“Ice and silence”: Motherhood in Anaïs Nin’s “Birth”

The short fiction piece “Birth” by Anaïs Nin can be found in a larger collection of her works titled Under a Glass Bell. However, the story can also be found, practically word for word, in Nin’s book Incest: From “A Journal of Love” - The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin. This is because it is a true story, so technically the piece should be considered creative nonfiction. In the introduction to Nin in the Norton Anthology of Literature by Women, it states that Nin intended to “capture the living moments of her emotional reactions to experience” (588), and she is more than successful in doing so within this short piece through both language and imagery.  I want to analyze the historical influences on Nin as a woman living in 1930’s France and how, by utilizing the contrasting images of both fire and ice throughout the story, Nin has successfully captured the contradictory emotions of a woman who both loves and hates the thing she has created.

“She’s discontent.”: The Nuclear Family and The Cold War in Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Edward Albee wrote his famous play, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, during the peak of the Cold War. There is much symbolism of patriotism in Albee’s play, from George and Martha’s names alluding to George Washington and his wife Martha and George’s speech against altering chromosomes could be seen as a metaphor for the popular fear that communism would take over the world: “There will be a certain… loss of liberty...diversity will no longer be the goal. Cultures and races will eventually vanish...the ants will take over the world” (Albee 73). In her book Homeward Bound: American Families in the Cold War Era, Elaine Tyler May explores the direct link between “the suburban American dream and the international dynamics of the cold war” (153). In this book, she reveals that the idea of the “nuclear family” and the “American dream” were government tactics created to sway international voters away from the Communist party and to keep Americans “preoccupied with procurement” as a “safeguard against the threat of class warfare and communism” (157). My theory is that the big bad Virginia Woolf's metaphor in Albee’s play is infact the illusion of the American dream and displays this predominantly through the baby symbolism, focusing specifically on Martha.

“Inside of my body there are fires”: Fire and Ice Imagery in Anaïs Nin’s “Birth”

Anaïs Nin’s short story “Birth” is a part of a larger work titled Under a Glass Bell, and Other Stories, which, ultimately, relates back to The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin. In this version of Nin’s Diary, in the volume labeled Incest, Nin goes into detail about the horrors of delivering a stillborn child, the father of whom is never clearly stated. In the introduction to Nin in the Norton Anthology of Literature by Women, it states that Nin intended to “capture the living moments of her emotional reactions to experience” (588), and she is more than successful in doing so within this short piece through language and imagery. More specifically, by utilizing the contrasting images of both fire and ice throughout the story, Nin has successfully captured the contradictory emotions of a woman who both loves and hates the thing she has created.

“Thank heavens, the fog is gone”: Fog as Symbol in Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey into Night

In the forward to Long Day’s Journey into Night, Harold Bloom states that the play is considered by many critics to be Eugene O’Neill’s “masterpiece” not only for its honesty as a semi-autobiographical play, but because O’Neill captures the realistic story of an American family and presents their story in a new type of tragedy. In this essay, I want to examine the role of fog within this play not only as an atmospheric device but also as a symbol for the Tyrone family’s “blindness” and Mary’s addiction.

“Rowing in Eden”: Sea and Bird Imagery in Emily Dickinson’s Poetry

Emily Dickinson is considered today to be one of the greatest poets of the nineteenth century despite being portrayed by some critics as an eccentric recluse, a spinster subjugated by unrequited or lost love, and the typical “madwoman in the attic.” These theories do have some basis since it is not untrue that Dickinson did spend most of her life indoors, but in The Norton Anthology of Literature by Women, the introduction to Dickinson says that “her adult life was marked not so much by longing for lost love as by aesthetic and intellectual commitment to her art” (1038). The negative portrayals of Dickinson most of the time influence how an audience reads her: without a separation of author and speaker. However, despite all of these different theories, I believe that Dickinson did feel trapped, both physically and mentally, and she portrays these feelings through the usage of bird and sea imagery in her poetry.

Tragedy and Theory: Antigone, Macbeth and Hedda Gabler

Three popular theorists when it comes to tragic theory are Aristotle, Hegel, and Nietzsche and each have distinct views on what are the important components of tragedy. Aristotle focuses on plot and the “tragic hero”, emphasizing hamartia and catharsis. Hegel coined the “Hegelian dialectic” that claims the conflict between a thesis and an antithesis creates a synthesis, in other words, there are two forces colliding within a play and neither is completely good or bad. Lastly, Nietzsche used the juxtaposition of the Greek gods Apollo and Dionysus as a metaphor for the tension of artistic forces within tragedy. The three plays we have read so far, Antigone, Macbeth and Hedda Gabler, could have any of these theories applied to them, but some work better than others. The combinations I think work best are: Antigone - Hegel, Macbeth - Aristotle/Nietzsche, and Hedda Gabler - Nietzsche.

“It doesn’t go with the rest of the things.”: Suicide in Hedda Gabler

There has been debate among critics since the play’s debut about why the title role commits suicide at the end of Hedda Gabler. There are theories that she was attempting to create a “beautiful” death because Lövborg was unable to, or that she finally has a psychotic break, or that she had lost all of her freedom. I would like to argue the latter, that she committed suicide due to a lack of freedom, but also touching on the fact of Hedda’s obvious depression and the warning signs given throughout the play that she was in fact on the path to suicide.