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An in-depth selection of articles from Critical Survey of Long Fiction, Fourth Edition. Psychological Novelists is a single-volume monograph that contains selected essays from Critical Survey of Long Fiction, Fourth Edition. Every article in this set was carefully selected by our editors to provide the best information available about the topic covered. The essays in Psychological Novelists discuss such influential writers as Jean Cocteau, Jane Hamilton, August Strindberg, and Franz Kafka.

A great starting point for students seeking an introduction to Atwood and the critical discussions surrounding her work. As the author of over forty works-including over a dozen novels and over a dozen books of poetry as well as collections of short stories and short fictions, works of literary criticism, and collections of her essays and reviews-Margaret Atwood is indisputably Canada's best-known contemporary author. Her works are taught in colleges and universities all over the world in a variety of courses, including women's literature, contemporary literature, and world and comparative literature. From the beginning of her career, when The Circle Game, won Canada's prestigious Governor General's Award, to the recent publication of The Year of the Flood, Atwood has been thrilling readers with her wit, incisive criticism, and complex characters. Edited by J. Brooks Bouson, Professor of English at Loyola University Chicago, this volume in the Critical Insights series presents a variety of new essays on the Canadian writer. For readers who are studying Atwood for the first time, a biographical sketch relates the details of her life and four essays survey the critical reception of Atwood's work, explore its cultural anistorical contexts, situate Atwood among her contemporaries, and review key themes in her work. Readers seeking a deeper understanding of the writer can then move on to other essays that explore topics like Atwood's feminism and Canadian identity; her use of myth; her on the environment; her reworking of the mystery genre; and the elements of gothicism, spirituality, and trauma that recur throughout her work. Works discussed include Surfacing, The Handmaid's Tale, The Blind Assassin, Alias Grace, Oryx and Crake, and The Year of the Flood as well as selections from her mostly widely read short story and poetry collections. Among the contributors are Coral Ann Howells, Heidi Slettedahl Macpherson, Michael P. Murphy, and Sharon R. Wilson. Rounding out the volume are a chronology of Atwood's life and a list of her principle publications as well as a bibliography for readers seeking to study this iconic author in greater depth.

A great starting point for students seeking an introduction to Orwell and the critical discussions surrounding his work. ""Big Brother Is Watching You,"" ""Two plus two make five,"" ""Some animals are more equal than others""… George Orwell's two famous novels, Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four, have added numerous phrases to the lexicon we use to describe our world. Though both novels were written as critiques of communist Russia, their relevance has endured for decades after the end of the Cold War. With the advent of surveillance, the spread of euphemistic corporate and political jargon, and the growing prevalence of demagogic rhetoric, the early decades of the twenty first century have shown Orwell to have been right about much more than the dangers of communism. His prescience cast such a long shadow over twentieth century that we are in many ways still living within it today. Edited by John Rodden, a renowned Orwell scholar, this volume in the Critical Insights series presents a variety of new essays on the British writer. For readers who are studying Orwell for the first time, a biographical sketch relates the details of his life and four essays survey the critical reception of Orwell's work, explore its cultural and historical contexts, situate Orwell among his contemporaries, and review key themes in his work. Readers seeking a deeper understanding of the writer can then move on to other essays that explore topics like Orwell's politics; his use of fable, satire and allegory; his outlook on science and technology; his reputation as a public intellectual; and his accomplishments as a journalist and documentarian. Uniquely, this volume also contains a short memoir by Dione Venables, whose cousin was a close childhood friend of Orwell. Works discussed include Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four, Homage to Catalonia and The Road to Wigan Pier, and some Orwell's most memorable essays, like ""Politics and the English Language"" and ""Why I Write."" Among the contributors are Peter Davison, Eugene Goodheart, Gorman Beauchamp, Peter Stansky, and Loraine Saunders. Rounding out the volume are a chronology of Orwell's life and a list of his principle publications as well as a bibliography for readers seeking to study this seminal author in greater depth.

Great starting point for students seeking an introduction to the theme and the critical discussions surrounding it. The addition of the word ""dystopia"" to our common, everyday vocabulary is indicative of both a dark turn taken by our popular culture, and a broader pessimistic turn in the general mood. As evidenced by the success of dark cinematic visions of the future-from Blade Runner (1982), to the Terminator sequence, to the Matrix trilogy-something in our natures respond to stories based in such visions of the future. The events of recent times -- September 11, 2001 being the most telling example - and their attendant sharpening of focus on such concepts as national security versus the privacy of citizens, have certainly contributed to the pervasive sense of anxiety that seems to have developed in our society, and which seems so readily to find catharsis in dystopian dramas. However, as this volume shows, the concept of dystopia is much older. To be dystopian, a work needs to foreground the oppressive society in which it is set, using that setting as an opportunity to comment in a critical way on some other society, typically that of the author and/or the audience. In other worlds, the bleak dystopian world should encourage the reader or viewer to think critically about it, then to transfer this critical thinking to his or her own world. Edited by M. Keith Booker, Professor of English at the University of Arkansas, this volume in the Critical Insights series presents a variety of new essays on the perennial theme. For readers who are studying it for the first time, a four essays survey the critical conversation regarding the theme, explore its cultural and historical contexts, and offer close and comparative readings of key texts in the genre. Readers seeking a deeper understanding of the theme can then move on to other essays that explore it in depth through a variety of critical approaches to both literature and film. Works discussed include Utopia; Looking Backward; We; Brave New World; Anthem; A Clockwork Orange; Make Room! Make Room!; Fahrenheit 451; Nineteen Eighty-Four; The Handmaid's Tale; and Little Brother. Rounding out the volume are a list of literary works not mentioned in the book that concern the theme of dystopia and as well as a bibliography of critical sources for readers seeking to study this timeless theme in greater depth.

Great starting point for students seeking an introduction to the theme and the critical discussions surrounding it. Odysseus, Gilgamesh, Aneas, even The Lord of the Rings' Frodo-their stories thrill us with their adventure and classic quest themes. Throughout their journeys, they discover amazing new lands, strange and captivating people and beasts, and even, sometimes, a deeper understanding of themselves. Perhaps because of their excitement and clear progression towards a greater good, stories of a hero's quest remain as compelling and classic today as they were in ancient times. Edited by Bernard Schweizer, Associate Professor of English at Long Island University, and Robert Segal, Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Aberdeen, this volume in the Critical Insights series addresses the theme of the hero's quest in literature through a diverse set of texts and through multiple methodologies. For readers who are studying the themes for the first time, a four essays survey the critical conversation regarding the theme, explore its cultural and historical contexts, and offer close and comparative readings of key texts containing the theme. Readers seeking a deeper understanding of the theme can then move on to other essays that explore it in depth through a variety of critical approaches. Works discussed include The Odyssey, The Aeneid, The Inferno, Gulliver's Travels, Tom Jones, Moby Dick, His Dark Materials, and Surfacing. Rounding out the volume are a list of literary works not mentioned in the book that concern the themes of nature and the environment as well as a bibliography of critical sources for readers seeking to study these timeless themes in greater depth.

Each title in The Encyclopedia of Mathematics and Society Singles presents 60-70 articles showing the math behind our daily lives, explaining to students how and why math works, and allowing readers to better understand how disciplines such as algebra, geometry, calculus, and others affect what we do every day. This outstanding reference is appropriate for both high school and undergraduate programs, making the content readily accessible to public library patrons as well.The articles are written in clear language and presented in a uniform, easily readable format. Every article begins with standard, ready reference top matter which includes the category, fields of study (such as geometry, measurements, communication) and a brief summary. The heart of the essay discusses the interconnections of mathematics, including its meaning, history and usage. Every essay ends with a list of sources for further reading and see-also cross-references.

An in-depth selection of articles from Encyclopedia of Mathematics and Society.Each title in The Encyclopedia of Mathematics and Society Singles presents 60-70 articles showing the maths behind our daily lives, explaining to students how and why maths works, and allowing readers to better understand how disciplines such as algebra, geometry, calculus, and others affect what we do every day. This outstanding reference is appropriate for both high school and undergraduate programmes, making the content readily accessible to public library patrons as well.The articles are written in clear language and presented in a uniform, easily readable format. Every article begins with standard, ready reference top matter which includes the category, fields of study (such as geometry, measurements, communication) and a brief summary. The heart of the essay discusses the interconnections of mathematics, including its meaning, history and usage. Every essay ends with a list of sources for further reading and see-also cross-references.Space, Science & the Environment Table of Contents:Accident Reconstruction; Animals; Astronomy; Bees; Black Holes; Brain; Carbon Dating; Carbon Footprint; Caves and Caverns; Chemotherapy; Climate Change; Clouds; Coral Reefs; Crystallography; Deforestation; Diagnostic Testing; Disease Survival Rates; Doppler Radar; Earthquakes; Elementary Particles; Elevation; Energy; Extinction; Farming; Fertility; Fingerprints; Firearms; Floods; Forest Fires; Game Theory; Genetics; Geometry of the Universe; Geothermal Energy; Gravity; Green Mathematics; Growth Charts; Hurricanes and Tornadoes; Infectious Disease, Tracking; Intelligence Quotients; Interplanetary Travel; Joints; LD50/Median Lethal Dose; Life Expectancy; Light; Lightning; Maps; Molecular Structure; Moon; Nanotechnology; Nervous System; Nutrition; Pacemakers; Planetary Orbits; Plate Tectonics; Predator-Prey Models; Pregnancy; Psychological Testing; Radiation; Recycling; Relativity; Satellites; Solar Panels; Stethoscopes; SunSpots; Synchrony and Spontaneous Order; Telescopes; Temperature; Tides and Waves; Transplantation; Ultrasound; Universal Constant; Viruses; Vision Correction; Volcanoes; Water Quality; Weather Prediction; Weather Scales; Weightless Flight; Wind and Wind Power.

Presents one of the few book-length surveys of the genre available today, in a diverse collection of representative texts from a group of international critics. In addition to exemplary novels from established writers, such as Edora Welty, Flannery O’Conner, Carson McCullers, and Cormac McCarthy, works explored here include poetry, a play, and a fairy tale novella. This volume, part of the Critical Insights series, offers a collection of original essays that will establish for students and their teachers an exemplary representation of the genre Southern Gothic as a field of study within American literature.This volume seeks to extend the scope and diversity of literature that constitutes the genre, drawing upon representative themes, grounded in the diverse, often troubled history of the South, while introducing new perspectives and twists to the form, such as in the work of zombie literature as a generative trope. The introduction of poetry, in readings on Allen Tate, James Dickey, and Donald Justice, among others, into what has been a genre defined by fiction represents the originality of the volume. This collection will also consider the geographical significance of the genre within the broader field Southern literature. Defining genres remains a complex task, and these chapters will provide for readers the constitutive terms to locate, both geographically and metaphorically, the Southern Gothic.As supplemental material to support readers, this volume includes a list of literary works not mentioned in the book and a bibliography of critical sources for readers seeking to study this timeless theme in greater depth.Each essay is 2,500 to 5,000 words in length, and all essays conclude with a list of "Works Cited," along with endnotes. Finally, the volume's appendixes offer a section of useful reference resources:

Explores the ""weird"" and diverse fiction of popular pulp writers such as H. P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, Clark Ashton Smith, A. Merritt, as well as pulp magazines such as Weird Tales.From their origin at the end of the nineteenth century to their decline in the 1950s, ""pulp"" magazines entertained the masses with lurid stories in such genres as adventure, Western, romance, crime, fantasy, horror, and science fiction. Notable publications, such as Weird Tales, also served as apprenticeships for many new writers, including H.P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, and Clark Ashton Smith.This volume in the Critical Insights series presents a variety of new essays on the topic of popular pulp fiction and writers of the 1920s and 1930s, focusing on those major contributors to the Weird Tales school, which not only included Lovecraft, Howard, and Smith, but also Seabury Quinn, C.L. Moore, Robert Bloch, August Derleth, and others. For readers who are studying pulp fiction for the first time, four essays survey the critical conversation regarding the subject, explore its cultural and historical contexts, and offer close and comparative readings of key texts. Readers seeking a deeper understanding can then move on to other essays that explore it in depth through a variety of critical approaches. Among the contributors are S.T. Joshi, Jeffrey H. Shanks, Andrew J. Wilson, Garyn Roberts, and Richard Bleiler. Rounding out the volume are a list of literary works not mentioned in the book that concern the theme as well as a bibliography of critical sources for readers seeking to study this timeless theme in greater depth. Each essay is 2,500 to 5,000 words in length, and all essays conclude with a list of ""Works Cited,"" along with endnotes. Finally, the volume's appendixes offer a section of useful reference resources:About This VolumeCritical Context: Original Introductory EssaysCritical Readings: Original In-Depth EssaysFurther ReadingsDetailed BibliographyDetailed Bio of the EditorGeneral Subject Index

This updated eight-volume set contains essays that cover the 20th century's most important events. With its articles arranged in chronological order, this new edition covers a wide variety of events from national and world politics, wars, civil disturbances, disasters, crimes, business, scientific and medical discoveries and breakthroughs,and other fields. The set's new articles extend the coverage through September 2001 and include stories such as the massacre of the Nepalese royal family by its own crown prince; and the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001 and their aftermath. The top matter offers a summary description ofthe event and defines its significance in a brief sentence. Following that description is a list of the ""what"", ""when"", and ""where"", ""who"" of the event,providing readers with the data on the first page of the article. The text of each 1000 word article is divided into three subsections, the first and second of which detailthe event itself and the background to it,and the last of which, ""Consequences"", identifies both the short-range consequences and the projected long-range impact of the event. The chronological arrangement of the articles not only serves as timeline but also casts light on the social, political,and economic evolution of the world from a collectopn of individual nations to a global community, in which developments in one regions have repercussions inothers.

In this expanded four-volume set of the ""Great Lives from History"" series, the lives of important men and women in all areas of achievement who flourished between 1801 and 1900 are profiled in extended biographical essays. The lengthy essays provide in-depth coverage and annotated bibliographic resources with worldwide focus including strong coverage of non-Europeans and women. A total of 737 essays covering 757 major figures comprise the set, including 123 women. Among the 189 sidebars, quotations from primary source documents supplement the text throughout. Both the geographic and the occupational scope of the individuals covered in ""Great Lives from History: The 19th Century, 1801-1900"" are intentionally broad, with a view to including influential individuals worldwide. Coverage is broad in areas of achievement as well as geography, while at the same time including the recognized shapers of history essential in any liberal arts curriculum. Major world leaders appear here, as well as the giants of religious faith who were central to the century: monarchs, presidents, popes, philosophers, writers, social reformers, educators, artists, scientists, and military leaders who left their imprint on political, cultural, and spiritual institutions. Also, however, the set includes figures who have received little attention in the past, from American educator and science writer Elizabeth Cabot Agassiz to Chinese statesman and military leader Zeng Guofan. By category, the contents include figures whose achievements fall into one or more of the following areas: agriculture, architecture, art, astronomy, biology, business, chemistry, church government, communications, crime, diplomacy, economics, education, engineering, entertainment, exploration, geography, geology, government and politics, historiography, journalism, law, linguistics, literature, mathematics, medicine, military, music, patronage of the arts, philanthropy, philosophy, photography, physics, psychology, religion and theology, scholarship, science and technology, social reform, sociology, sports, theater, warfare and conquest, and women's rights. Each essay ranges from 1,500 to 3,000 words in length (roughly 3 to 5 pages) and displays standard ready-reference top matter offering easy access to biographical information. Several features distinguish this series as a whole from other biographical reference works. The front matter includes a complete list of contents; a key to pronunciation; a list of maps and sidebars. The front matter of each volume contains a section of maps displaying major regions of the world during the 19th century. There are 4 volumes; 2,944 pages; 189 sidebars, primary source quotes; 350 photographs; 737 biographies, 120 new; regional and world maps; rulers and heads of state list; pronunciation guide; cross-references; chronological list of entries; category index; geographical index; personages index; and, subject index.

Salem's definitive 20th century historical reference continues with this title.Salem Press' monumental ""Great Events from History"" series spans human history from ancient times to the present, worldwide. ""Great Events from History: The 20th Century, 1971-2000"", a six-volume set, provides extended coverage of 1,083 major events between 1971 and 2000.The period is extraordinarily important: The late twentieth century was a time of significant advances in science and technology. Space probes explored comets. Personal computers were born and quickly grew to change the way people all over the world work, play, and communicate. With the rise of the Internet, information of all kinds became available at the click of a button. In addition, advances in biotechnology were groundbreaking, producing the first genetically engineered vaccine, a map of the human genome, and the first successfully cloned mammal.Plus, the events covered include the curriculum-oriented geopolitical events of the era - from the end of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War in 1973 to the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. Essays also address important social and cultural developments in daily life: major literary movements, significant developments in the arts and motion pictures, trends in world population and immigration, and landmark social legislation.The essays range in length from 3 to 5 pages and adhere to a uniform format. The ready-reference top matter of every essay displays the most precise date of the event, the common name, a summary paragraph, locale, category of the event, and the key people involved.The text of each essay is divided into four sections: ""Summary of Event"" gives a chronological description of the facts of the event. ""Significance"" assesses the event's historical impact, ""Further Reading"" provides a fully annotated list of sources for further study, and ""See Also"" offers extensive cross-references to other essays within the Great Events set.A ""Keyword List of Contents"" appears in the front matter to each volume. A section of historical maps also appears in the front matter, displaying world regions in the late twentieth century to assist readers in placing the events' locales. Accompanying the individual essays are an additional 85 maps; 240 quotations from primary source documents, lists, and time lines; and more than 500 photographs and other illustrations. In addition, several research aids appear at the end of Volume 6, including a bibliography, a chronological list of entries, and a listing of electronic resources. Four complete indexes (Geographical, Category, Personages, and Subject) round out this remarkable set.

This new edition of ""Notable American Novelists"" presents biographical sketches and analytical overviews of 145 of the best-known American and Canadian writers of long fiction from the 19th and 20th centuries, arranged alphabetically by name. The set's three volumes survey the novelists, whose works are included in core curricula of high school and undergraduate literature studies. Essays on living authors and all the bibliographies in the articles are updated. About two-thirds of the essays are illustrated with portraits of the writers. ""Notable American Novelists"" features often-studied writers ranging from Nathaniel Hawthorne, Mark Twain, Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner, and Jack London to Joan Didion and J. D. Salinger. Other important nineteenth century figures include Herman Melville, James Fenimore Cooper, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and George Washington Cable. Among the other major twentieth century writers featured are Sinclair Lewis, Norman Mailer, Joyce Carol Oates, John Irving, E. L. Doctorow, Joseph Heller, Toni Morrison, Vladimir Nabokov, Thomas Pynchon, John Steinbeck, Kurt Vonnegut, and John Updike. One can also find essays on such widely read and popular authors as Stephen King, James Michener, Louisa May Alcott, Larry McMurtry, and Anne Rice. A major addition to this new edition is the inclusion of Canadian novelists: Margaret Atwood, Robertson Davies, Frederick Philip Grove, Margaret Laurence, Mordecai Richler, and Sinclair Ross. Each essay begins with a presentation of reference information: the novelist's birth and death dates and a list of the writer's principal works of long fiction, with publication dates. ""Other literary forms"" then briefly describes genres other than long fiction in which the writer has worked, and an ""Achievements"" section encapsulates the author's central contribution and notes major honors and awards. The major sections of the text follow: ""Biography"" provides a sketch of the author's life, and ""Analysis"" looks at the novelist's work in detail; this section examines central and well-known works in the author's canon and illuminates the themes and techniques of primary interest to the novelist. The longest section in the article, ""Analysis"" is divided into subsections on the writer's major individual works. Following ""Analysis"" is a categorized list, ""Other major works,"" that provides titles and dates of works the author has written in genres other than long fiction, including plays, poetry, short fiction, and nonfiction. Each essay concludes with an updated, annotated bibliography. All articles are signed by the principal writer and, where applicable, by the updating contributor. Three helpful reference features are included at the end of volume 3: a glossary entitled ""Terms and Techniques,"" a time line of the writers' birthdates, and an index.

Scope and coverage - Virtually every athlete and every sport readers might reasonably expect to find can be found here. Although there is an emphasis on sports that are popular in North America, there is considerable coverage on sports and athletes from other parts of the world. Most North Americans have at least some familiarity with such sports as baseball, basketball, football, golf, ice hockey, and tennis. They are likely to have had less exposure to badminton, cycling, and soccer and even less exposure to sports such as cricket, fencing, and Tae Kwon Do. No matter what the sport, however, readers of ""Great Athletes"" will learn that outstanding athletes from all parts of the world and all cultures. Organization and format: Averaging three to four pages in length, articles are written in clear language and presented in a uniform, easily readable format. Each article is divided into four sections that cover the athlete's life and achievements chronologically. 'Early Life' covers the athlete's family background, early education, introduction to sports, and other formative experiences. 'The Road to Excellence' discusses the athlete's first serious involvement in sports and the experiences and influences that propelled the athlete toward greatness. 'The Emerging Champion' section follows the athlete from the threshold of stardom to higher levels, and 'Continuing the Story' tracks the athlete's subsequent athletic career and later life. Finally, each article concludes with a 'Summary' recapitulating the athlete's achievements and legacy. A photograph of the athlete accompanies each essay, and every article is accompanied by at least one table, shadowed for easy reference. With their content varying greatly among different sports, these tables summarize the career statistics, honors and awards, records, and other milestones that set each great athlete apart. At a Glance: This title contains 13 Volumes; 5,000 Pages; 1,470 Essays, 380 new; 1,470 Photos (one per essay); 2,600 Sidebars/Statistic Tables; 60 Appendixes; and Name, Sport Team, Position & Country Indexes. Arguably one of the most popular sports today, this title features 150 of the most influential people to ever play the game, including Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Michael Jordan, and Candace Parker.

Poets examined include Margaret Atwood, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Chaucer, T.S. Eliot, D.H. Lawrence, Christopher Marlowe, Shakespeare, Oscar Wilde, Wordsworth and Yeats. New to this edition are Leonard Cohen, Christopher Logue and Harold Pinter.

This title contains in-depth critical discussions of F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel. Representing a variety of critical approaches and edited by one of the leading critics on 20th Century American literature, this collection focuses on one of the most widely taught works of American literature. The critical viewpoints presented in the volume cover a wide array of topics from issues of race in the novel to individual character studies. The Editor's Introduction explores the deceptive simplicity of the plot and the complex underpinnings of what makes the novel a true masterpiece. This volume of criticism begins simply enough with essays that provide the reader with cultural, historical, comparative, and critical contexts for understanding ""Gatsby"". Several essays consider the cultural and historical contexts of Fitzgerald's work while critical comparisons link the novel to the poetry of Keats and the novels ""Daisy Miller"" and ""Passing"". The section of contextual readings is followed by a selection of critical overviews, including Robert Roulston and Helen H. Roulston's consideration of Gatsby as a type of culmination of Fitzgerald's writings and Ruth Prigozy's comprehensive introduction to the Oxford World Classic edition of ""Gatsby"". The critical overviews are followed by a series of critical readings that focus on narrative style, color symbolism, and character analysis among other topics. Spanning nearly 40 years of critical study, the selection of essays contained in this volume provide the ideal introduction for any one seeking an introduction to this American classic. Each essay is 5,000 words in length, and all essays conclude with a list of ""Works Cited,"" along with endnotes.

This title contains in-depth critical discussions of Arthur Miller's great drama. When it premiered, ""Death of a Salesman"" received immediate critical praise and popular attention. Miller set out to change the face of American Drama and succeeded. The play won the Pulitzer Prize, the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award, the Donaldson Award, and Tony Awards for best play, best direction, best scene design, and best supporting actor. To this day, it remains one of the most-read and most performed plays in the world, and no survey course on American Drama would be complete without it. Edited by distinguished scholar and one-time President of the American Theatre and Drama Society, Brenda Murphy, this volume brings together some of the best essays written on Miller's most accomplished play. The essays contained within present a variety of critical viewpoints and an array of critical approaches. Close readings include Jon Dietrick's consideration of the play in the context of literary naturalism and monetary theory and Terry W. Thompson's analysis of Willy's comparison of Biff to Hercules. Chester E. Eisinger looks at the differences between dream and reality while also considering the competing dreams of the Loman family and Fred Ribkoff addresses the dynamics of shame, guilt, empathy, and the search for identity in the play. In the volume's two concluding essays, Matthew C. Roudane provides a broad-based reading of ""Salesman"" while Christopher Bigsby considers the play in the context of American Culture. Each essay is 5,000 words in length, and all essays conclude with a list of ""Works Cited,"" along with endnotes.

This title includes in-depth critical discussions of Edgar Allan Poe's work. This is a collection of sixteen essays by leading scholars examining the short stories and life of the 19th century American writer Edgar Allan Poe. Representing the best of a broad range of critical perspectives from the psychoanalytical to the postcolonial, the volume serves as an excellent introduction to Poe's tales and the critical conversation surrounding them. The volume is introduced by Steven Frye, Professor of English at California State University, Bakersfield, the author of ""Historiography and the American Romance: A Study of Four Authors"" (2001) and the editor of ""Poe Studies/Dark Romanticism: History, Theory, Interpretation"" (2008). Original essays illuminate the influences that shaped Poe, contextualize his work, and assess his enduring impact on American and Continental poetry and fiction. A sketch of the historical and cultural forces surrounding Poe illuminates their influence on his aesthetic; a reception history examines Poe's enduring contributions to the short story genre, the French Symbolist movement, and modernist aesthetics; a comparison of Poe's and Baudelaire's works reveals how the two authors exploited the duplicitous possibilities within the writer-reader relationship; and a critical reading of ""The Fall of the House of Usher,"" ""The Black Cat,"" ""The Tell-Tale Heart,"" ""Ligeia,"" and ""Bernice"" seeks to expose the stories' unifying aesthetic principles. Further, a varied selection of critical views offers detailed analyses of Poe's most essential tales like ""The Murders in the Rue Morgue"", ""The Fall of the House of Usher"", ""The Cask of Amontillado"", ""The Gold Bug"", and ""Ligeia"". Uniquely, the collection also contains an original essay by Nathaniel Rich, senior editor of ""The Paris Review"". Reflecting on Poe's insight into and fascination with the perverse instincts of humanity, Rich offers a writer's perspective on one of America's most enigmatic writers. Finally, a wealth of reference material, including a complete list of Poe's publications and a full biography, rounds out the volume by giving readers ample sources for continuing their studies. Edited and with an introduction by Steven Frye, the collection is a gateway into the best of Poe and his critics. Each essay is 5,000 words in length, and all essays conclude with a list of 'Works Cited', along with endnotes.

This title includes in-depth discussions of Margaret Atwood's ""The Handmaid's Tale"". ""The Handmaid's Tale"" won international acclaim when it was first published in 1985; with it, Margaret Atwood won Canada's Governor General's Award as well as the Arthur C. Clarke Award and was nominated for the Booker Prize. Written in the midst of the anti-feminist backlash and the culture wars of the 1980s, readers recognized it as a timely and chilling dystopian novel depicting a future in which the American government has been overthrown by religious fundamentalists who have, in turn, erected a patriarchal theocracy. Though Atwood had doubts about the novel when she was writing it, and though both conservative and liberal critics have found fault with it, the years following ""The Handmaid's Tale""'s publication have been rich with critical discussion. Edited and with an introduction by J. Brooks Bouson, a widely recognized Atwood scholar, this volume in the ""Critical Insights"" series collects some the novel's best critics to introduce high school students and undergraduates to one of Atwood's most widely read novels. Original essays by Lisa Jadwin and Dominick Grace lend context to the novel by surveying the political and cultural events out of which the novel grew as well as how Atwood's critics have responded to the novel. Two other original essays by Matthew Bolton and Jennifer E. Dunn explore the novel in light the dystopian literary tradition and feminist literary theory. This collection of republished essays continues the conversation as Coral Ann Howells considers the novel's narrative structure and Madonne Miner and Shirley Neuman examine the role of love in the novel. Chinmoy Banerjee addresses the topic of criticism as commodity in the novel, Elisabeth Hansot and Hilde Staels investigate hegemonic and subversive discourses, and Danita J. Dodson reads the story in light of America's Puritanistic past. Finally, Eleonora Rao offers a psychoanalytic reading that focuses on narrative gaps and ambiguities, and Karen F. Stein and Joseph Andriano consider the novel's metafictional elements. Each essay is 5,000 words in length, and all essays conclude with a list of 'Works Cited', along with endnotes. Finally, the volume's appendixes offer a section of useful reference resources: a chronology of the author's life; a complete list of the author's works and their original dates of publication; a general bibliography; a detailed paragraph on the volume's editor; notes on the individual chapter authors; and, a subject index.

This title includes in-depth critical discussions of Maya Angelou's novel. Maya Angelou's ""I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings"" took the world by storm when it was published in 1969. As it shot to the top of best-seller lists, it made Angelou one of the most recognized black women in America. Despite controversy over its frank depiction of sexual abuse, the autobiography is still widely read in high schools and colleges across the country. Three decades after it was published, readers continue to admire Angelou's artistry, wit, and indomitable spirit. Edited by Mildred R. Mickle, Assistant Professor of English at Penn State Greater Allegheny, this volume brings together a variety of critical offerings on Angelou's famous autobiography. Mickle's introduction pays tribute to Angelou's achievement and examines the inspiration she drew from Phillis Wheatley's civil rights advocacy as well as the similarities between ""Caged Bird"" and Harriet Jacobs' ""Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl"" and Paul Lawrence Dunbar's poetry. ""The Paris Review""'s Christopher Cox reminds readers of how revolutionary Angelou's autobiography was when it was published and recounts the comments Angelou made on her work in an interview with George Plimpton. Four original essays by Amy Sickels, Pamela Loos, Neil Heims, and Robert C. Evans provide valuable context for reader's new to Angelou's work. Sickels discusses the historical events that surround Angelou's life: the civil rights, black power, and black arts movements as well as the emergence of black women's literature with the first publications of Toni Morrison, Nikki Giovanni, Alice Walker, and Lucille Clifton. Loos provides a survey of the major pieces of criticism on ""Caged Bird"", paying special attention to the book's early reception and how it fits in the autobiographical genre and slave narratives, as well as issues of race, gender, aesthetics, and identity. Neil Heims discusses the struggle for a black identity through readings of both ""Caged Bird"" and James Baldwin's ""If Beale Street Could Talk"". Finally, Robert C. Evans examines the role that both formal and informal education play in the young Maya's maturation. The collection also includes ten previously published essays that examine ""Caged Bird"" through a variety of lenses. Critics examine the character of young Maya, noting how her rootlessness contributes to her perseverance and adaptability, as well as how Angelou's narrative technique allows her to recount the details of incredible life without being controlled by them. The book's treatment of sexual abuse is also investigated in the larger context of other black women's narratives of sexual abuse. Other critics attend to ""Caged Bird""'s place in the genre of ethnic autobiography and the particular challenges it presents to teachers seeking to expose students multicultural literature; the childhood roots of Angelou's political activism; the influence of blues music on the narrative's structure; and, the young Maya's relationships with the black community, literature, and the women in her life.

The border between fact and fiction has always been a porous one for Isabel Allende. Her acclaimed first novel, The House of the Spirits, began as a letter to her dying grandfather yet is filled with ghosts and green-haired and clairvoyant women; her memoir Paula, though ostensibly nonfiction, is a moving and highly imaginative account of her family history and the illness and death of her daughter, Paula. Even in the many interviews she has given, Allende has embellished the details of her life to captivate and charm her readers. She has more than succeeded. Around the world, readers have flocked to both her fiction and her nonfiction, making her one of the best-selling women novelists in the world today. Edited and with an introduction by John Rodden, a celebrated Allende scholar, this volume in the Critical Insights series brings together a variety of essays on this Chilean Scheherazade. Rodden's introduction assesses the phases of Allende's career and her growth as a writer, and Michael Wood, writing on behalf of The Paris Review, considers Allende's relation to magical realism. Amanda Hopkinson, in turn, provides a comprehensive biography of Allende and a measured examination of how her life has informed her work.For students encountering Allende for the first time, four introductory essays provide a valuable framework for studying her in greater depth. Beth E. Jörgenson surveys the range of critical opinions and the major strands of critical thought on Allende's work, and Charles Rossman's close reading of The House of the Spirits analyzes in depth the novel's setting, characters, and plot. María Roof compares Allende's use of the family saga novel to Maryse Condé's, and Carrie Sheffield describes the context in which Allende wrote her first and most popular novel, The House of the Spirits.Next, a collection of essays on key works and subjects deepens readers' understanding of Allende. The House of the Spirits is treated by Sara E. Cooper, who uses family systems theory to explicate the novel's major themes, and Barbara Foley Buedel considers the magical realist aspects of Eva Luna and The Stories of Eva Luna. Linda S. Maier and Cherie Meacham both explore Paula, with Maier focusing on how the memoir acted as a catharsis for Allende and Meacham relating the work to The House of the Spirits.Allende's prequels to The House of the Spirits—Daughter of Fortune and Portrait in Sepia—are then taken up by John Rodden and Nadia Avendaño. Rodden examines the autobiographical facets of both novels while Avendaño considers how Allende breaks down gender barriers in Daughter of Fortune. Linda Gould Levine extends Avendaño's insights with a broad study of how Allende has transgressed boundaries of race, class, gender, and nationality throughout her career. Vincent Kling seeks to overturn the common perception of Allende as little more than a popular novelist by revealing how she continually draws on myth, archetype, and paradox to lend depth and nuance to her writing.A quartet of essays then treat a few of Allende's lesser known works. Philip Swanson examines Zorro, while Luz María Umpierre analyzes one of the short stories, "Two Words." Don Latham discusses the magical realist facets of Allende's young adult novels, and John Rodden considers Allende's self-presentation in her interviews.Rounding out the volume are a chronology of Allende's life and a list of her principal publications as well as a bibliography for readers seeking to study this fascinating author in greater depth.Finally, the volume's appendixes offer a section of useful reference resources:A chronology of the author's lifeA complete list of the author's works and their original dates of publicationA general bibliographyA detailed paragraph on the volume's editorNotes on the individual chapter authorsA subject index

There is nothing intelligent to say about a massacre," Kurt Vonnegut writes in the first chapter of Slaughterhouse-Five, his novel about the firebombing of Dresden during World War II. "Everybody is supposed to be dead, to never say anything or want anything ever again." Fittingly, Slaughterhouse-Five is an odd sort of book—both an antiwar novel and science fiction, a dark comedy as well as a tragedy. Published at the height of the Vietnam War protests, it seized the imaginations of thousands of young people and made Vonnegut into an overnight sensation. Now, more than forty years after its publication, scholars are only beginning to assess Vonnegut's unique achievement with this stoic yet compassionate treatment of what remains one of the most deadly military strikes in European history.Edited and with an introduction by Leonard Mustazza, Distinguished Professor of English and American Studies at Penn State Abington, this volume in the Critical Insights series brings together some of the best classic and contemporary criticism on Vonnegut's famous novel. Mustazza's introduction describes the cultural moment in which Slaughterhouse-Five appeared, and Sarah Fay, writing forThe Paris Review, analyzes Vonnegut's unique comic sensibility.For readers studying Slaughterhouse-Five for the first time, a quartet of introductory essays provide a framework for gaining a deeper understanding of the novel. Jerome Klinkowitz first reviews the vicissitudes of the novel's reputation among critics, readers, and scholars. Kevin Alexander Boon then demonstrates how Vonnegut borrows techniques from film to hold together his fragmented narrative. David Simmons compares Slaughterhouse-Five with another classic antiwar novel, Joseph Heller's Catch-22, and Christina Jarvis explains how the Vietnam War and the antiwar movement influenced both Vonnegut and Thomas Pychon as they wrote their novels about World War II.The volume then continues with a selection of classic and contemporary essays. William Rodney Allen offers a comprehensive overview of the novel and its composition, and Donald J. Greiner, Jerome Klinkowtiz, and Maurice J. O'Sullivan, Jr., all examine the autobiographical nature of Slaughterhouse-Five and Vonnegut's attempts to come to terms with the events he witnessed in Dresden. James Lundquist describes the formal techniques Vonnegut devised to meet the challenge of writing about such an unimaginable tragedy as Dresden, and Wayne D. McGinnis treats the novel's unusual structure, showing how its unresolved circularity mimics the irresolution and circularity of death and time. T. J. Matheson also offers an analysis of the novel's formal elements, concentrating in particular on how its first chapter sets up the themes Vonnegut will follow throughout the book.C. Barry Chabot also takes up Vonnegut's treatment of death and his perpetual comment on it, "so it goes," and Hans van Stralen examines Vonnegut's postmodern renewal of existentialist themes. The novel's science-fiction elements are treated by Arnold Edelstein, who argues that Billy Pilgrim's "time traveling" is actually a fantasy Billy concocted to escape his memories and responsibilities, and Susanne Vees-Gulani extends this argument in a psychoanalytic reading of Billy and his creator. Dolores K. Gros Louis, Donald E. Morse, and Leonard Mustazza find biblical allusions in the novel. Gros Louis reads Billy Pilgrim as an ironic Christ figure, while Morse draws parallels between the destruction of Dresden and the book of Job, and Mustazza finds further connections between Eden and the alien world Tralfamador. Joyce Nelson makes a comparative analysis of the novel and its film adaptation.Rounding out the volume are a brief biography of Vonnegut, a chronology of his life, and a comprehensive bibliography of the major pieces of criticism on Slaughterhouse-Five for readers wishing to study the novel in greater depth.

A completely new reference from Salem Press, Applied Science covers major fields and technologies in all areas, from agriculture to computers to engineering to medical to space sciences. Applied Science contains over 300 alphabetically arranged articles on a broad range of applied-science fields ranging from long-established engineering fields to cutting-edge fields such as micro- and nanotechnologies, addressing applied sciences in areas as diverse as aerospace, communications, energy, information, medical, military, transportation, forensic, and even food technologies. SCOPE AND COVERAGEArticles examine the relationship between science and technology, providing insight into the many ways in which science affects daily life. Understanding the interconnectedness of the different and varied branches of science and technology is important for anyone preparing for a career or endeavour in science or technology. To that end, essays look beyond basic principles to examine a wide range of topics, including industrial and business applications, historical and social contexts, and the impact a particular field of science or technology will have on future jobs and careers. Especially targeted toward high-school students, this excellent reference work is edited to tie into the high-school curriculum, making the content readily accessible as well to patrons of public, academic, and university libraries.

All the original author essays were evaluated for their currency, and 145 of them were given substantial revision, in some cases by the original contributor. The sections "Other literary forms," "Achievements," "Biography," and "Analysis" were updated to include recent developments: new titles or awards, changes in residence or employment, and alterations in critical and popular reception. For these essays, material on one or more specific stories or collections was added.This edition adds 145 new writers. A significant effort was made to add more women; they include such notable figures as Michelle Cliff, Edwidge Danticat, Anita Desai, Judith Ortiz Cofer, Carol Shields, and Christa Wolf. Many important authors from around the world are featured for the first time in this edition; those with works in English translation include such as Daniel Alarcon, J. M. G. Le Clézio, Haruki Murakami, and Mario Vargas Llosa.

All the original author essays were evaluated for their currency, and 145 of them were given substantial revision, in some cases by the original contributor. The sections "Other literary forms," "Achievements," "Biography," and "Analysis" were updated to include recent developments: new titles or awards, changes in residence or employment, and alterations in critical and popular reception. For these essays, material on one or more specific stories or collections was added.This edition adds 145 new writers. A significant effort was made to add more women; they include such notable figures as Michelle Cliff, Edwidge Danticat, Anita Desai, Judith Ortiz Cofer, Carol Shields, and Christa Wolf. Many important authors from around the world are featured for the first time in this edition; those with works in English translation include such as Daniel Alarcon, J. M. G. Le Clézio, Haruki Murakami, and Mario Vargas Llosa.

Camus attracted the interest of scholars from many disciplines— specialists in literature, theater, philosophy, theology, political science, history, psychology, medicine, and law. This volume offers original contributions, while also reprinting a sampling of some of the more trenchant earlier essays about the man and his work.

This collection provides broad coverage of Cheever and his work. Original essays discuss the basic facts of Cheever's life and critical reputation. The work explores his complicated personal life and discusses his decorous style and fragmented structure, and his fascination with language.This Critical Insights volume opens with essays that provide the basic facts of Cheever's life and critical reputation. Providing these facts is especially important in the case of the biography of a man who was prone to self-mythologizing. What's more, Cheever's version of his own life was long accepted as fact but, posthumously, has been complicated by unflattering revelations about his personal life in his daughter's memoirs, in his published journals and in two biographies. Establishing the basic facts of Cheever's critical reception is equally important and differently challenging. The critical response to his writing was a roller-coaster ride. Reviewers and critics consistently failed to reach a consensus on Cheever's importance. Suburbia is central to any analysis of Cheever. Here he is discussed as a suburban romancer rather than, as was more usually the case, a novelist of manners. Mixed with self-doubt, this approach ""may begin with allegorical ambitions but . . . then morphs into such tortuous interconnections, where superficial differences . . . become virtually synonymous with one another so that they are so entangled, one cannot decide where one ends and the other begins."" Cheever is described as ""an unfailingly surreal lyricist of disorientation . . . whose fictions are propelled by fear"" and who used imagination to mediate ""between senseless reality and an immensely coherent dreamworld."" Cheever's ""wariness"" toward modern life is treated in two essays that survey Cheever's entire career. In ""Supermarket and Superhighway,"" these two dominant symbols are representative of the ""nomadism and commercialism"" that characterise ""the modern malaise."" Another essay takes a similarly expansive look at Cheever's career (through Falconer) but reaches a very different conclusion. ""Cheever's subject has been the increasing alienation of modern man from a central role in his own life to that of a peripheral, almost ignored spectator to a social process that has little real need of any individuals, requiring merely a mass."" Cheever depicted the suburbs as ""a forceful yoking together of impossible contraries."" In Cheever's much maligned third novel, Bullet Park, the ""wry moral censure of the banal suburban existence"" that is so evident in Cheever's short fiction is given the space needed to pursue ""dimensions of human dejection not completely accessible to the shorter form."" Putting Cheever's suburban fiction in historical context, in another essay the writer examines the cultural significance of the suburbs in the 50's and 60's, plus the sociological and fictional responses to the suburbanisation of American life. In this context, it is noted that Cheever treats his white suburban readers as if they were ""everyone.