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Analysis of ‘An American Tragedy’ by Theodore Dreiser

Analysis of ‘An American Tragedy’ by Theodore Dreiser Author Background Analysis of ‘An American Tragedy’ by Theodore Dreiser – Theodore Dreiser was born in Indiana as the twelfth of thirteen children to a couple of partly German descent. He worked for some time as a journalist. He married in 1898 but his married life was marred by a series of affairs that led to nothing. The heavy prose of Dreiser has been bitterly criticized by twentieth century critics. Relevance of the Title The novel isRead More…

Analysis of ‘Billy Budd’ by Herman Melville

Analysis of ‘Billy Budd’ by Herman Melville Author Background Analysis of ‘Billy Budd’ by Herman Melville – He was born in New York as the third among eight children to a prosperous trading family. Unfortunately, they fell upon bad times forcing young Melville to stop schooling and start working. As he had no qualifications, he worked at odd jobs. Some years later, he joined a ship as a sailor. Many of books have to do with sailing where he drew upon his own experience. His most famous book Read More…

Analysis of ‘Wuthering Heights’, by Emily Brontë

The Bronte sisters have not written many novels but what have been written are excellent pieces of literary work. Emily Bronte wrote ‘Wuthering Heights’ between October 1845 and June 1846. It was published under the pseudonym Ellis Bell, the next year. She did not live long to see the book becoming popular in the literary circles. Emily Bronte died in the year 1847 at the age of thirty. Charlotte Bronte’s ‘Jane Eyre’ became an instant hit and she edited ‘Wuthering Heights’ and got Read More…

Analysis of ‘A Separate Peace’ by John Knowles

Analysis of ‘A Separate Peace’ by John Knowles Analysis of ‘A Separate Peace’ by John Knowles – John Knowles was born in Fairmont, West Virginia to wealthy parents who could afford to send him to Philip Exeter Academy. Though the novel is not autobiographical in that the incidents described there never happened, Devon School where much of the action took place is a thinly disguised fictionalization of Philip Exeter Academy where John Knowles studied. John Knowles achieved instant fame when A SeRead More…

Analysis of ‘Cold Mountain’, by Charles Frazier

Charles Frazier has spent most of his life living in North Carolina. The story, Cold Mountain is based on the same mountains where the author spent his childhood. The story borrows some details from the life of his great-great uncle W.P. Inman who like the author was a Confederate soldier. Inman was twice wounded and later, completely disillusioned with the war, deserted his regiment and tried to walk home to be reunited with his love, Ada. Relevance of the Title Cold Mountain is central tRead More…

Analysis of ‘The Old Man and the Sea’ by Ernest Hemingway

Analysis of ‘The Old Man and the Sea’ by Ernest Hemingway Background Analysis of ‘The Old Man and the Sea’ by Ernest Hemingway – Ernest Hemingway was born in Oak Park, Illinois where his father worked as a doctor and his mother was musician. Hemingway started working with a newspaper before he was eighteen. At eighteen, at the height of the First World War, he volunteered to be an ambulance driver in Italy. His experiences in the front, the injuries he suffered and the war itself made Read More…

Analysis of ‘All The Pretty Horses’, by Cormac McCarthy

Author Background Cormac McCarthy is an American writer who was born in Rhode Island. He attended the University of Tennessee but did not graduate. His writing is marked by the sparse use of punctuations. McCarthy has won several awards. All the Pretty Horses is one of the Border Trilogy which features the border towns of Mexico. McCarthy is fluent in Spanish; Spanish conversation can be seen often in the Trilogy. Relevance of the Title Horses form the core of the novel. The novel is alRead More…