In literature, as in life, ending well is the great, hard achievement. No mere conclusion, an ending completes and shapes the meaning of the whole story, the whole life. Last week my students and I reached the ending to William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, which surprises the reader as much as it does the […]
Lord of the Flies: Evil Recognized Is Redemption Begun Read More »
“As Gregor Samsa awoke one morning from uneasy dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a gigantic vermin.” Everyone knows that Kafka’s Metamorphosis is the story of a man who wakes up one morning to discover he has turned into a giant insect. The plot of the story is strange, but the plot
When Beowulf fights Grendel, he refuses the use of a sword and insists that God will determine the victor. We later learn the Grendel is protected by a hex and that no blade can harm him. Beowulf refuses every advantage in battle which he might take unto himself, and so doing he invites God to
