ENL 258 – Literary Studies
Anna M. Balkus, “The Monstrosity of the Male Gaze” In the Victorian era, women were expected to maintain sexual purity and submissiveness to be considered respectable. Women who violated these norms became known as “fallen women,” a term used to describe prostitutes, the lower class, or homeless people. However, the late nineteenth century introduced a… Read more Anna M. Balkus, “The Monstrosity of the Male Gaze,” 1st Place ENL 258
Gwen Pichette, “The Patriarchy’s ‘Ideal’ Woman” George Bernard Shaw’s reinvention of Pygmalion is a play about a linguist, Henry Higgins, who takes up the challenge of transforming a low-ranking flower girl with poor speech into a respectable lady, in an attempt to pass her off as a duchess. Similar to the story of Acis and… Read more Gwen Pichette, “The Patriarchy’s ‘Ideal’ Woman,” 2nd Place ENL 258
Emily M. Sonia, “Sex and Salvation in Victorian England” Bram Stoker’s Dracula and Christina Rossetti’s “Goblin Market” share similar themes of sexuality and fallen women in Victorian England. While Dracula proposes that independence and education, two characteristics important to the New Woman movement, would be women’s salvation from sexual desire, “Goblin Market” uses religious themes… Read more Emily M. Sonia, “Sex and Salvation in Victorian England,” 3rd Place ENL 258
Lauryn Nosek, Fall 2007 The character of Okonkwo in Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart was driven by fear, a fear of change and losing his self-worth. He needed the village of Umuofia to remain untouched by time and progress because its system and structure were the measures by which he assigned worth and meaning in… Read more Lauryn Nosek, “Change is Bad: Okonkwo’s Resistance to Change in Things Fall Apart,” 1st Place ENL 258
Josh Martin, Fall 2011 “Thrice-nobler than myself, thou teachest me, O valiant Eros, what I should, and thou couldst not. My queen and Eros have by their brave instruction got upon me a nobleness in record. But I will be a bridegroom in my death, and run into’t as to a lover’s bed. Come then;… Read more Josh Martin, “Reason Versus Passion: An Analysis of the Representation of Logic and Emotion in Antony and Cleopatra and Charlotte Temple,” 1st Place ENL 258
Ana Marie Bell, Fall 2009 Nigerian author Chinua Achebe, in his essay “Today, the Balance of Stories,” advocates the telling of “hitherto untold stories, along with new ways of telling” as a means of healing the trauma of cultural dispossession and advancing a “universal conversation” that respects the validity and vitality of all human stories… Read more Ana Marie Bell, “Balancing Man and Man Alike,” 1st Place ENL 258
Angela Tieng, Fall 2011 History is the study of a human past; but, for Ireland, history is not merely that. History is as much the living, breathing present. Ireland’s people are aware of their dejected “history,” which stares them in the face every day, anew. The violence and innumerable pains Northern Ireland has suffered at… Read more Angela Tieng, “Now and Then,” 2nd Place ENL 258
LeAnne Coady, Fall 2007 Since childhood, we all have been taught that “racism is bad” and should be avoided at all costs. We have been told that “everyone is a child of God and we are all created equal.” In fact, Americans are praised for the so-called equality they possess. Renowned Author Toni Morrison sheds… Read more LeAnne Coady, “Toni Morrison Writes on Racism,” 2nd Place ENL 258
Sephora Marie Borges, Spring 2010 Seamus Heaney was born on April 13, 1939 in Derry, Northern Ireland at the Heaneys’ family farm of ‘Mossbawn’; as the son of a potato farmer, he would have been expected to follow in his father’s footsteps, but chose a profession in writing instead (Vendler xi). Heaney lived in Northern… Read more Sephora Marie Borges, “The Troubles of an Irish Poet,” 2nd Place ENL 258
Steven Martin, Fall 2009 In the Japanese arts, nothing is more revered than the idyllic balance of harmony between nature and man. Such a relationship is at the heart of the Zen-Buddhist notion of “Sattori,” or enlightenment (Suzuki 211). Whether such harmony is found in the minimalist structure of the Haiku of Basho and Myoe,… Read more Steven Martin, “Ask the Art, Not the Artist,” 2nd Place ENL 258