All Questions

Is this an example of any rhetorical/stylistic device or literary technique? But can one really call it a life? If to live is to endure endless pain and destitution and to suffer humiliation so deep ...

From the second part of the Shahnameh: Five hundred years did Feridoun rule the world, and might and virtue increased in the land, and all his days he did that which was good. And he roamed ...

Nick's surname sounds a lot like care-away, and I've seen a number of online sources that state that this Fitzgerald intended for this to be so. I find this hard to believe, considering that Nick isn'...

In "Stolen Ingots" in Dr. Thorndyke's Case-Book by R. Austin Freeman,the chief officer and the inspector were insisting on that they have captured the stolen ingots, but Thorndyke was a bit ...

On May 29, 1851, Sojourner Truth, an ex-slave abolitionist and women's rights activist gave a speech in Akron, Ohio that later came to be known as "Ain't I a woman?" The speech originally ...

One of my favorite things about Dr. Seuss's One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish is the combination of rhyme and rhythm or meter in its poems. I think I've found satisfying rhythms for reading all ...

The word Shahnameh usually refers to the Persian epic poem written by Ferdowsi in 977-1010 CE, although this versification was mostly a rewriting of existing mythological and historical stories of the ...

Something which strikes me both while reading the book and watching the movie is the very striking name "Wormtongue". He might as well be named "Evil Dude". He seems over-the-top ...

"Learning Late Letters", a poem originally written in Vietnamese by Nguyễn Hoàng Quyên, was one of the winners of the 2020 Words Without Borders Academy of Americans Poets Poems in ...

As all of us who have read Silmarillion know, Sauron wasn't the original "Lord of Darkness". In fact, he is a much lesser, and later, one. Melkor (AKA "Morgoth") was the original. ...

In the book "Moonwalking with einstein" by Joshua Foer In chapter 7 "The end of Remembering" he writes: One of the last places where this tradition of recitation still survives is ...

Many years back, in school, I read a story about a tourist who goes to a new country and gets a tattoo from a renowned artist. When the artist dies, the two countries fight for the rights to the ...

From When the Emperor Was Divine, by Julie Otsuka: He put down his suitcase and looked at her. "Did you..." she [the mother] said "Every day," he [the father] replied. Then he ...

Are there any websites designed for asking real people for specific book recommendations? I know there are websites where you can enter your reading preferences and have an algorithm give you ...

In "Stolen Ingots" in Dr. Thorndyke's Case-Book by R. Austin Freeman, there was a boat that chases a barge in a tidal river and amongst muddy banks: Meanwhile the fugitive barge, having got ...

In "Stolen Ingots" in Dr. Thorndyke's Case-Book by R. Austin Freeman, Mr. Badger was standing on a bridge watching a boat running with a stolen case. Badger cursed volubly, and, turning to ...

One of the Peruvian writer Sui-Yun's Four Short Poems (translated from Spanish by Jennifer Shyue) is written as addressed to "Eve, my eternal mother". I hope I'm not being excessively dirty-...

In 2008 I read a book (fiction) about a boy living with a carnival. The carnival was a bunch of radical environmentalists. I can't recall the title or the author so I'm hoping somebody on here can ...

Camus says somewhere that there is only death in the universe. By 'death' he simply means physics (energy, matter). He is rejecting the metaphysics of a universal dualism: Life and Death. I believe ...

In "Stolen Ingots" in Dr. Thorndyke's Case-Book by R. Austin Freeman, Mr. Badger was standing on a bridge watching a barge and brawley “Yes. There’s a little ramshackle bawley from Leigh—...

In Maya Angelou's poem "The Mothering Blackness", there's a verse that goes like this: She came down creeping        here to the black arms waiting        now to the warm heart waiting rime ...

I once read a book about an American ex-spy, but remember nether its title nor the author. I remember that author was an American ex-spy who took part in covert ops in several countries including ...

The problem with Fairy Tales is that with the passage of time they were changed in order to become more politically correct. Which source has the most original Fairy Tales? https://www.csmonitor.com/...

In Pride and Prejudice, there is a part where Lady Catherine visited the Bennets. She wished to ward off Elizabeth and wanted her to refuse Darcy's proposal and was stumped. How did Lady Catharine ...

Is a “climax” necessary for a novel to be successful? If so, does the reason of this abide more in the appreciating needs of readers or the expression needs of the author? If it is not necessary, in ...

I just watched a comedy bit by Sean Lock. I was at the zoo the other day and I got told off. I said, "Look! There's a mongoose!" Can't say that any more. "Special needs goose". ...

AKA the author of Winnie the Pooh? This web page ( https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Creator/JRRTolkien ) claims far far down that Tolkien once wrote a strongly worded letter to A.A. Milne ...

In Ishay Ribo's song "Keter Melucha / כתר מלוכה" (Royal Crown), a song written about, essentially, COVID and lockdown, there's a stanza that goes like this: בין תצווה לכי תישא אסתר פורים ...

In Shelley's famous sonnet, which begins 'Lift not the painted veil', the "turn" is placed - unusually - in the seventh line. Lift not the painted veil which those who live Call Life: ...

I can’t be with you, not another night Even nothing makes something more than you My freedom, leaving you, my only light A window, glass, with no way to come through The way I had felt towards you ...

In one sense, it might refer to "the lord of" the rings, as in the person or entity currently in possession of The One ring. In another way, it could (IMO) mean that The One ring is "...

In "A Worn Path" by Eudora Welty, how can the story's point of view be described? How does the point of view affect what we know about the situation?

I was looking through Maya Angelou's "On the Pulse of Morning", and noticed that there's an interesting use of capitalization in the poem. (I checked multiple version to make sure that this ...

The story, so far... When I was a kid, I read a story about a guy, who was sent to a country as a spy. He ended up working with doing propaganda for said countrys government, but is secretly sending ...

Shylock, a Jewish moneylender, hates Antonio. Bassanio, in need of money, approaches Antonio for a loan so that he can pursue Portia, as he is in love with her, and wants to marry her. Antonio at that ...

I read a poem entitled Archery by Carl Phillips: The first few lines read as: was still a thing, then. To have timed your arrow perfectly meant watching the air for a moment... As a basic reader I ...

What does Lorca mean in his poem "Romance sonámbulo" when he says: Tiny tin-leaf lanterns were trembling on the tiles. A thousand crystal tambourines were wounding dawn's dark sky. (...

As an epigraph a T. S. Eliot verse appears at the beginning of Toni Morrison's Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination: I am moved by fancies that are curled Around these images, ...

I started reading James Joyce with his poetry Pomes Penyeach and then I went for some short stories in Dubliners. I found that the style and the sudden change of contents (as especially in The Dead) ...

So, I was researching Karl Marx, and apparently he wrote a book/article called On the Jewish Question. Several people say that Hitler used this as source material, but they don't provide any ...

I'm trying to remember a children's fiction book I read as a child. I only remember vague key words and ideas. Do you know what this story is? Language: English Date read: mid 2000s Where I would've ...

So, I was recently re-reading the Inferno, and I have come across this quote which I can't make sense of. "Daddy Satan, daddy Satan aleppe," (VII.1) It seemed rather weird that it wouldn't ...

Szymborska's poem "Tarsier" ("Tarsjusz" in the original Polish) has been translated, in a version that says "Translations and Comments by Magnus J. Krynski and Robert A. ...

In the opening stanza of Maya Angelou's "Still I Rise", the syllables go 9 / 7 / 9 / 6. The second verse goes 8 / 7 / 9 / 7. All of these are within two or three syllables of each other, and ...

When Gregor Samsa awakens to find himself transformed into some type of beetle or roach-like creature, he gives little thought to whys and wherefores but just seems to attempt to deal with his ...

While Hercule Poirot, Nick and Captain Hastings are sitting at a table outside the hotel, supposedly a bullet passes through Nick's hat and ends up on the ground near the table, which Hercule finds. ...

In Normani's song "Motivation" (video slightly NSFW), there's a stanza that goes like this: You got a bad one, baby, don't you? Got a bad one, baby, don't you And we both know there's no ...

Does anyone know the title of the poem by Szymborska which contains a line worded something like “whose life has ever turned out as they thought it would anyway”? I believe that the poem was published ...

Since this site is called Literature Stack Exchange, one of the most basic questions we could ask here is how scholars of literature define literature. We have an older question on the ways academics ...

In "The Fisher of Men" in Dr. Thorndyke's Case-Book by R. Austin Freeman, Dr. Gervis was digging the earth with his friend, while they saw a stranger man coming along the path, then that man ...