During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, many British poets attempted to establish a universal poetic image in the European nightingale, often viewing it as a muse or contemporary artist. This use of the songster became so prevalent that it was adopted, along with other conventions, for use in the United States. Yet, despite the efforts of both British and American poets, this imperialized songbird would ultimately fail in America, as the nightingale is not indigenous to the United States. The failure of this nightingale image, I contend, is reflective of the growing need to establish a national identity in nineteenth-century American literature, separate from British convention. In this process of cultural exploration, I believe the northern mockingbird becomes the replacement for the nightingale, and is developed as a distinctly American image through the poetry of Maurice Thompson, Walt Whitman, and others, exemplifying traits of the country through its charismatic song and personality

The themes of guilt and atonement have been analyzed in selected writings of Tennessee Williams. Research concerning these two themes has been developed simultaneously with Williams’s concept of the universe and man. Many of Williams’s characters seek a form of atonement or purification for their guilt which has arisen due to their “incompleteness and unnatural desires.” Williams’s basic concept concerning the universe is that it is fragmented, a universe not completed by its Creator. Consequently, Williams envisions man and his nature to be likewise incomplete. It is this incompletion in man which causes him to have “unnatural desires,” labeled as such, according to Williams, because society has made them so. Many of Williams’s characters seek atonement for their desires and sins by one of two forms; (1) violent death, (2) mental laceration. Williams’s characters who choose violent death generally do so because they feel their lives are so corrupted that only something as tormenting as death can cleanse them. The second form of atonement is the open confrontation of one’s sins and true nature to the world with the hope of cleansing one’s conscience. This second form of atonement is the one Williams himself seems to be presently undergoing. He is openly admitting his past

The use of myth in Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God has been touched on by a few critics, but the wealth of Hurston's knowledge of different cultures offers readers a number of stories and tales from which to draw possible analogues to her characters. In fact, readers can trace Greek, Roman, Norse, Babylonian, Egyptian, African and African-American mythic elements in her character Tea Cake Woods. Hurston uses these analogues to enrich the characterization and to posit her theories of love and happiness in the modern age.

The traditional ballad, the genre of the above poetry, has been a subject of much controversy and speculation, especially regarding its origin. The problem of origin is not likely to be solved unless much more evidence is found. Among the many theories are communal authorship, and individual poet; humble and oral origin, and sophisticated and literary origin. Studies of linguistics, of ballad refrain, and of carole continue the attempt to discover ballad genesis. However, a very different approach perhaps can be used to determine the origin of some ballads, particularly the romantic ballads; that approach is to use the courtly love code as an indicator - the highly codified love which evolved from literary sources of eleventh and twelfth century Provence. Elements of courtly love occur in the above stanzas of "Johnie Scot" (No. 99), such as high birth of the lovers, bravery, and illicit love. If substantial evidence of inherent courtly love elements in certain of the ballads can be offered, the ballads in question would appear to have originated from literary or courtly sources. All of the 3')5 Child ballads were first screened for romantic elements. Since more than half the ballads contain such elements, the scope was narrowed to approximately eighty romantic ballads in the first 116. Selection was then made of five ballads which seemed to offer the best examples of courtly love. Two of them were probably composed soon after courtly love came into vogue, for they appear to have been based primarily on illicit and sensual love: "Little Musgrave and Lady Barnard" (No. 81) and "Glasgerion" (No. 67). Three others, if of courtly origin, possibly were composed towards the end of the courtly love era when marriage was becoming idealized, for they include definite hints of marriage: "Johnie Scot" (No. 99), "Lady Maisry" (No. 65), and "Sir Cawline" (::o. 61). In order to show contrast, other romantic ballads were studied for absence of courtly love or use of courtly love simply as ornamentation. Ballads in this group are "Hind Horn" (No. 17), "Tam Lin" (No. 39), and "The Raffled Knight" (No. 112). Evelyn Kendrick in The Ballad Tree regards the romantic ballads as: Those ballads which form the main trunk of the tree . . . 'romantic' in their concern with the them of love and adventure . . . The romantic ballad deals with the stuff of life, as it would be understood in any age . . . it appears today as it did five hundred years ago. Romantic as applied to the ballads in this paper refers to those ballads which focus on male-female relationships involving some aspect of love. Then this love appears to be courtly and intrinsic to the ballad plot, the theory of ballad origin directly related to the courts achieves validity.

There have been many reports made on education in Kentucky since it became a state, but these factual reports are one-dimensional. They present the known, concrete facts, but do not give the true picture any more than flat drawings of a landscape is a true representation of the beauty and feeling of the landscape itself. In this study of the reflection of the schools of Kentucky in the mirror of fiction I have tried to present the scene in perspective, to give it color and to add the fourth dimension of human character.

This study develops an approach to narrator reliability in the creative autobiography for the solo interpreter. The relationships between narrator reliability and firstperson point of view are given, and the need for an understanding of reliability to develop a performance stance is also stated. The defining characteristics of the creative autobiography are also included. The analytical approach to narrator reliability is three-fold. The reliability of the narrator is examined in terms of mental locus, spatial locus, and temporal locus. The mental locus of the narrator is determined through his relationships with himself, the characters, the action, and the reader. The narrator's spatial locus is examined according to his use of general and specific locations and the importance placed on given locations in the text. Temporal locus is studied in terms of time order, the relationship between the experiencing and the narrating self, and the relationship between time-past and time-present. Illustrations for the three-fold approach are provided by examples from two creative autobiographies: Stop-time by Frank Conroy and A Fan's Notes by Frederick Exley. In chapter three, the locus triad is applied to A Fan's Notes, providing an in-depth analysis of narrator reliability for that text. In conclusion, the problems of narrator reliability particular to the creative autobiography are cited, and possible applications of the approach to other first-person narratives are given. This study is not exhaustive, and the need for further research in this area is apparent.

To define the scope of this study, therefore, Harrowing of Hell imagery will be thought of as those symbols peculiar to the pseudo-biblical story, with redemptive activity and triumph as distinguishing criteria. The hero is a Christ figure who has already achieved a degree of self-mastery. His descent into hell represents an act of redemption for others, with victory as the outcome. This delimitation, it will be seen, is not impossibly restrictive. A survey of contemporary literature indicates that Wasserman's use of the descent motif with redemptive implications is far from an isolated instance. Edward Albee in The Zoo Story and Samuel Beckett in Waiting for Godot employ the imagery as a tentative suggestion of redemption, hoped for if unachieved. The same wistful negation accompanies its appearance in Kazantzakis' Greek Passion and Mauriac's The Lamb.

Probably no other period in American history has been more productive of romance, strife, bravery, aggressiveness, and conflicting ideas of thought than the period from 1850 to 1865. One who was fortunate enough to be born in the early years of that period, would have been old enough by 1865 for those various experiences to have branded his future life. Young E. Allison was so fortunate. He was born in Henderson, Kentucky, on December 23, 1853 and was named after his father, who was county judge and county clerk.

This paper will draw on the work of leading feminist critics and the works of Dickinson, her biographers, and her critics. No effort is being made to trace the history of feminist criticism; that has been done numerous times by critic after critic. Nor does this paper attempt to provide a concordance to critical thought on Dickinson. That, too, is unnecessary. Rather, this paper looks at the relationship between self-identity in Dickinson's poetry and the fundamental need for such a pronounced sense of identity to serve as the cornerstone of feminist criticism. Dickinson's courage to be female and the implications of that courage on her world view are at the core of neofeminist or post-feminist criticism. Dickinson exhibited an independence of mind that broke out of the boxes of cultural constraints developing a strong sense of identity as a woman and as a poet. She expressed a strong moral view of the world solidly grounded in, but often critical of, the Christian tradition. With her strong sense of self, her overarching moral vision, and her disregard for the "oughts" and "shoulds" of her culture, Dickinson held her work to a high standard of significance. Feminist criticism is only now reaching such a standard of significance. As Dickinson achieved personal wholeness and creative integrity through the integration of (not the obliteration or repression of) opposing qualities, feminist criticism, too, must have that same courage to stand firm in the face of powerful opposition and defy social and political pressures to conform. Conforming to a mediocre, and consequently powerless but socially acceptable, integrated position within mainstream criticism places feminist criticism once again on the sidelines waiting for the next popular trend to relegate it even further from the intellectual center.

The following is a collection of five short stories set in regions familiar to me: “Dewberry Park,” “YouLead,” and “The Color Violet” in Indiana; “Mens Rea” in Kentucky; and “Tory Ride” in Cambodia. Gay identity plays a role in many of these stories, and other themes explored include family, region, socioeconomics, gender, mentality, and change. These stories are concerned with people on the brink, failing and surviving all the same. Some of them are intended to weigh, and some to satirize. I hope they all nick their readers.