Women and literature

Marge Piercy's poetry reflects the way her life and her feminist beliefs have changed over the years. Her public poems reflect her political views while her private poems focus on the linguistic problems encountered in male/female dialogue. In her private poems, she specifically addresses the need for men and women to communicate effectively by showing miscommunication occuring between the sexes. Her later works present a mature piercy as an equal partner in her relationships. Her public poetry shows her drive to change society's view of women. Although critics often reject Piercy's militant style, she continues to push for changes in society. A study of Piercy's poetry is truly a study of linguistic styles, political changes, and male/female relationships.

This thesis aims to rescue the name of Elisabeth Mulder, a Spanish female poet who started to publish her first poetry books around the rise of the Generation of 1927 in Spain. The importance of this work hinges on the recognition of Mulder as a female poet whose work has been marginalized from the literary canon, like that of many other women of her era. This thesis focuses on Mulde''s third poetry collection, Sinfonâia en rojo, which was published in 1929 and stands out for its symbolic richness and its romantic and modernist features. Part of this research deals with the symbolism of the color red and the meanings that red acquires within the context of the poems. The main leitmotivs of Sinfonâia en rojo are the images of fire and blood, which are used to make reference to both the emotional and the physical world of the poetic voice. The research also focuses on the connections between Mulder's work and that of her contemporaries, and it suggests that she was in contact with the literary world of her era.

Edith Wharton uses characterization in the primary three characters in The Age of Innocence to explore the aspects of her life. Early adulthood is represented by May Welland Archer, who was born into New York 400, where society suppressed an individual's emotions, aspirations, and freedoms. The intermediate phase of her life is depicted in Newland Archer, who tests the confining limits of the society to which he belongs and strives to understand the role of emotions in achieving personal satisfaction. Wharton rejected and craved the ties of the New York 400 in the final phase of her life as portrayed in Ellen Olenska who left the 400, lived in Europe, and returned to New York. By developing these characters, Wharton attempts to retrospectively reconcile the transformations she experienced. Indeed, it will be clear that Wharton's work serves as a personal assessment of her self-actualization.

Marie Corelli was arguably the most popular British novelist of the early 1900s, yet few today even know her name. Though she is not the only author to lose popularity, her enormous influence during her lifetime deserves consideration. What people liked about Marie Corelli can shed light on why the rise of modernism is seen as such a break from the popular in literature. This paper examines two of her bestsellers, A Romance of Two Worlds and The Sorrows of Satan, in light of the fin de siáecle, as well as the critical response to her work from both modernist and postmodern perspectives. Corelli is of interest today because her popular female characters are women who affirm traditional femininity yet also pursue and wield great power. The question I raise is whether Corelli's work is best seen as illustrative of theories about popular literature or as contradictory to them.

This thesis represents a study of Kate Chopin's groundbreaking novel, The Awakening. Further, it applies Nietzsche's principles of Dionysiac and Apollonian impulses to the literary analysis of the novel. I argue that the protagonist of the novel, Edna Pontellier, embarks on a quest to determine how she may live an authentic life - that is, a life whereby she is true to herself above all others. Ultimately, her search for self is overwhelmed by the imbalance of the Apollonian and Dionysiac impulses against which she struggles. Because Edna cannot successfully mediate this struggle, she reaches the conclusion that she may only attain a truth to her self if she finds that truth in death.