A Portrait Of The Lady In Modern American Literature

A Portrait of the Lady in Modern American Literature is a collection of fifteen original essays, and a reprint of a classic essay, that reconsiders the figure of the woman in distress in canonical American texts. Approached from the method of close reading and the theoretical perspective of gender theory, these essays look at the forgotten women at the heart of such beloved works as The Tragic Muse, The Awakening, The Age of Innocence, The Great Gatsby, Machinal, Passing, The Sound and the Fury, Their Eyes Were Watching God, and The Hours. In taking up the famous question “What does a woman want?” this collection finds some answers in artistic endeavour, political agency, freedom, and – above all – independence.

A Portrait of the Lady in Modern American Literature is a collection of fifteen original essays, and a reprint of a classic essay, that reconsiders the figure of the woman in distress in canonical American texts. Approached from the method of close reading and the theoretical perspective of gender theory, these essays look at the forgotten women at the heart of such beloved works as The Tragic Muse, The Awakening, The Age of Innocence, The Great Gatsby, Machinal, Passing, The Sound and the Fury, Their Eyes Were Watching God, and The Hours. In taking up the famous question "What does a woman want?" this collection finds some answers in artistic endeavour, political agency, freedom, and - above all - independence.

“The Portrait of a Lady is entirely successful in giving one the sense of having met somebody far too radiantly good for this world.”-Rebecca West “A fairy tale in reverse.” -The Sunday Times Henry James’s The Portrait of a Lady is regarded as one of the towering works of Victorian literature; an exceptional examination of the disparate nature between Americans and Europeans, and the divides between contentment and money. Isabel Archer, one of the most compelling heroines of American literature, is at the center of this moving story about the manners and mores of 19th Century life. The Portrait of a Lady opens as the beautiful and fiery American Isabel Archer travels to England to visit her wealthy Aunt Touchett. She is introduced her Uncle Touchett, her cousin Ralph, and the local nobleman, Lord Warburton, who wastes no time in asking for Isabel’s hand in marriage. In character with Isabel’s independent spirt, she refuses the proposal, and while on a trip to London receives a second proposal from an American suitor; once again, she refuses. When she learns that her uncle is deathly ill, Isabel returns to the Touchett home, where she inherits a great fortune following his death. Traveling to Italy with her Aunt as a great heiress, she is introduced to Gilbert Osmond, a self-centered and calculating American expatriate. Despite the warnings from her family and friends, Isabel falls for Osborne and in turn is pulled the darkness of deception. The Portrait of a Lady is a tragic yet humane masterpiece of American literature. With an eye-catching new cover, and professionally typeset manuscript, this edition of The Portrait of a Lady is both modern and readable.

An incisive study of modern American literature, casting new light on its origins and themes. Exploring canonical American writers such as Ezra Pound, Ernest Hemingway and William Faulkner alongside less familiar writers like Djuna Barnes and Susan Glaspell, the guide takes readers though a diverse literary landscape. It considers how the rise of the American metropolis contributed to the growth of American modernism; and also examines the ways in which regional writers responded to an accelerated American modernity. Taking in African American modernism, cultural and geographical exile, as well as developments in modern American drama, the guide introduces readers to current critical trends in modernist studies.

As an endeavor to contribute to the burgeoning field of comparative literature, this monograph addresses the dynamic yet understudied "intertextual dialogism" between modern American literature and contemporary Iranian Cinema, pinpointing how the latter appropriates and recontextualizes instances of the former to construct and inculcate vestiges of national/gender identity on the silver screen. Drawing on Louis Montrose’s catchphrase that Cultural Materialism foregrounds "the textuality of history, [and] the historicity of texts", this book contends that literary "texts" are synchronic artifacts prone to myriad intertextual and extra-textual readings and understandings, each historically conditioned. The recontextualization of Herzog, Franny and Zooey, The Glass Menagerie, A Streetcar Named Desire, and Death of a Salesman into contemporary Iran provides an intertextual avenue to delineate the textuality of history and the historicity of texts

A collection of essays on Henry James's most appealing and accessible novel.

Seminar paper from the year 2009 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Literature, grade: 2,0, University of Kassel, language: English, abstract: In summary, in this paper the poem "Portrait of a Lady" written by T. S. Eliot has been placed in a beginning of the 20th century genre of portraiture in painting and regarded as a modern portrait. There is a remarkable similarity of techniques implied in Eliot's poem and used by modern portrait artists such as different media of expression, technique of deconstruc-tion, incomprehensible image and flatness. The poem represents a dual portrait of an elderly lady and her friend, the young narrator. Both figures are characterised by their dramatic monologues from different perspectives. A great deal of the impressive effect of the poem is achieved through dramatic verse that exactly express the tones of the lady's speech. The free verse and effects of rhythm help to provide this impression. The technique of disembodiment and fragmentation used by Eliot shows certain similarities to cubist portrait artists who broke the portrayed subject up and re-assembled it in a new form. Furthermore, "Portrait of a Lady" provides a shifting succession of thoughts, consciousness, protean in its variety of music and tone and depicts the figures' internal drama without creating a comprehensible image of their appearance. In addition, the lady imitates in her speech Arnold and expresses her feelings through quotations and, therefore, is mentally absent, though she eliminates the narrator's consciousness of himself as facing her. However, the observer registers the look of absorption which dominates the imaginary face of the lady. This effect of flatness is directly connected with modern portrait painters such as douard Manet. Therefore, it can be concluded that Eliot's "Portrait of a Lady" is a notable example of the modern portrait in poetry.

This critical study of Stephen Crane's journalism examines the climate of change that had begun to blur the line between non-fiction writing and fiction in Crane's era and provides insight into the masculine aesthetic Crane championed in his urban reportage, travel writing and war correspondence.