...capacity to create a trend or a genre, therefore it gives the piece of work a feeling of transcendetality. Two great authors from the Western civilization that take part of a modern literary culture that is characterized for its epic stories and epic characters that follow along the definition of an epic hero. An epic hero is a brave and noble character in an epic poem, admired for great achievements or affected by grand events. Dante’s Aligheri’s Inferno and Homer’s The Odyssey respectively have two characters that fulfill what is like to be recognized as a brave and noble character. Throughout both poems, we can see how each character has unique qualities that make them outstand and set them up as a leader, but at the same time, they have the flaws of any human being. It is clear when a character overcomes the status of any human being and sets the lead as a hero. An important trait of an epic hero is the fact that starts a journey; it may be of a personal matter, such as Dante, or of societal matter, like Odysseus. In The Odyssey, Odysseus is a war hero travelling home after a period of twenty years. In this epic, Odysseus is brought out as a hero with superhuman courage. In most cases, he has been shown fighting with supernatural forces. One characteristic of this journey that is different from Dante is that the hero in this epic fights against external forces. Odysseus faces many challenges while traveling home. To begin with, he is cast on an island that is surrounded by...
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... The Inferno written by Durante Alighieri published in 1314 and the Odyssey by Homer in 800 B.C.E. are about true love, great journeys that are different but in some ways parallel and end with them back with their true love. Both Dante and Odysseus have a woman who waits for them and in their travels must search themselves and make the right choices to get back to them. Odysseus longs to be with his wife Penelope and Dante to be with the woman he wants to marry Beatrice. Both men are very much love the woman in their lives, go to their own hell and back and can think of nothing other than finding their way back to them. Beatrice even after death has a spirit that is very much in love with Dante. She has faith in him, and asks Virgil to guide him through hell to bring him back to her. As written by a professor in psychoanalysis, "Dante the voyager through this arduous voyage, a voyage that initially descends into ever deeper, ever more terrifying levels, is the love of and the love from two people: Virgil (his 'Psyche') and Beatrice (his 'Eros')" (Szajnberg, N. M., 2010). Dante travels through hell with Virgil's guidance to find his Beatrice that is lost on earth after suffering an early death. Dante's Inferno does not tell a lot about Beatrice but does show her deep love for him and that she will do what it takes to be with him again. "For I am Beatrice who sends you on; I come from where I most long to return; Love prompted me, that Love which makes me speak"(Inferno). ...
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...angered the God and they make it extremely difficult for him to achieve his goals. Dante and Virgil travel through the circles of hell in order for Dante to search for his humanity. The plot of these two stories are evident when comparing the epic characteristics, epic conventions, and comparing the different religious backgrounds of the time period in which these novels were written. Both the Odyssey by Homer and Dante’s Inferno were written to reveal culture and tradition of life and values that each epic portrays. In the Odyssey by Homer the main character Odysseus is a man struggling with multiple obstacles while trying to return home after twenty years fighting in the Trojan War. In the Inferno, Dante is on a journey between good and evil, with references to heaven and hell. The Gods or angels are used in both books by helping Odysseus and Dante to grow in faith and attain their own potential dream. Odysseus faces challenges on his journey home are plagued by the wrath of the Gods. Dante is challenged by going through hell in search of his humanity. Throughout the Odyssey by Homer Odysseus must face obstacles and struggle to be able to overcome these obstacles by using his mind and also his strength but he needs to make sure all that he does in good and honorable. The goddess Athena is on Odysseus’s side guiding him on his journeys, but Odysseus thinks that he is above the Gods and is able to make it home on his own merits. This thinking causes Odysseus and his...
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...was one person, was born between 850 and 1100 BCE) was, to use a modern term, the source code for Greek literature and poetry, and therefore for Western literature, heavily influencing practically everyone who followed him, including, of course, the great Florentine poet Dante Alighieri ( 1265-1321 A.D.). Both poets’ visions of Hell, as depicted in The Odyssey and Inferno, are noteworthy because they open important windows into the philosophical and theological underpinnings of the worlds into which these authors were born. Why is this important? Because their elaborately drawn visions of Hell represent the two great divides in how humans for 3,000 years have been seeing themselves and the universe they perceive surrounding them. In the Homeric vision, life is tragic and arbitrary. We as humans are mere playthings of the Fates and the gods. Sometimes justice occurs, but usually only by accident, and even then it comes wrapped up in irony. Good is punished and evil triumphs. The hero, instead of enjoying the fruits of his victory, is brought low by some tragic flaw. Homer’s portrayal of the gods and of hell in the Odyssey…[big long quote] For Dante, in sharp contrast, the universe is ordered and just. The wicked are, eventually, punished and the righteous are rewarded, if not in this life, then in the next. Existence, while often painful and scary, is not arbitrary, but proceeds according to a mysterious divine plan devised long ago by an eternally all-knowing, loving...
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...monotheism, Archaic Age, Classical Age, Hellenistic Age Art & Artworks: Sculpture: relief sculpture, free-standing sculpture, idealism, naturalism; characteristics of Archaic sculpture, kouros, kore; characteristics of Classical sculpture, Myron, Discus Thrower, Polycleitus, Spear-Bearer, Canon, unknown sculptors, Zeus, Three Goddesses,, Praxiteles, Aphrodite of Knidos; characteristics of Hellenistic sculpture, Laocoon and his Sons, Old Shepherdess ; Architecture, frieze, pediment, entablature, capital, metope, triglyph,; Characteristics of Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian styles, Parthenon, Temple of Athena Nike, Erectheion (with Porch of the Maidens), Propylaia Literature & Drama: epic poetry, Epic of Gilgamesh, Homer, Iliad, Odyssey; Hesiod, Theogony; Theater of Dionysus, tragedy, comedy, Oresteia of Aeschylus, Antigone & Oedipus the King by Sophocles, Medea by Euripides, Lysistrata by Aristophanes, characteristics of tragedy, hubris, hamartia, catharsis Thought: Pre-Socratic Philosophers, Thales, water, Xenophanes, Democritus, atoms; Socrates, Plato & theory of forms, Allegory of the Cave, Republic, Aristotle, criticisms of Plato, soma, psuche, excerpt from Aristotle Roman Culture Terms: Octavian=Augustus, Roman Republic, Roman Empire Art & Artworks: Sculpture: Augustus of Primaporta, Victory Column of Trajan, Aristocrat with Portrait Busts,...
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...in England. Don Quixote was a fictional character by Miguel de Cervantes who was considered Spain’s greatest writer. Published in two volumes a decade apart, Don Quixote contains romance, adventure, humor, aspiration and philosophy. Cervantes himself states that he wrote Don Quixote in order to undermine the influence of those "vain and empty books of chivalry.” I believe Cervantes wanted to take the knight idea to a different approach. Don Quixote was an important book for many reasons, but mostly because it was the first book to bring reasonable real-life consequences into the world of literature. Don Quixote is very different to other literature of previous time periods such as The Iliad, The Odyssey, Beowulf, Inferno, etc. It was an important development in literature and shows us readers that the reality of existence consists in accepting all the impact of experience. The popular literature at the time was romance. Cervantes work influenced the creation and transformation of literary genres. Don Quixote introduced the contrast between romance and reality. Alonzo Quixano who later changes his name to Don Quixote, was a wealthy man who spends all his days and nights reading books about medieval knights and dragon-slaying. Don Quixote is a sweet old man under a delusion that he is a knight in a land where knights have gone out of style. He is a dreamer and characterized as a fool. Throughout his many adventures Quixote...
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...Kafka's Metamorphosis "As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect" (Kafka 1757). This opening is famous not only for its startling content but also for its calm, matter-of-fact style which then sets the tone for the rest of the story. Along with Homer's Iliad and Odyssey and Dante's Inferno, Franz Kafka's "The Metamorphosis" has one of the most-memorized and most attention-catching opening lines. Gregor Samsa feels that he has been treated as a lowly insect and comes to feel that he is one; the story makes the leap from "I feel like an insect" to "I am an insect." Whatever the causes for Gregor feeling this way, these causes have led to his isolation and alienation (the feeling of being a stranger and an alien, even in those places where one should feel at home). Gregor has undergone an ultimate alienation: he is alienated from both his psychological and physical self. Once Gregor's metamorphosis (change) has been accomplished, the story moves inevitably to his death. In many ways, the protagonist (main character) of "The Metamorphosis" and his dilemmas are much like those in "The Death of Ivan Ilyich." Franz Kafka (1883-1924) was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia to a Jewish family of German...
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...Kafka's Metamorphosis "As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic insect" (Kafka 1757). This opening is famous not only for its startling content but also for its calm, matter-of-fact style which then sets the tone for the rest of the story. Along with Homer's Iliad and Odyssey and Dante's Inferno, Franz Kafka's "The Metamorphosis" has one of the most-memorized and most attention-catching opening lines. Gregor Samsa feels that he has been treated as a lowly insect and comes to feel that he is one; the story makes the leap from "I feel like an insect" to "I am an insect." Whatever the causes for Gregor feeling this way, these causes have led to his isolation and alienation (the feeling of being a stranger and an alien, even in those places where one should feel at home). Gregor has undergone an ultimate alienation: he is alienated from both his psychological and physical self. Once Gregor's metamorphosis (change) has been accomplished, the story moves inevitably to his death. In many ways, the protagonist (main character) of "The Metamorphosis" and his dilemmas are much like those in "The Death of Ivan Ilyich." Franz Kafka (1883-1924) was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia to a Jewish family of German...
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...Tennyson (Ulysses and Crossing the Bar) Presented by: Fatima Tawfiq ********************************************************** Tennyson Biography Alfred, Lord Tennyson, is one of the most famous poets in English literature. Many of his poems are standard of 19th-century literature and are critical and popular favorites. The body of critical work on him is immense, and although some of his work is seen as too sentimental today, his intellectual contributions to poetry and metaphysics are undeniable. Alfred Tennyson was born on August 5, 1809 in Somersby, Lincolnshire, where his father George was a clergyman. Young Alfred began writing poetry at a very early age, and published his first work "Poems by Two Brothers" at the tender age of sixteen. In that same year of 1827 Tennyson entered Cambridge University, where he befriended Thackery and produced his second collection, "Poems, Chiefly Lyrical". He also met Emily Selwood, to whom he became engaged in 1839. The Selwood family objected to the engagement, partly because of Tennyson's lack of money, and partly because his brother Charles was unhappily married to Emily's sister Louisa. Tennyson poured his energy into writing, and his "Poems" of 1842 made him extremely popular. He let his doctors convince him to give up writing for a time because of his poor health, but the respite was temporary. In 1847 "The Princess" was another success, and two years later Tennyson married Emily in a secret ceremony. When William Wordsworth...
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...The Divine Comedy represents the mature Dante’s solution to the poet’s task annunciated in The New Life. Its three canticles (the Inferno, the Purgatorio, and the Paradiso) display a nearly limitless wealth of references to historical particulars of the late Middle Ages and to Dante’s life. Even so, its allegorical form allows these to function as symbols. The Pilgrim’s journey through Hell to Heaven thus becomes an emblem of all human experience and a recognition of life’s circularity. The “Comedy” of its title is, therefore, the situation of life and the accumulation of experience that attends it. Correspondingly, however, chronological placement of the narrative from Good Friday through Easter Sunday, 1300, particularizes the experience even as it implies the death and rebirth that attends a critical stage of any person’s life. The poet tells his readers in the first line of the Inferno that he is midway through life, and indeed Dante would have been thirty-five years of age in 1300. Though he maintains present tense throughout the poem, he is, however, actually writing in the years that follow the events that he describes. This extraordinary method allows the Poet to place what amounts to prophetic utterance in the mouth of the Pilgrim. Dante thus maintains and further develops the thesis of The New Life, that the progress of the Pilgrim corresponds directly to the progress of the Poet. The literal journey that the Pilgrim undertakes toward the Beatific Vision succeeds only...
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...Everyone likes to throw the word “hero around”, but I dont think everyone actually realizes what a hero is, everyone has a different perception of what makes someone a hero. To some, a hero can range from someone with supernatural abilities that dedicate their whole lives to keeping the world safe from any threat to just someone with no special super power, it’s just people to admire or look up to. With the word having such a wide spectrum, it seems fairly easy to fall into the hero category. That range leaves no doubt why Odysseus and Dante are epic heroes; with what they went through, traveling through sea and passing straight through hell, they have also earned the title of being respectable heroes. According to The Odyssey, it is shown that a hero has a quality of being a risk taker; a trait Odysseus demonstrates throughout his journey. When Odysseus stabbed the Cyclopes in the eye, it is considered a huge, bold risk “Straight forward they sprinted, lifting it, and rammed it deep in his crater eye” (book IX. 380-381). Odysseus knew if he didn’t act quick, him and his men would live out their last days waiting to be lunch for the Cyclops. However, Odysseus is considered a god among men because of his quick thinking, he knew he had to succeed in order to avoid that fate. Not only were they inspired by the fact that they had to act on the situation to save their lives, but it also seems like they had some external motivation. As Odysseus’ men stood around him, “some god...
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...Omeros: The River of Ancestry and the Importance of Identity What defines a location, a place in space? Is it those who are there or those who have been there? Is it the life this position exudes or the life that is being suppressed? How does one define what is in front of them? How does one differentiate between the history of a place, the lives – the feelings, everyday happenings of the people – and the History of the place, that is to say the history that is imposed on the people? This is a problem when discussing places that have been colonized. The history of the people is assumed to be the History – the histories of the colonizers. The lives of the colonizers are projected onto the colonized – their religion, their rites, their businesses. The actual lives of the people are forgotten . The lives of the ingenious people are forgotten. And in places where slavery and indentured servitude was a practice, the original and true histories of those people are forgotten. This is a phenomenon that West Indian author and poet Derek Walcott addresses in his insightful and touched the Nobel Prize Lecture delivered after receiving the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1992. He begins his lecture describing a performance that takes place on the island of Trinidad, every year by the East Indian population of the town Felicity. The performance is a dramatization of the Hindu epic Ramayana, a major representation of their original history and presentation of their identities....
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...ARISTOTLE TRANSFIGURED Dante and the Structure of the Inferno and the Purgatorio by Donald J. Hambrick Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Phüosophy Dalhousie University Halifax, Nova Scotia August, 1997 Q copyright by Donald J. Harnbrick, 1997 N l*lofational Library Canada Bibliothèque.nationale du Canada Acquisitions and Bibliogaphic Services Acquisitions et seMces bibliographiques 395 Wdingtoci Street OttawaON K 1 A W 395, rua Wellington Ottawa ON K I A O N 4 canada Canada The author has granted a nonexclusive licence allowing the National Library of Canada to reproduce, loan, distribute or sell copies of this thesis in microfonn, paper or electronic formats. L'auteur a accorde une licence non exclusive permettant à la Bibliothèque nationale du Canada de reproduire, prêter' distribuer ou vendre des copies de cette thèse sous la forme de microfiche/nlm, de reproduction sur papier ou sur format électronique. The author retains ownership of the L'auteur conserve la proprieté du droit d'auteur q ui protège cette thèse. Ni la thèse ni des extraits substantiels de celle-ci ne doivent être imprimés ou autrement reproduits sans son autorisation. copyright i this thesis. Neither the n thesis nor substantid extracts fkom it may be printed or otherwise reproduced without the author's permission. To Those Who Teach. .. TABLE OF CONTEWS INTRODUCTION...
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...1. One day in Joszfow- Christopher Browing a. Emphasizes the old age of the officers- 39 b. Shows that they were trained to be like this and had a choice. They were not brainwashed o Myth that Browning is trying to disprove; that all Nazi’s were thoroughly indoctrinated • Some of the killers were old enough to think for themselves o Trying to give the lie to idea that people thought they had to kill so that they themselves would not be killed o Conclusions Browning drew about killers: • Some men did not want to appear cowardly to the other men • peer pressure of not stepping up against the idea • Testimony was consistent—gives it weight and truth • Career destruction – thought that if they refused to kill Jews that it would destroy there business/careers • Holocaust: The ignored Reality- Timothy Snyder • What is wrong with making (A) the iconic Holocaust experience? o It was the western most camp o Eastern killings are much unknown o Should view as one mass murder o Most Jews were polish Jews that were killed o Jews killed at (A) were not representative victims • Jews at (A) came mostly from western Europe • More educated/less religious than Polish Jews o (A) was not as bad other camps • Gets attention because there are a lot of survivors • Educated prisoners were able to write and share their story • Western released prisoners were able to spread their stories easier than eastern survivors who were under Soviet rule o 50% of the victims...
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...White Man’s Burden (Handout) Summary & Annotation: A straightforward analysis of the poem may conclude that Kipling presents a"Euro-centric" view of the world, in which people view society from only a European cultures point of view. This view proposes that white people consequently have an obligation to rule over, and encourage the cultural development of people from other ethnic and cultural backgrounds until they can take their place in the world by fully adopting Western ways. The term "the white man's burden" can be interpreted simply as racist, or taken as a metaphor for a condescending view of non-Western national culture and economic traditions, identified as a sense of European ascendancy which has been called "cultural imperialism". A parallel can also be drawn with the charitable view, common in Kipling's formative years, that the rich have a moral duty and obligation to help the poor "better" themselves whether the poor want the help or not until according to Europeans, "they can take their place in the world socially and economically." The term "white man's burden" is a phrase that became current in the controversy about the United States acquisition of the Philippines after the Spanish-American war of 1898. It was a concept that was the responsibility of white Europeans to bring "proper" European civilization to the nations (mostly brown, black, red or yellow) that did not have it. The underlying thought was that Europeans were correct in their beliefs and...
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