The gunfight at the O.K. Corral, President James Garfield is shot and killed by Charles Guiteau, and the first Christmas tree with electric lights is manufactured by Thomas Edison employee Edward Johnson. The Gilded Age was a strange time. But all of these events happened the same year Robert Louis Stevenson penned the landmark pirate novel Treasure Island. Thus, we can look at Treasure Island as a Gilded Age novel.
Continue reading Treasure Island as a Gilded Age Novel: Perspective and Historical SignificanceMonthly Archives: June 2024
Book Review: ‘Master and Commander’ by Patrick O’Brien
Sailing, exploration, naval combat, and the desperation that comes with adventure–what more could a reader ask for? In this post, we will conduct a review of Master and Commander by Patrick O’Brian. This book holds some sentimental value for me, oddly enough, as it relates to my youthful reading interests. And, as my shelf becomes more crowded, it becomes less and less essential.
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Great Lakes Pirates: Revealing Michigan’s Forgotten Outlaws
I hail from the far reaches of the US in a land called Michigan, where the trees are plentiful–as well as the freshwater lakes. Indeed, with five Great Lakes surrounding our borders, native Michiganders are taught to recognize the waters as a crucial part of our history and economy (repeat with me, HOMES). In this post, I would like to discuss a different part of the aquatic lore surrounding Michigan: The Great Lakes pirates!
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Literary and Historical Stockades: Definition and History
In the second half of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island, many of the characters spend time in a stockade. Now, I was unfamiliar with the term. I assumed it was a wooden structure for ne’er-do-wells to force them into acquiescence. Turns out that’s a pillory. In this post, we will define literary and historical stockades.
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How to Enrich Characters and Plot with Conflict
Conflicts in stories can seem pretty straight forward. There is a bad guy (or event) and the main character must confront it and succeed. Yet, conflicts are more nuanced than even that, with characters shifting from static to dynamic. Additionally, depending on the genre, you might see more conflict in specific stories, such as action and adventure. As such, conflict is both important and complex to plots and characterization. Today on the blog, I would like to discuss two types of conflict that enrich characters and stories: internal and external conflict.
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Ghost Story Conventions in Stephen King’s ‘Salem’s Lot’
As a connoisseur of the strange, I dabble in many forms of odd things. From folklore to legend, from ghost stories to little red men on telephone poles. I have read a fair amount of the weird. When I listened to Salem’s Lot by Stephen King (and read “Jerusalem’s Lot” and “One for the Road”), I felt as though there was this great haunting happening to the town of Salem’s Lot. The spirits of the dead are restless and all that. In this post, we are going to analyze ghost story conventions in Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot.
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Book List: World War Z by Max Brooks
The zombie apocalypse is a pervasive element in our modern culture thanks to a few luminaries and extremely popular shows (both George A. Romero and The Walking Dead respectively). However, many interpretations of the zombie plague have come and gone, but some have stayed more relevant and engaging. In this post, we examine World War Z by Max Brooks and look at how the world changes through the zombie apocalypse.
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Metaphorical Loss in Hemingway’s ‘The Three-Day Blow’
In Michigan, a certain feeling fills the air in the autumn months that is nearly indescribable. It is the feeling of aging and nostalgia, of cold nights from before, and it’s the feeling of all things coming to an end. Such a backdrop is perfect for examining the metaphorical loss in Hemingway’s short story “The Three-Day Blow.” For this post, we are going to discuss Hemingway’s short story as it relates to this ending and how the permeation of Michigan fall make that feeling all the more tangible, real, and emotional.
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Embracing Threshold Concepts for Growth
When I was in graduate school for writing, there was a great deal of talk about “threshold concepts” in writing. Mainly, these conversations were put forth to implore teachers to reflect on their practices and to remember what it was like to be a first-year writing student; never you mind that many teachers and writers struggle with some of these concepts long into adulthood and possibly their entire lives. This includes struggling with the writing process. For this post, we are going to look at embracing threshold concepts and how to think about them as they relate to our writing lives.
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Defining Anaphora through Emotion, Emphasis, and Rhythm
Repetition has a lot of power if used correctly. Especially repetition in speech. In rhetorical studies, using language to persuade and to writing compelling arguments is essential. Similarly, there are many strategies in rhetoric, from anacoluthon to polemics. In this post, we will be defining anaphora, and figure out what it is and how to use it in writing.
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