Huck's Moral Development in Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

One of the most interesting themes in Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn is Huck’s moral development who despite his close relationship with Jim is pro-slavery and is thus plagued with his ambivalent conscience because of his collaboration in Jim’s escape.

The Top Scottish Castles for Tourists

In ancient times Scottish castles served as a dwelling for Scottish inhabitants while providing security and defence in case of enemy attacks. The thousands of castles located in Scotland are all infused with Scottish culture and ancient history and are definitely a must-see for anyone planning a visit to Scotland.

The Origins of Boxing Day in the UK

In the United Kingdom the secular holiday referred to as Boxing Day is celebrated on December 26, on the same day of the Feast of St. Stephen, the day after Christmas. The origins of Boxing Day has deep roots, some argue that its origins date back to medieval times. Nonetheless it became recognised as a public holiday in the United Kingdom in the mid nineteenth century during Queen Victoria’s reign.

The Story of San Michele by Axel Munthe

The Book of San Michele is generally considered biographical in its presentation, even though the book gives scarce information about Munthe’s private life. Its structure is a number of loosely interwoven short stories recounting among other episodes the construction of his home in Capri. The book is clearly based on Munthe’s life although the events related do not always reflect a truthful representation of what actually happened. For instance, his marriages are never mentioned; Munthe writes that he began to practice medicine in Paris soon after qualifying as a doctor. However, in reality he returned to Stockholm and married. The couple spent their honeymoon in Capri where they stayed while Munthe helped with an outbreak of typhus in the island. The narrative is tinged with an air of romanticism interspersed with light humour, which contributes to the enormous popularity of the book and the interests that has arisen in Villa San Michele.

Comparing the movie adaptation of The French Lieutenant's Woman with the novel by John Fowles

John Fowles’s novel The French Lieutenant’s Woman alternates from a representation of characters and events using a form of modified realism followed by a shattering of the same illusion it creates. Fowles’s Brechtian techniques emphasise the temporal distance between the ‘real’ world of historical data and the ‘reality’ of his fictional nineteenth-century characters. Acquainting his readers with Mrs. Poultney, the narrator relates: ‘she was an opium addict – but before you think I am wildly sacrificing plausibility to sensation, let me quickly add that she did not know it. What we call opium she called laudanum … It was, in short, a very near equivalent of our own age’s sedative pills’. The narrator blurs the distinction between the real world and the fictive world, in such a way that foregrounds the degree by which reality is constructed. The various kinds of epigraphs, the footnotes, the references to nineteenth-century and twentieth-century characters all serve to undermine the very concept of reality.