English language during Old English Period

 Origin of English Language: The English language is a West Germanic language that originated in England. It is the third most spoken language in the world after Mandarin Chinese and Spanish. English has been influenced by several other languages over the centuries, including Old Norse, Latin, French, and Dutch. The English language has a rich and complex history, evolving over centuries through various influences. It originated from the Germanic tribes who invaded Britain in the 5th and 6th centuries, bringing with them what we now call Old English. Over time, Old English evolved, absorbing vocabulary and influences from Latin (through the Roman occupation of Britain) and Old Norse (through Viking invasions), among others.

The Different Periods of the English Language

The English language has gone through distinct periods throughout its history. Different aspects of the language have changed throughout time, such as grammar, vocabulary, spelling, etc.

The Old English period (5th-11th centuries), Middle English period (11th-15th centuries), and Modern English period (16th century to present) are the three main divisions in the history of the English language.

Let's take a closer look at each one:

Old English Period: The English language has undergone significant grammatical changes over the centuries, reflecting its evolution and adaptation to various influences. began in 449 AD with the arrival of three Germanic tribes from the Continent: The Angles, Saxons, and Jutes. They settled in the south and east of Britain, which was then inhabited by the Celts. The Anglo-Saxons had their language, called Old English, which was spoken from around the 5th century to the 11th century.

Old English was a Germanic language, and as such, it was very different from the Celtic languages spoken by the Britons. It was also a very different language from the English we speak today. It was a highly inflected language, meaning that words could change their form depending on how they were being used in a sentence. There are four known dialects of the Old English language:

1. ·         Northumbrian in northern England and southeastern Scotland,
2. ·        Mercian in central England,
3. ·        Kentish in southeastern England,
4. ·        West Saxon in southern and southwestern England.

Old English grammar also had a complex system, with five main cases (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, instrumental), three genders (masculine, feminine, and neuter), and two numbers (singular and plural).

The Anglo-Saxons also had their own alphabet, which was known as the futhorc. The futhorc consisted of 24 letters, most of which were named after rune symbols. However, they also borrowed the Roman alphabet and eventually started using that instead.

The vocabulary was also quite different, with many words being borrowed from other languages such as Latin, French, and Old Norse. The first account of Anglo-Saxon England ever written is from 731 AD – a document known as the Venerable Bede's ‘Ecclesiastical History of the English People’, which remains the single most valuable source from this period.

Another one of the most famous examples of Old English literature is the epic poem Beowulf, which was written sometime between the 8th and 11th centuries. By the end of the Old English period at the close of the 11th century, West Saxon dominated, resulting in most of the surviving documents from this period being written in the West Saxon dialect.

The Old English period was a time of great change for Britain. In 1066, the Normans invaded England and conquered the Anglo-Saxons. The Normans were originally Viking settlers from Scandinavia who had settled in France in the 10th century. They spoke a form of French, which was the language of the ruling class in England after the Norman Conquest.

The Old English period came to an end in 1066 with the Norman Conquest. However, Old English continued to be spoken in some parts of England until the 12th century. After that, it was replaced by Middle English. (A Brief History of the English Language: From Old English to Modern Days)

Bottom Line: Overall, the Old English period was characterized by a highly inflected language with complex grammatical structures. It laid the foundation for the subsequent development of Middle and Modern English, influencing vocabulary, syntax, and grammar in profound ways. Despite its differences from contemporary English, Old English remains a fascinating linguistic legacy, offering insights into the evolution of the English language over time.

To appear in an online quiz on Old and Middle English Period, Click here

References

A Brief History of the English Language: From Old English to Modern Days. (n.d.). Retrieved from Langster: https://langster.org/en/blog/a-brief-history-of-the-english-language-from-old-english-to-modern-days

(ChatGPT, personal communication, February 11, 2024).

 

 

 

Comparative analysis of story The Heathen and life of Pi movie

This blog is a classroom task assigned to Students to check their understanding. Students shall compare and contrast the story Heathen with Movie life of pie. 

"The Heathen" is a short story by the American writer Jack London. It was first published in Everybody's Magazine in August 1910In the story, two people, from different cultural and racial backgrounds, are the only survivors of a ship that encounters a hurricane in the Pacific, and they remain together.

Life of Pi is a Canadian philosophical novel by Yann Martel published in 2001.The protagonist is Piscine Molitor "Pi" Patel, an Indian boy, He survives 227 days after a shipwreck while stranded on a lifeboat in the Pacific Ocean with a Bengal tiger which raises questions about the nature of reality and how it is perceived and told.later in the year 2012 it was adapted into a movie directed and produced by Ang Lee and written by David Magee.

To Watch the movie click here:

Post viewing task

(Give responses to these questions in the comment section below this blog-post)

1. What similarities and differences did you found between the story and Movie? 

2. How far does the character of Otto and Richard Parker is influential in character development of protagonist? 

3.Do you feel ‘aesthetic delight’ while watching the movie? If yes, exactly when did it happen? If no, can you explain with reasons?

4. What is the role of religion in both movie and story? 

5.Was there any particular scene or moment in the movie that you will cherish lifetime?

Book Review: Totto-Chan The little girl at the Window

શીર્ષક: તોત્તો-ચાન

લેખક: તેત્સુકો કુરોયાનાગી

અનુવાદ: રમણ સોની

મૂળ જાપાની ભાષામાં લખાયેલું  આ પુસ્તક બીજી અનેક ભાષાઓમાં અનુવાદિત થયેલ છે. 

તોતો-ચાન પુસ્તક ની નાયિકા તેત્સુકો કુરોયાનાગીએ પોતાના શાળા- જીવનના સંસ્મરણો અને સત્ય ઘટનાઓ નાની નાની પ્રસંગ કથાઓ રૂપે રજૂ કરી છે. વાત છે નાયિકા તેત્સુકો કુરોયાનાગી એટલે કે તોતો-ચાનની 'ખરાબ, નઠોર છોકરી' માંથી 'તું સાચે જ ખૂબ સારી છોકરી છે' સુધીની સફર. 

નટખટ, ચંચળ અને જીજ્ઞાસુ તોતો-ચાનના મનમાં  'તોમોએ' નામની નવી શાળાના બે ઝાડનું બનેલું પ્રવેશદ્વાર તથા રેલવેના ડબ્બામાં ચાલતા વર્ગખંડ જોઈને આનંદ તથા અચરજનુ મોજું ફરી વળે છે. શાળાના હેડમાસ્તર  કોબાયાશી ખૂબ જ પ્રેમાળ અને કલ્પનાશીલ હતા. બાળકોને મુકત વાતાવરણ અને સમતોલ આહાર મળે એની ખાસ કાળજી લેતા હતા. શ્રી કોબાયાશીના જાપાન અને અમેરીકાના યુધ્ધની વિષમ પરિસ્થિતિમાં પણ શાળાનું વાતાવરણ જીવંત અને ભયમુક્ત રહે એવા પ્રયત્ન રહેતા. 

ઈ.સ. ૧૯૪૫ માં ટોકિયો પર હવાઈ હુમલો થયેલો ત્યારે આગ લાગેલી ને એમાં તોમોએ શાળા ભસ્મીભૂત થઈ ગયેલી, ત્યારે શ્રી કોબાયાશી ફરી પોતાની આદર્શ શાળા સ્થાપવાનું સ્વપ્ન સેવે છે પરંતુ એ સ્વપ્ન વાસ્તવિકતા માં પરિણમે એ પહેલાં ઓગણસિત્તેરની વયે અવસાન પામે છે, પરંતુ શ્રી કોબાયાશી, એમનો સ્નેહાળ સ્વભાવ અને અનેરી શિક્ષણ પધ્ધતિ એમના વિધ્યાર્થીઓમા  તથા એમની જ વિધ્યાર્થી દ્વારા લખાયેલ પુસ્તક સ્વરૂપે જીવંત રહેશે. 

એક વિધ્યાર્થીએ એના શિક્ષક વિશે લખેલું પુસ્તક દરેક શિક્ષકે અચૂક વાચવા જેવું છે!

Refund: One act play by Fritz Karinthy

characters:  

• wasserkopf

• The Principal 

• The teachers of various Subjects  ( History, geography,mathematics, Physics)

---

Refund Play Summary:  

Refund is a one act play by famous Hungarian writer Fritz Karinthy.Fritz Karinthy is a well known short story writer who wrote the one act play “Refund” in 1938. This is the story of a former student Wasserkopf, who demands that his tuition should be refunded because he feels his education was worthless. But he loses his fight when he is tricked by the mathematics master.  The play “Refund” is full of humour which deals with an extraordinarily absurd situation.

Wasserkopf is forty years old. He could not get any job and wherever he goes people tell him that he is fit for nothing. One day he meets Leaderer and asks him about his business. When Leaderer tells him about foreign exchange and Hungarian money, he is not able to understand anything and starts asking questions about foreign exchange. Leaderer says when Wasserkopf does not know the silly thing then what had he studied? He better can go to the school and get his tuition fees back. Wasserkopf who is jobless and does not have any finance, thought this idea as something beneficial. So he went to the school where he studied once.

Wasserkopf wanted the refund of his tuition fees which were paid eighteen years ago because he was taught badly. When he asks for it, the principal is shocked. The principal is in a peculiar situation now and he calls for an urgent meeting with all other staff members. The masters realized that Wasserkopf’s real intention was to fail in the exam and claim the refund. Therefore, they decided to outsmart the old student by proving all his answers right. The Mathematics Master said that they had to be united and ought to help each other in implementing their plan. The exam was an oral one as Wasserkopf’s refusal to write. They decide that whatever answers he gives whether it is right or wrong they will prove him right.

The first question was from the History Master. The Master asked him how many years the ‘Thirty Years’ war lasted. The answer was in the question itself. But Wasserkopf, who was keen on giving wrong answers, said that the ‘Thirty Years war’, lasted seven metres. The History Master did not know how to prove this answer right. Fortunately for him, the Mathematics master aided him by proving that the answer was right on the basis of Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. The Master argued that time and space are relative terms and therefore years can be represented in terms of meter. The war took place during half of each day, three hours a day to eat, hours given up to noon day, so totally seven years.  The actual time spent in fighting was seven years and it has been by Einstein’s equivalence of seven meters. Wasserkopf called the History Master a numskull.

 The Physics Master asked Wasserkopf whether clocks in church become smaller if one walks away from it or is it because of optical illusion.  He called The Physics master an ass.  The master says that the answer is correct because the ass does not have any illusion of vision. Therefore, Wasserkopf has given a metaphorical explanation. Wasserkopf called him a cannibal.

     The Geography Master asks Wasserkopf for the name of a city which has the same name as the capital of German Province of Brunswick.  He replied as ‘Same’.  Master said it as the correct answer.  There was a legend that once as the emperor Barbarossa was riding in the city, he met a young peasant (farmer) girl, who was munching a bun mouthful.  He called out to her God Bless you and asked her the name of the city, she answered the same to you sir for his wishes, and the Emperor mistook the city name as ‘Same’.

One by one each teacher justified his wrong answer to be the correct one and they marked him excellent. Though Wasserkopf gives wrong answers and uses abusive words to each teacher, they don't show their anger because they have to prove him as an excellent student.

At last the mathematics master asks him a difficult question and an easy question. For the easy question he gives the wrong answer and the master gets angry and says that he has failed in his examination so he should be given his tuition fees back. The master says that they have decided to give him his tuition fees back and asks for the exact amount which he has to get. Wasserkopf without knowing that he is going to fall into their trap gives them the list of exact amounts. The mathematics master says that was his difficult question and he gave the right answer. Now he is proved excellent in the entire subject and they throw him out without allowing him to say anything further. It shows the ability of the teachers to manage the situation and how they tackle Wasserkopf without spoiling the reputation of their school.

---

                              

laugh and be Merry by John Masefield

Laugh and be Merry

About Poet :

John Masefield was born in Ledbury in Herefordshire in the year  1878. It was at an early age of sixteen, Masefield joined the merchant navy. He remained the Poet laureate of United Kingdom from 1830 until his death, 1867. Masefield developed his passion for writing and reading while he was on his voyage! Today, he is popular for his classic children’s novels like The Midnight Folk and The Box of Delight.

 About Poem:

Here, we are attempting an analysis of Laugh and Be Merry by John Masefield. The poem is written in plain verse with a rhythmic style. The theme of Laugh and Be Merry is to have a constructive outlook in life. Yes, the purpose of creation is to make this better and discover happiness! Anything we create or do, is an attempt to make ourselves happy! When God created this Earth and gave life to us, his main purpose was to see us happy! Our happiness would actually make God happy! While we forget the very purpose of creation, Masefield attempts to express the same through his poetic  verse!

 Poem analysis :

Laugh and be merry, remember, better the world with a song,

Better the world with a blow in the teeth of a wrong.

Laugh, for the time is brief, a thread the length of a span.

Laugh and be proud to belong to the old proud pageant of man.

 

“Laugh and Be Merry” is actually the symbol of being human! The phrase is used as a tagline and the very purpose of our life. Hence the poet commences the poem with this phrase! The world becomes better with every song! The song actually refers to the inner voice when happy!

“Blow in the teeth of a wrong”

If you do something wrong, make a mistake, punishment is inevitable! Yes, the poet says, a blow (punishment) makes the world better because it saves you from “the bigger punishment”.

…Time is brief,

Our time on Earth is very limited and actually can be measured with a thread! In this  little life, is there any scope to sit and repent! Well, that’s a no-no!

Laugh and be proud to belong…

This is again a very sweet expression that reflects the notion of being humane. It’s not that we’d only be happy throughout our life! We equally need to be proud of our existence and the place from where we belonged.

Laugh and be merry: remember, in olden time.

God made Heaven and Earth for joy He took in a rhyme,

Made them, and filled them full with the strong red wine of

His mirth

The splendid joy of the stars: the joy of the earth.

In this stanza Masefield expresses his opinion about the creation of Earth! According to him, God made Heaven and Earth for joy and took in a rhyme! Mark, there is no mention of Hell! The poem is actually an attempt to look into the brighter side of creation without depicting instances of the sleuth.

… filled them full with the strong red wine of

His mirth

 

The phrase ‘red wine’ is used to express the feeling of authority, celebration and merry-making! In the next line, the poet conveys, as the heaven and the star rejoice, so does the earth!

So we must laugh and drink from the deep blue cup of the sky,

Join the jubilant song of the great stars sweeping by,

Laugh, and battle, and work, and drink of the wine outpoured

In the dear green earth, the sign of the joy of the Lord.

The stretch of the sky is endless! The poet appeals us (…so we must laugh and drink) to lead our life much like the sky which knows no barrier and constraint! You shouldn’t to constrained to any feeling!

Star actually is referred to ‘Us’ and the way we should see our life refers to the “sky”.

In life, it’s ok to fight, laugh, get wounded, or anything! But you should laugh because “to be sad is not an option for you”

Theme of Laugh and Be Merry Revealed

In these very lines …. Laugh, and battle, and work, and drink of the wine outpoured

In the dear green earth, the sign of the joy of the Lord… lays hidden the theme of the poem!

Actually, the words “laugh”, “battle”, “work” are associated with “drinking of the wine”

The words, “work and battle” here symbolize all human actions! In a battle, lives are lost, but still the poet tells you to laugh because if battle is inevitable, you have to develop the feeling of accepting the loss happily! That’s the way of creation! Only if nine others fail, one becomes successful – this is the truth! To love and laugh even after failure is the theme of the poem! Because, that actually is the greatest win! When all the ten are happy, that’s the sign of the joy of the Lord.

Laugh and be merry together, like brothers akin,

Guesting awhile in the rooms of a beautiful inn,

Glad till the dancing stops, and the lilt of the music ends.

Laugh till the game is played; and be you merry, my friends.

The final stanza ignites the feeling of brotherhood because we all are eventually going to die! The purpose of hatred or separation withers upon realizing the ultimate end of each being! We are in our individual rooms of a beautiful inn. Anytime the music can stop, and then it actually ends! So, let there be a happy beginning, happy journey and a happy ending!

Analysis of the poem

The poem “Laugh and be Merry” by John Masefield examines the theme of living ‘Life’ to the full. In this poem he urges us to be cheerful and be merry and live the ‘Life’ to the fullest. The primary idea of the creation of entire universe is for happiness of man. The poet reminds us that life is not a bed of roses. There may be challenges and sufferings and the moments of sorrow or unhappiness in the life of each person but they are all passing things. The joy that we derive from the universe and from the Nature of the Earth is everlasting. Men will not do well to have recourse to Nature, which is an embodiment of God’s beauty and grandeur. So, the poet advises us to laugh and be merry.

Life is brief and it is not to be wasted away in sorrow and despair. He advocates us to get pleasure from our lives in this world, since the universe itself is a manifestation of the joy of God. Each moment of our life should be cherished and rejoiced. The celestial bodies like moon and stars are created for the happiness of man. So we should be enlivened by God’s purposeful creation. The poet compares the world with an inn where all human beings are temporary guests. We should enjoy life till it comes to an end and the lilt of music of life ends. So man should make use of his short and brief stay on Earth by laughing away his troubles and sorrows. The entire universe is created with the sweet pattern of music and filled them with intoxicating red wine that is His extreme joy and delight. He must draw happiness and inspiration from everything around him. The joy of life is very basis of our brotherhood and mutual love. Man must live happily with fellow men like brothers residing in an inn. He must play game of life cheerfully and pass through the journey of joy till he reaches his ultimate goal or destination. Similarly, we should enjoy our life to the last breath; and the song finishes. Life is compared to a game also. While playing we must enjoy the game without fretting about victory or defeat. Let us play the game of life cheerfully till to the end.

Game of Thrones

                              “When you play a game of thrones you win or die”

Yes, your guess is right this blog is about famous television series game of thrones which is an adaptation of George R.R.Martin’s A song of Ice and Fire, a series of fantasy novels from which A game of thrones is the first novel. This Series got humongous fame from all around the world. This series had created whirlpool of different emotions in me. What is most captivating about this series is cinematography dialogue and characters. When I say cinematography I mean to say it is splendid until season 6 (that doesn’t mean other two seasons were bad, but not as satisfying as earlier seasons) When it comes to dialogue I would say that dialogues are the soul of this series when dialogue is being said it lefts deep effect on viewer.

(This series has 8 season and 73 episodes, each episode is about 1 hour and 30 minutes long, there is plenty character out which I have selected few of them to discuss here, Trust me this series has many more interesting character and Dialogues apart from which are discussed below)

Dialogues were never a common communication between two people rather it indicates what is coming next. Dialogue between Varys and Tyrion were always indirect yet direct plus interesting:

    

Varys: Power is a curious thing, my lord. Are you fond of riddles?

Tyrion: Why? Am I about to hear one?

Varys: Three great men it in a room, a king, a priest and a rich man. Between them stand a common sellsword. Each great man bids the sellsword kill the other two. Who lives, who Dies?

Tyrion: Depends upon sellsword.

Varys: does it? He has neither crown, nor gold, nor sword, nor favor with the gods.

Tyrion: he’s got the sword, the power of life and death!

Varys: But if it’s swordsmen who rules, why do we pretend king hold all the power? When Ned stark lost his head, who was truly responsible- Joffrey, the executioner, or something else?

Tyrion: I have decided I don’t like riddles.

Varys: Power resides where men believe it resides. It’s a trick, a shadow on the wall and a very small man can cast a very large shadow

When a lie being told again and again it becomes truth, We have another interesting conversation between Varys and Lord Baelish (Littlefinger) where this two are talking about their differing views: Varys on peace of realm, and littlefinger about embracing chaos, both acknowledging that, like in chess, the king are the weakest pieces.

Varys: I did what I did for the good of the realm.

Bealish: The realm. Do you know what the realm is? It’s the thousand blades of Aegon’s enemies- a story we agree to tell each other over and over, until we forgot that it’s a lie.

Varys: But what do we have left’ once we abandon the lie? Chaos? A gasping pit waiting to swallow us all.

Bealish: Chaos isn’t a pit. Chaos is a ladder. Many who try to climb it fails, and never get to try again. The fall breaks them. And some, given a chance to climb, they refuse. They cling to the realm, or gods, or love. Illusions, only the ladder is real. The climb is all there is.

Male Characters:

Dialogues always lefts character with two choices and there will always rest a question “to be or not to be” it can be seen at very first episode of first season where Catelyn warns Ned stark about arrival of Robert Baratheon and his intention about this sudden arrival from all the way Kings landing. It was all in his hand and he had to make a choice. Further about Ned Bran stark is that his first impression was decent until we came to know about his bastered son John Snow. We couldn’t believe it to be possible because of his decent character and it was a moment we knew that there is something odd about the existence of John snow himself as a bastered of Ned Stark. HE KNEW NOTHING, The boy had long way to go.

It always happens when director or writer kills the person we root for. Ned’s elder son Robb Stark was talented and in every way was capable of becoming a good king but soon was killed which was second shocking scene after the death of Ned stark and shock was doubled with the death of Catelyn stark where we lost three strong characters of the series.(The death of three Starks left audience in tears)

Bran stark was also left with choices were his decision of becoming Three eyed Raven led us to the reality of John snow. One reason behind Robb’s character was killed very soon so that John’s character can emerge. But John had his own limit like he was the person, who can sway away by emotions; his emotions will always come in his way of making decisions. Besides the fact the he was true heir of the Iron throne he decided to support Daenerys.

Tyrion was an imp and was disgusted by his own sister calling him monster, she believed that he killed their mother because she died giving birth to him and which arouse pity in viewer for him. He was always successful in making himself safe with his wordplay; his character development is impressive along with Sansa Stark. His wordplay led him to become hand of king for the rest of his life, where first it was for his survival while in the end of the series it was a punishment for him.

Lord Varys’s character was perplexed from the beginning where I couldn’t really know his intention of doing and saying. He was revealed to be person who wants good for the people of realm. I find his character very similar to professor Snape from Harry potter where he was believed to be a villain but in reality he was trying to protect harry in every possible way. Whereas Varys wanted to protect realm. Even if he didn’t know about John being a Targaryen he still would have chosen John over Daenerys as a king of Iron throne.

Female Characters:

When it comes to the female characters of the series on one hand director successfully did justice to female characters that we can see from characters like Catelyn Stark, Arya Stark, Sansa Stark, Daenerys Targaryen, Cersei Lannister, Lady Olenna( Trust me this old lady was Badass even till her death) but on another hand he didn’t failed to show how women are being used as mere an object with such characters like women in whore house named Rose and Shae.

Catelyn was a loving mother to her children and wife to her husband, her character was a combination of wise and fierce. She knew from the beginning that what will be the result when Ned will accept the proposal of Robert Baratheon which will bring a storm upon their family and will destroy their nest.

On the other hand Cersei was also Mother but the difference is that she can go to any extent for her children. I find her character very selfish because she never drops her weapon no matter what happen. This attitude of her led Daenerys lost her one dragon to a Night King and almost all kings landing was burned down. Thousand innocents were turned in to ashes.

Arya is most loved character in whole series. From childhood she wanted to learn sword. After knowing about the death of her parents and brother she goes Braavos and uses her new skill to bring those who have wronged her family to justice. She left everyone in awe when she killed Night king.

Human can grown only when they walk on a way full of thorns- Sansa’s journey in whole series tells the same thing, her Journey from being innocent little dove to being Queen in the North is very satisfying to watch.

Daenerys rules the whole series, her ambitions of being queen leads to her own end. Her belief of being right in every situation becomes the reason of her own death. Her character was really feeding my woman ego until last season, the way her character was twisted in last episode blew audiences mind. But again what we root for never happens because there will be no thrill if there is no twisted end right?

Ending:

And pack survived!!!..

To be honest I kind of expected this ending where I knew one of the stark will sit on the Iron throne. Director be like “Nah I’m not gonna make king as per your wish” (for those whished for John or Daenerys to sit on the Iron throne) where he made a crippled boy a king and an Imp his hand and he really didn’t disappointed audience by making Sansa queen in the North and of course Arya being Arya not interested being in being lady of anyone goes on a Journey to west from Westeros. Whereas Johns end up again being in Night’s watch. This series bring so many emotions where you will feel overwhelm, emotional, thrilled, furious, disappoint yet happy in the same situation. Best series I have ever watched!!!

Language Lab review

                                               

What is Language lab?

A room Equipped with audio and visual equipment to aid people learning a foreign language. Language lab majorly favors the Audio – lingual method, it stressed listening and speaking more than readin and writing skills. The original language labs are now very outdated. They were using tapes based system using reel or cassette.

History of Language Lab:

Ralf Waltz is usually credited with cong the term language laboratory .The History of the American Language laboratory can be divided into five periods,

(1) The beginning period, before World War 2

(2) The Establishing period, until 1958 when the national defense education Act(NDEA), which supplied large amounts of money for education, was passed

(3) The developing period, until the end of the 1960’s

(4) The diminishing period, until the end of the 1970’s and,

(5) The revival period, until today.

Language laboratories have become practical use since around 1950. Edison’s tin foil phonograph, invented in 1877, is the origin of our deluxe language laboratories with all their complex equipment. Edison’s phonograph was used in a foreign language class for the first time at college of Milwaukee n 1891.

Rafael Diez de la Cortina thought the method of teaching a foreign language using a phonograph for the first time. (Kitao) Unquestionably the 1960s were the golden years of language laboratory. According to Hocking by 1962 there were approximately 5000 installation in secondary schools another 1000 secondary school had labs by 1964.

Advantages of Language Lab:

· It is self assisted learning; student is in the center of the learning process.

· Possible to listen to many speakers

· Not to hear other student’s bad pronunciation

· To listen to the records many times and practice

· To listen the teacher’s drills

· To prepare for the class enjoyably

· Able to test listening and speaking



· Can learn same lesson repeatedly



· Teachers gets tired but not machine



Disadvantages of Language Lab:

· Student needed to study reading most

· Student can not repeat correctly by themselves

· Repetition of same instruction leads to boredom

· It can improve only listening and speaking

· One can’t learn all LSRW skills with Language lab software

· It requires electricity; software can’t work without it

· Somewhere we feel need of teacher for proper instruction, teacher can give more explanation and examples for better understanding we can’t expect this from language lab.

Language lab Past Present and future:

As we have already discussed past of the language lab, what is the present situation of language lab? We are living in digital era. PCs have replaced the old language labs, every student have tablet or android phones they can watch learning videos or can record their inputs and upload it. In future there will be no need of big room equipped with language lab software. One can carry lab in his/her pocket.

Works Cited

BARRUTIA, RICHARD. THE PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE OF LANGUAGE LABORATORIES. n.d. 21 February 2018. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/338842 .>.

Khampusaen, Dararat. "Past, Present and Future: From Traditional Language Laboratories to Digital Language Laboratories and Multimedia ICT Suites." n.d. 21 February 2018. <http://www.ijcim.th.org/SpecialEditions/v21nSP2/02_08_14E_Dararat.pdf>.

Kitao, Kenji. The History of Language Laboratories Origin and establishment. n.d. 21 February 2018. <https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED381020>.

Roby, Warren B. TECHNOLOGY IN THE SERVICE OF FOREIGN LANGUAGE LEARNING: THE CASE OF THE LANGUAGE LABORATORY. n.d. 21 February 2018. <https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/ebc8/687dde1b89deaf01cc53de2084de54ebc2db.pdf>.

Sense of and Ending By Julian Barnes

                                               

Sense of an Ending is a very short novel by Julian Barnes. ‘Ending’- Actually there is no Ending but to a certain extent there will be always a beginning in the Ending (I believe so). like other novels this novel has a story, a story which is based on someone’s memory, story of entangled relations, story about growing characters, a story about human psychology, how human being fabricate their own memory to console themselves. The story seems very easy but it is difficult to understand. There are many references about history and literature and one has to have knowledge about it or else he/she will close the book after reading about it.

There are some debatable questions after reading this novel, let us discuss:

What is the meaning of phrase ‘Blood Money’ in Veronica’s reply email?

Sarah Ford (Mother of veronica) left 500 dollars to Tony Webster (narrator and Protagonist) after her death. Veronica sent a mail to Tony Webster in which she has written only one word ‘Blood Money’.

There is a chain of cause and effect. Every action has reaction, Tony and veronica were in Romantic relation but after their break up veronica came in relation with Tony’s friend Adrian Finn. Adrian told about this in his letter to Tony and asked about Veronica. Tony was offended somewhere with this and portrayed veronica in wrong way and asked him to meet her mother Sarah Ford, this meeting between Adrian Finn and Sarah Ford leads them to fell in love with each other. Adrian Commits Suicide after Sarah Ford Got Pregnant. Sarah Ford believes that it is Tony because of whom Adrian came in her life,, she was happy with this relation and that is why she gave this money to him, but Veronica believes that somewhere Tony is responsible for all this, and this is the reason she wrote ‘Blood Money’.

How do you decipher the equation: b = s – v x/+ a1 or a2 + v + a1 X s = b?

Adrian Finn Wrote this equation is his Suicide note, we are not told the meaning, it is up to us that how we interpret this, As story says this could be solved like this:

a1 or a2 + v + a1 X s = b

A1= Adrian Finn

A2=Tony Webster

V= Veronica

S= Sarah Ford

B= Baby (J. Adrian)

Adrian’s diary is willed to Tony by Sarah Ford. Why did Sarah Ford own it? Why was it in the possession of Veronica?

Sarah owned the dairy of Adrian Finn because they were in relation and Veronica got this dairy because she was living with her and that could be reason that the dairy was in possession of her.

Was the mentally retarded middle aged ‘Adrian’, Tony’s friend who did not commit suicide and was suffering from trauma and thus gone mad, and was living with hidden identity?

Mentally retarded middle aged ‘Adrian’ is in actual sense son of Adrian Finn and Sarah Ford and Brother of Veronica. If he was alive then Sarah would know it, but there is no such statement by Sarah. There is no such possibility because he committed suicide in his very consciousness which can be proved through his suicide note.

How was Veronica related to Adrian, the one suffering in care-in-the-community?

There are two different shades of veronica we see within one novel. First is shown by Tony, but the real side of veronica we come to know in the end. She got nothing in the end, she did the real sacrifice. Her boyfriend turn toward her mother and now she is raising her brother; the son by her boyfriend and mother. For the sake of humanity she is taking care of her brother, J.Adrain got guardian but Veronica had no one left behind her to see her condition.

Do you see any missing block – some dot which is not getting connected with the whole or dot missing to get full sense of the novel - in the plot of this psychological thriller?

Yes there are many missing blocks which lefts the reader in ambiguity. Why Adrian did suicide? There is no such specific reason. Why Adrian would have took permission of Tony to ask for Veronica because there is no such need to do that. Why Sarah Ford is Veronica had no Good relations. Why Sarah Ford was so selfish that she ruined her daughter’s life.

Do you see any possible reason in the suicide of Adrian Finn?

Well if we see the story, Adrian’s suicide seems very Intellectual one. Which he confessed in his suicide note. He said that he was happy in his last days. He was bright student, who have seen his life in philosophical way. But some where he was escapist because he was the father of J. Adrian and he could have raised him as his son but he escaped from his responsibility by committing suicide, May be he was guilty for having relation with Sarah Ford , we don’t find any specific reason.

In the light of new revelations, how do you read character of Veronica? Instinctive, manipulative, calculating, stubborn, haughty, sacrificial, trustworthy, good Samaritan?

If we study each and every Character of the novel then veronica seems more practical and clever. In starting of the novel she was portrayed manipulative, stubborn instinctive but afterward we come to know that she has sacrificed her life behind someone else’s deed. She was time and again blamed by Tony and betrayed by her own mother and Boyfriend. She is raising her mentally retarded brother, who is the son of her boyfriend and mother, how pitiful! She doesn’t deserve this but then also she is taking burden of other’s wrong deed.

What do you mean by Unreliable Narrator? Is Tony Webster classifiable as Unreliable Narrator?

Tony is unreliable Narrator, within the text he breaks down; letter which he wrote to Adrian and Veronica is evidence of it, which reveal what actually was written in letter. When veronica returns that Letter back in the End. 

Thank you 

OD2017-18: Contemporary Debates and Mario Vargos Llosa

Contemporary Debates and Mario Vargos  Llosa

Liberalism simply means ‘freedom’. As Mario Vargos points in his talk concerning liberalism that “Liberalism defends some basic Ideas: Freedom, individualism, the rejection of collectivism and Nationalism- in other words, all the ideologies or doctrines that limit or annihilate freedom within Society”.
                                                        

LAUREN BACALL , the famous Hollywood star observed that “being a liberal is the best thing on earth you can be. You are welcoming to everyone when you are liberal. You do not have a small mind…I’m total, total, and total liberal and proud of it”. But today while liberalism thriving in Hollywood, lights are going out in Bollywood. Shahrukh khan, the once out spoken bearer of liberal discourse, has vowed to keep his opinion to himself and not comment on especially on political and religious issues, after blundering into too many controversies. “Unfortunately, because of the reaction I get when I answer something political or religious, I don’t think I will answer this question”, he told reporters when asked to comment on cancelation of Pakistani ghazal singer Ghulam Ali’s concert in Mumbai recently. Ditto Aamir khan, he too has gone uncharacteristically quiet after his last controversy coast him a lucrative advertising concert. (Suroor- Click here to read full article)

I do agree with his(Mario Vargos) second point as he mentioned that, “Nationalism involves a kind of Racism and Racism inevitably leads to Violence and the Suppression of Freedom”. By promoting one country or religion, you deliberately present yourself superior over other- “The not belonging group”. In between he makes a good point about literature that is, “literature and morality don’t get along. They are enemies and you have to respect literature if you believe in Freedom”.

We are living in digital era and because of social media sometimes (well, very often) reality of News gets violated. Very often we find news on social media like ‘so and so actor died’, we come to know that he/she is alive when they tweets. Same happened to me when I heard about Shree Devi’s death, I could not believe because many time I’ve came across these kinds of news about death of some stars which afterwards was proved wrong, though it was right in the case of Shree Devi. Fake news spreads very fast. We really can’t rely on one source and we have to go through some other sources to make sure whether the new is true or fake. 

Works Cited

Suroor, Hasan. "Death of Liberalism in Bollywood, The Tribune." February 10 2016. Tribune.com. Ed. Harish Khare. Indian english Daily.

To His Coy Mistress By Andrew Marvell

                                                                       

The poem is like an Ode. It is addressed to poet’s beloved. By the title it is clear that the lady is very beautiful woman and she is conscious of it. She pretends to be modest in presence of people. There is a satire on her. She perhaps wants to create sensation by attracting people. The same attitude she also maintains to her lover. Her beauty is for her lover. She has no benefits if she keeps distance from him. If they have time coyness can be approved. They can talk fr long time or they can advise hoe to walk even he would Praise for a long time.

The poet tells her that she can go to the Ganges and find Rubies. He would represent people’s complaint in the parliament as he was the MP of Humber England. Both of them have different attitude. There’s long time gone that he loved her. If she doesn’t come forward centuries would pass but people don’t live for centuries. His vegetable love grows. It means it is slow but evergreen. It is beyond and boundary of kingdom. His love is a great and deep as her love. This argument of the poet to explain her importantance of time is very short for us he says

“But at my back I always hears

Time’s winged chariot hurrying nears’’

Our life is passing quickly. Death is always following us. We can hear its steps. We would die and be in the grave. For lovers the case is same. Their grave can be near. No doubt grave is a fine and private Place but /lovers will not be able to meet. So what’s the use of it? Our body will be eaten by worms. Finally there will be dust of it. For all this the lover tells that she should leave coyness and love each other. for such a beautiful thing they can roll the world into a ball and roll over the universe so that their sweetness can be everywhere.

Stopping by woods on a snowy evening

‘Stopping by woods on a snowy evening’ is one of the most celebrated poems of Robert Frost. The first prime minister of independent India Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru was so much impressed with the message of this poem that he always kept this poem on the table beneath the glass.  The poem is simple but the message which it conveys is significant. The poem is about poet to the forest, getting tempted to stay there and finally realizing that he has many works to be done by him and so he cannot step in the forest. It is a poem about the internal dilemma of a poet between love for beauty and sense of beauty. This kind of dilemma is witnessed by every person at some stage in life. We all are sometimes tempted by beauty of the nature to stop there for a longtime but the work which is to be done by us reminds us of our duty and we do not stop for a long time. Where that beautiful place is, this truth of life is conveyed by the poet through present poem.

The subject matter of the poem is simple. The port goes to a dark deep lovely forest on his horseback. It is such a beautiful place that the poet is tempted to stop there and pass that night in the forest but the horse of the poet shakes it’s head to ring thr bells which are tied to it‘s harness.  The horse wants to ask the poet whether he is mistaken in making a stay in that forest. The reason it is the darkest evening. The lake is frozen and the snowfall is there, such a gesture of his horse reminds the poet that the woods are lovely dark and deep but he has s many promises to keep. He has to perfume many duties before he sleeps in the forest and before he dies. The final message of the poem is that sense of duty in life is more important than tempting beauty. No tempting should ever prove to a hindrance on the path of duty.  

Gulliver's Travel by Johnathan Swift

                                         

Gulliver's Travel a misanthrope satire of humanity, was written in 1726 by Jonathan Swift. Captain Lemuel Gulliver, who narrates and Speaks directly to the readers from his own experience. we find Gulliver as an average man.

There are Four Different journey of Gulliver,Each of which begins with a Shipwreck and ends with either a daring escape or congenial decision that it is time for Gulliver to leave.The First Voyage is to Lilliput,the Second Voyage is to Brobdingnag and The third Voyage is to Laputa. His fourth Voyage is to the Land of the Houyhnhnms, Who are Horses endowed with Reason.

Gulliver's Travel is an Satire on Power and Politics, Through this lens, Swift hoped to "vex" his readers by offering them new insights into the game of politics and into the social follies of humans.

Moby Dick

                                         
Author:

Herman Melville was born on August 1, 1819. Herman had a troubled childhood. A bout with scarlet fever at the age of seven left his eyesight permanently damaged, and, following his father's death, the family was so poor that Herman's education was sporadic. He studied the classics in Albany and trained to be a surveyor while in Lansingburgh but had to curtail his education to earn money for the family. Despite his weak eyes, Melville was an avid reader and delighted in finding, in his late twenties, an edition of Shakespeare with print large enough to accommodate him. But his real education was at sea. He could say, with Ishmael, "a whale-ship was my Yale College and my Harvard."

Writing and Reputation

Melville's writing career, much of which was inspired by his travels, began with the publication of Typee in 1846, followed relatively shortly after by Omoo (1847). The reaction to these first two novels was encouraging enough to make Melville believe, initially, that he had a future as a professional writer. For a short time, contemporaries thought of him as one of the bright young novelists of America. These first two books are based on the author's experiences in the South Seas — Typee on his life with the cannibals and Omoo on his experiences in Tahiti. They purport to be fairly factual adventure stories allowing the audience an unusual view of Polynesian life, and each was a modest critical success.


Mardi (1849) was not. It opens with apparent realism as the narrator deserts his whaling ship, but it develops into a fantasy that readers rejected. Even Melville called it a "chartless voyage." Melville returned to the approach of his first two books in Redburn (1849), a partly autobiographical story of the reminiscences of a "Son-of-a-Gentleman" in the merchant service. Much of White Jacket (1850) is a fictional account of Melville's experiences aboard the U. S. frigate United States. The narrator exposes the tyranny and injustice of life aboard a warship, from the point of view of an enlisted man. Melville claimed that he wrote these two novels strictly for money, and they did have limited success.


Melville produced his finest book, Moby-Dick, in 1851. Only a few critics recognized the genius of the work, and Melville had serious doubts about his future career. Pierre (1852) was too ambiguous and complex for Melville's audience. The story, somewhat autobiographical, deals with a young writer who seeks strict honesty but finds only disaster for himself and those around him. Israel Potter (1855), somewhat more successful, was first published as a magazine serial. It is a rewrite of a story about an American Revolutionary veteran who returns to America after fifty years of adventures abroad, having learned to be a survivor through the application of good sense. The Piazza Tales (1856) contains some of Melville's finest writing, shorter works such as "Bartleby, the Scrivener," a consideration of the values of Wall Street; the dark "Benito Cereno"; and a work that has grown in respect over the years, "The Encantadas," a philosophical look into the Galapagos Islands. The Confidence-Man (1857), an enigmatic consideration of identity and self-deception taking place on a Mississippi River steamboat, was the last work of fiction that Melville published in his lifetime. These last works, especially The Piazza Tales, found some small audience, but Melville was terribly discouraged and withdrew from his efforts to support himself and his family through writing.


Despite his disappointment, Melville did continue to write part-time. During the final days of the Civil War, he created some moving poetry that he eventually published in Harper's New Monthly Magazine and in a volume titled Battle-Pieces (1866). A prose "Supplement" calls for decency on the part of the victorious North during the reconstruction period, a position that Abraham Lincoln espoused but did not live to bring into effect. Again, contemporary reviews were tepid.


Melville published three more books in his declining years, all at his own or a sponsor's expense. Clarel (1876) is a long poem based on his pilgrimage to the Holy Land. While ambitious, it does not attract many readers even today. John Marr and Other Sailors (1888) is a collection of poems based on Melville's life as a seaman. Timoleon and Other Ventures in Minor Verse (1891) is a collection of poetry partly based on his travels. These last two were handsome little private editions of only twenty-five copies each.


Melville left a few unpublished poems and, most notably, the fine novella Billy Budd, Foretopman, which was finally published in 1924. Although Melville was thought to be one of the finer young writers in America at the end of the 1840s, by his death he was nearly forgotten. Only one obituary noted his passing on September 28, 1891. (Harcourt)

Moby Dick:

Ishmael, the narrator, announces his intent to ship aboard a whaling vessel. He has made several voyages as a sailor but none as a whaler. He travels to New Bedford, Massachusetts, where he stays in a whalers’ inn. Since the inn is rather full, he has to share a bed with a harpooner from the South Pacific named Queequeg. At first repulsed by Queequeg’s strange habits and shocking appearance (Queequeg is covered with tattoos), Ishmael eventually comes to appreciate the man’s generosity and kind spirit, and the two decide to seek work on a whaling vessel together. They take a ferry to Nantucket, the traditional capital of the whaling industry. There they secure berths on the Pequod, a savage-looking ship adorned with the bones and teeth of sperm whales. Peleg and Bildad, the Pequod’s Quaker owners, drive a hard bargain in terms of salary. They also mention the ship’s mysterious captain, Ahab, who is still recovering from losing his leg in an encounter with a sperm whale on his last voyage.


The Pequod leaves Nantucket on a cold Christmas Day with a crew made up of men from many different countries and races. Soon the ship is in warmer waters, and Ahab makes his first appearance on deck, balancing gingerly on his false leg, which is made from a sperm whale’s jaw. He announces his desire to pursue and kill Moby Dick, the legendary great white whale who took his leg, because he sees this whale as the embodiment of evil. Ahab nails a gold doubloon to the mast and declares that it will be the prize for the first man to sight the whale. As the Pequod sails toward the southern tip of Africa, whales are sighted and unsuccessfully hunted. During the hunt, a group of men, none of whom anyone on the ship’s crew has seen before on the voyage, emerges from the hold. The men’s leader is an exotic-looking man named Fedallah. These men constitute Ahab’s private harpoon crew, smuggled aboard in defiance of Bildad and Peleg. Ahab hopes that their skills and Fedallah’s prophetic abilities will help him in his hunt for Moby Dick.


The Pequod rounds Africa and enters the Indian Ocean. A few whales are successfully caught and processed for their oil. From time to time, the ship encounters other whaling vessels. Ahab always demands information about Moby Dick from their captains. One of the ships, the Jeroboam, carries Gabriel, a crazed prophet who predicts doom for anyone who threatens Moby Dick. His predictions seem to carry some weight, as those aboard his ship who have hunted the whale have met disaster. While trying to drain the oil from the head of a captured sperm whale, Tashtego, one of the Pequod’s harpooners, falls into the whale’s voluminous head, which then rips free of the ship and begins to sink. Queequeg saves Tashtego by diving into the ocean and cutting into the slowly sinking head.


During another whale hunt, Pip, the Pequod’s black cabin boy, jumps from a whaleboat and is left behind in the middle of the ocean. He goes insane as the result of the experience and becomes a crazy but prophetic jester for the ship. Soon after, the Pequod meets the Samuel Enderby, a whaling ship whose skipper, Captain Boomer, has lost an arm in an encounter with Moby Dick. The two captains discuss the whale; Boomer, happy simply to have survived his encounter, cannot understand Ahab’s lust for vengeance. Not long after, Queequeg falls ill and has the ship’s carpenter make him a coffin in anticipation of his death. He recovers, however, and the coffin eventually becomes the Pequod’s replacement life buoy.


Ahab orders a harpoon forged in the expectation that he will soon encounter Moby Dick. He baptizes the harpoon with the blood of the Pequod’s three harpooners. The Pequod kills several more whales. Issuing a prophecy about Ahab’s death, Fedallah declares that Ahab will first see two hearses, the second of which will be made only from American wood, and that he will be killed by hemp rope. Ahab interprets these words to mean that he will not die at sea, where there are no hearses and no hangings. A typhoon hits the Pequod,illuminating it with electrical fire. Ahab takes this occurrence as a sign of imminent confrontation and success, but Starbuck, the ship’s first mate, takes it as a bad omen and considers killing Ahab to end the mad quest. After the storm ends, one of the sailors falls from the ship’s masthead and drowns—a grim foreshadowing of what lies ahead.


Ahab’s fervent desire to find and destroy Moby Dick continues to intensify, and the mad Pip is now his constant companion. The Pequod approaches the equator, where Ahab expects to find the great whale. The ship encounters two more whaling ships, the Rachel and the Delight, both of which have recently had fatal encounters with the whale. Ahab finally sights Moby Dick. The harpoon boats are launched, and Moby Dick attacks Ahab’s harpoon boat, destroying it. The next day, Moby Dick is sighted again, and the boats are lowered once more. The whale is harpooned, but Moby Dick again attacks Ahab’s boat. Fedallah, trapped in the harpoon line, is dragged overboard to his death. Starbuck must maneuver the Pequod between Ahab and the angry whale.


On the third day, the boats are once again sent after Moby Dick, who once again attacks them. The men can see Fedallah’s corpse lashed to the whale by the harpoon line. Moby Dick rams the Pequod and sinks it. Ahab is then caught in a harpoon line and hurled out of his harpoon boat to his death. All of the remaining whaleboats and men are caught in the vortex created by the sinking Pequod and pulled under to their deaths. Ishmael, who was thrown from a boat at the beginning of the chase, was far enough away to escape the whirlpool, and he alone survives. He floats atop Queequeg’s coffin, which popped back up from the wreck, until he is picked up by the Rachel, which is still searching for the crewmen lost in her earlier encounter with Moby Dick.


Works Cited


Editors, SparkNotes. "“SparkNote on Moby-Dick.”." 28 march 2018. SparkNotes.com. <http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/mobydick/>.


Harcourt, Houghton Mifflin. "Herman Melville Biography,CliffsNotes." n.d. CliffsNotes. <https://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/m/mobydick/herman-melville-biography>.

All My Sons by Aurthur Miller

                                         

All My Sons is a 1947 play by Arthur Miller. It opened on Broadway at the Coronet Theatre in New York City on January 29, 1947, closed on November 8, 1949 and ran for 328 performances.It was directed by Elia Kazan (to whom it is dedicated), produced by Elia Kazan and Harold Clurman, and won the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award.


Regarded by critics as Arthur Miller’s first successful play, All My Sons presents a narrow slice of American middle-class life. The play’s context is limited: A manufacturer sells defective parts to the military and then covers up his crime by forcing his partner to take the blame. The ensuing situation, however, is where the scope of the play enlarges, culminating in the moment when the American Everyman must take a moral stand.


The drama’s spatial confines underscore the theme of the play. The Kellers’ backyard is enclosed by hedges and arbors and offers only a glimpse into the adjoining neighbors’ yards. The focus is on the individual family and its moral limitations. While the story’s premise is specific, the everyday, down-home setting of a backyard in a middle-class neighborhood in a nameless American town offers the audience a common ground of experience.


A major theme of All My Sons is that of responsibility. Before the play’s action begins, Joe Keller ducked moral responsibility by allowing cracked cylinder heads to be shipped out of his factory. He covers up and blames his partner, but he is able to justify his actions as a consequence of his obligation to his family. At the end of the play, he accepts responsibility for his crime only after his dead son Larry’s letter indicts him.


Kate Keller, too, bears responsibility for the cover-up, but she participates in it primarily as a way to keep Larry alive in her mind. If she acknowledges Joe’s guilt, she will have to acknowledge that Larry crashed. Kate represents the intuitive and the irrational. Her responsibility to her family defies—and defines—moral obligation.


The son Chris is the idealist who must come to grips with his parents’ human weaknesses. It can be said that in idolizing his father he sets up a barrier to the truth and to exploring the notion of his father’s guilt, a possibility that must have occurred to him. Chris feels a larger responsibility. Where Joe has his family in mind, Chris sees something bigger than family. It is Chris’s responsibility to make his father see that larger arena. In doing so, he brings about his father’s ultimate acceptance of responsibility and his father’s decision to take his own life in expiation for his crime.


All My Sons also addresses the material aspect of the American Dream and its effects on the soul. When Joe says that he acted as he did for Chris and his family, he represents the tension between the need to succeed materially and the responsibility of behaving ethically. Because the American economy flourished as a result of World War II, a sense of guilt could be overpowering. Chris lives this tension, and by the end of the play Joe, too, is forced to confront it. The sentiments of the play are rooted in a prewar era, but the emotional power defines the angst of postwar American society.


All My Sons, which prepares the way for Miller’s masterpiece, Death of a Salesman (1949), continues a tradition in twentieth century American drama that was established by Eugene O’Neill in Ah, Wilderness! (1933) and Long Day’s Journey into Night (1956), and by Thornton Wilder in Our Town (1938). In these plays, as in Miller’s All My Sons, the authors explore the complex dynamic between individual responsibility and family relationships.

Far from the madding crowd

                                       

Long considered one of England's foremost nineteenth-century novelists, Hardy established his reputation with the publication of Far from the Madding Crowd in 1874. It was the first of his so-called “Wessex novels,” set in a fictitious English county closely resembling Hardy's native Dorsetshire. The novel, whose title was borrowed from Thomas Gray's famous “Elegy in a Country Churchyard,” initially appeared in magazine serial form and was the first Hardy work to be widely reviewed. Variations of its rustic characters and settings were to be repeated in several future novels. The novel's protagonist, Bathsheba Everdene, would also presage other strong Hardy heroines.

Plot and Major Characters

Bathsheba Everdene, who has inherited a large farm from her uncle, becomes the center of attention for three men. After a chance meeting with a gentle sheep farmer, Gabriel Oak, Gabriel proposes marriage to Bathsheba, but is refused, as she does not consider him a proper suitor. Gabriel loses most of his herd and becomes a faithful shepherd for Bathsheba. She then meets a neighboring well-to-do farmer, Mr. Boldwood, who impresses Bathsheba. She later capriciously sends him a valentine, which excites Boldwood, and he later proposes marriage. Bathsheba puts him off, but it is assumed that she will succumb. In a subplot, a marriage between Bathsheba's servant, Fanny Robin, and the dashing Sergeant Troy is stopped because of a misunderstanding. Troy turns his attentions to Bathsheba and impresses her with his dazzling sword practice. Troy gains her hand in marriage, leaving Boldwood heartbroken. Meanwhile, the hapless Fanny dies in the workhouse, and her body is brought back to Bathsheba's farm. Bathsheba discovers the corpse of a baby, Troy's child, beside that of Fanny. Troy then disappears, and when his clothes are discovered on a beach, it is presumed that he has drowned. Boldwood reappears on the scene, and Bathsheba agrees to marry him out of a sense of remorse. Troy, however, unexpectedly returns and is killed by the distraught Boldwood, who is later tried and found insane. Bathsheba is at last ready to see the true worth of Gabriel, who has faithfully waited like the Oak of his last name, and the two are married.

Major Themes

A facile interpretation of Far from the Madding Crowd would be that true love triumphs over adversity. Since Hardy's ending, however, has often been criticized as contrived, other dominant themes in the novel should be explored. The “Wessex” setting is almost a theme in itself, with the changeless rhythms of nature and agrarian life set against the vicissitudes which confront the characters. It is noteworthy that the most positively portrayed characters are those closest to the earth, such as Gabriel and the peasants who work the soil. The timelessness of the setting is contrasted with the struggles that the characters face against time and chance. Had Bathsheba not sent the valentine, had Fanny not missed her wedding, for example, the story would have taken an entirely different path. Another important theme is that virtue will ultimately be rewarded. Bathsheba's final acceptance of Gabriel is a form of redemption for her earlier willful behavior. The development of Bathsheba's character reinforces the ideas that vanity is futile and that rebellion will ultimately be put down for the good of the community. While Bathsheba ultimately is portrayed as a reformed character, the reader may find that her old feisty self was truly more interesting.

Critical Reception

Far from the Madding Crowd was the first Hardy novel to receive considerable critical attention. It was widely reviewed in England and also marked an important stage in the growth of Hardy's international reputation; the Paris journal Revue des deux mondes, for example, made it the occasion for a long survey-article on Hardy's work to date. After the appearance (anonymously) of the first installment, the Spectator observed that “If Far from the Madding Crowd is not written by George Eliot, then there is a new light among novelists.” Critics during a number of decades have noted that the early serialization of the novel presupposed certain conventions, which could account for the melodramatic nature of many of the scenes. Study of Hardy's manuscript has shown that he had to make extensive alterations in the portions of the novel referring to Fanny Robin and her illegitimate child. Hardy was widely read and respected at the turn of the twentieth century, but a perception that his work was mostly for a popular audience discouraged serious criticism for several decades. In 1940, a seminal issue of the Southern Review devoted solely to Hardy precipitated a rebirth in Hardy criticism. Early modern critics tended to praise Far from the Madding Crowd's evocation of rural life or its universality of theme. By the 1960s and 1970s, Freudian and feminist criticism predominated. In the 1980s and 1990s, critics used a wide variety of critical approaches to Far from the Madding Crowd. While some reviewers continued to adopt a New Critical stance, most were influenced by deconstructive or New Historical techniques. A few of the themes critics exploited were the forms of love in the novel, its subtexts, Hardy's narrative techniques, the relationship of Far from the Madding Crowd to Hardy's own life experiences, and the novel's treatment of gender and power.