, where action takes places in the protagonist’s mind. Actually, the story deals with the crisis of the choice of a nineteen-year damsel . She is on the horns of a dilemma, whether she should stay with her tyrannical father or should leave Dublin holding the hands of the beloved.         At the very beginning of the short story, we see the girl, Eveline, sitting by the window, looks out onto the street recollecting her childhood, when she played with other children in a field now developed with new homes. Now s...

The Difference between Tragic Literature  and Non-tragic Literature Aldous Huxley (1894-1963), a great literary critic, highly individualistic writer and a major modern essayist, shows the difference between tragic literature, containing partial truth and the non-tragic literature, containing whole truth, in his master-piece essay “ Tragedy and the Whole Truth ”. Here he also shows the superiority of the whole truth over the tragedy.  Now we are going to discuss the difference between tragedy and the whole truth in detail. In order to know the difference between tragedy and the whole truth, we are, at first, to know what the truth is. We generally find two types of truth. First one is actual truth and another one is literary truth. To Huxley, two and two makes four, or Queen Victoria came to the throne in 1837 or light travels at the rate of 187000 miles a second is the example of actual truth.  But in literature we may not find such kind of t...