Stuff About Books and Literature

Violence against women - photo by Breahn You may have read fiction with themes about women and children being abused or bullied. You may have read novels and not realised that what you were reading is a form of abuse towards women since many behaviours and phrases become acceptable over time. Check out the 1930s 1940s films and see how many times a 'broad' gets slapped or pushed around. Domestic violence towards women is a known common worldwide problem. However, all statistics are 'guestimates' because many women, in fear of their lives, do not report abuse. I'm not saying men do not suffer from types of abuse - usually psychological and verbal but overall more women are abuse victims. Abuse – A Daily Occurrence – Why? Domestic violence is widespread, yet, even though there is   information and help   available, numerous women do not choose to use it and/or cannot fight their legal systems because they do not have the appropriate resources at hand. The US organisat...

Image - Valparaiso Police Department - Public Domain Best to flick through the books you are choosing in your local library thoroughly before taking them home. As reported by Arthur Weinreb on Digital Journal, one Indiana librarian found an antique gun nicely placed in a carved out section in a copy of Outerbridge Reach, a 1998 novel by Richard Stone, which presents a story about a man "pitting himself against the sea, against society, and against himself". The book had been donated to the Porter County Public Library in Valparaiso. Read " Gun found in book donated to Indiana library " and find out more about this unusual story.

Eating Disorders - image by Rega photography Dieting, anorexia, and eating disorders that boomed in the 1980's and continue today - were actually set in motion a hundred years earlier. Exploring the links between food and femininity, in her book, Fasting Girls: The History of Anorexia Nervosa , Joan Jacobs Brumberg made an intensive study of anorexia nervosa in America, and its connection to the social pressures on women to control their appetite. Thinness in the 19th and 20th Centuries Brumberg found that by 1890, thinness already reflected social levels and morality in that a thin waif-like body demonstrated the rejection of sexual cravings, which suited the Victorian ideal of femininity. Later, the 20th century brought additional social pressures; the development of nutrition and standard-sized clothes and social changes were the foundations of the epidemic eating disorders, which became evident in the 1980s and 1990s and continue today. Early in the 20th century, due to new ta...

Cotton Mather by Peter Pelham Early American literature shows that Puritan women were bound within a tight community and refused the opportunity to develop themselves intellectually. A survey of early American literature shows that for Puritan women in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the subservient role of wifely service amounted to just one of the functions of marriage. Even more significant for them was motherhood. In this society, women were not considered as intellectuals and were only educated in Calvinistic doctrines. Puritan Women – Must Suffer Childbirth In   A History of Their Own: Women in Europe From Prehistory to the Present , Volume II, 1989, authors Bonnie Anderson and Judith Zinsser point out that Calvin believed women could not reach salvation by faith alone, but were required to suffer the act of childbirth and nurturing; the punishment that Eve deserved in order to reach such exaltation (260). However, throughout the seventee...

Puritan woman at hearthstone A survey of Puritan women in early American literature reveals the strict, unjust Puritan model of community life. The omnipotent male hierarchy of the Puritan community conveniently stereotyped women as mothers, wives, and homemakers. Those who did not fit into the specified categories were labelled whores, evil types and old hags. In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story, "Young Goodman Brown," part of   The Norton Anthology of American Literature , 1995, the majority of converts to Satanism are women, suggesting they are easily tempted by evil forces. Puritan Symbols of Shame The prophet Isaiah (1:18-19) associates the colour scarlet with sinful behaviour. This colour is used by Hawthorne in his short story "My Kinsman, Major Molineux" for the garments of the "fair and hospitable dame" (556). In addition, Hawthorne's novel,   The Scarlet Letter, blatantly reiterates the meaning of this symbolic colour when character Hester...

T. H. Matteson - The Scarlet Letter Seventeenth and eighteenth century American literature inspired by Puritan ideals allows the reader insight into the lives of women in the patriarchal Puritan communities of that time. European women perceived Puritan women to be pioneers and individuals who had acquired more freedom and more rights as citizens than themselves. Nevertheless, seventeenth and eighteenth century American literature,  reflects the rigid Calvinistic theology and model of community life within which Puritan women dwelled. Through extracts from John Winthrop's "Journal" and “Model of Christian Charity," and selections from Anne Bradstreet's poems and Nathaniel Hawthorne's works, evidence  indicates Puritan society, a patriarchal society, subjugated women in order to preserve masculine authority. Patriarchal Society Subjugates Puritan Women To ensure daily Puritan life conformed to the rules and regulations of the bible, Calvinist leaders such as ...

Salinger's protagonist,  Holden Caulfield reveals his innermost thoughts through a stream of consciousness awash with slang, swearing, and references to death. Societal pressures intensely disturb the anti-hero of   The Catcher in the Rye , causing him to reject and pervert expected social conventions. Although Holden constantly engages himself in conversation, he equally explicitly demonstrates his dislike of dialogue and instead prefers to express himself through the medium of writing, a form of communication that creates a distance between himself and the reader but brings him closer to his older brother D.B., who is a writer. Holden Caulfield’s use of slang Through his writing, Holden discovers a vehicle for self-expression; however, the surface structure of his narration projects simple language, “lousy vocabulary” (8), and consistent vulgarities. Yet, with repeated occurrences of key words or groups of key words, a technique of this kind serves to symbol...

For Holden Caulfield, the protagonist of Salinger's   The Catcher in the Rye , the written word, especially word choice and tone, enables him to distance himself from, and express his dissatisfaction with society. In addition, writing provides him with a vehicle that brings the reader closer to the true essence of his character and background. If the reader pays attention, through this medium, Holden reveals his intelligence and deep sympathetic side,  not just the superficial,  dumb, vulgar and anti-social character he is playing. Holden’s transparent word choice A writer’s word-choice offers information in relation to social background and context. In each case, the distinctive features of a person’s language and idiolect mark them as belonging to a specific group. For instance, Holden Caulfield claims that “[his brother] was about fifty times as intelligent” (33) as himself and “[he’s] the only dumb one in the family” (60). Holden thus supports his disparaging feeling...

In his essay “Text Building, Epistemology, and Aesthetics in Javanese Shadow Theatre,” Professor A. L. Becker says that "an artist whose intent is self-expression creates and develops his own text, his own mythology, so far as he can and still communicate." (46)  Like the artist described by Becker, Holden Caulfield, the autobiographical narrator of J.D. Salinger’s novel,   The Catcher in the Rye , constructs his own text. Disillusioned and misunderstood, he develops and uses an idiosyncratic language system to disassociate himself from the constraints of his social class and withdraw from society. This post, one of a series, begins to reveal how Holden’s authentic style captures the depth of his personality and demonstrates his disparity with an environment he perceives as full of “perverts, morons, and screwballs” (54) . Holden an adolescent who avoids real communication While communities bind together psychologically and physically via the dynamics of spoken language, Ho...