F.Y.B.A.

Literary Terms:

1. Short story

A short story is fictional work of prose that is shorter in length than a novel. Edgar Allan Poe, in his essay "The Philosophy of Composition," said that a short story should be read in one sitting, anywhere from a half hour to two hours. In contemporary fiction, a short story can range from 1,000 to 20,000 words.

Because of the shorter length, a short story usually focuses on one plot, one main character (with a few additional minor characters), and one central theme, whereas a novel can tackle multiple plots and themes, with a variety of prominent characters. Short stories also lend themselves more to experimentation — that is, using uncommon prose styles or literary devices to tell the story. Such uncommon styles or devices might get tedious, and downright annoying, in a novel, but they may work well in a short story.

S.Y.B.A

The Pearl by John Steinbeck : Context


John Steinbeck was born in Salinas, California, in 1902. He was the third of four children and the only son of John Steinbeck, Sr. and Olive Hamilton Steinbeck. Growing up in a rural valley near the Pacific coast, Steinbeck was an intense reader, and both his father, a local government official, and his mother, a former schoolteacher, encouraged his literary pursuits. In 1919 he graduated from Salinas High School and matriculated at Stanford University, where he studied literature and writing.

In 1925, without a degree, Steinbeck left Stanford to pursue work as a reporter in New York City. He returned to California the following year, supporting his endeavors at writing with a steady income from manual labor. Over the next several years his literary career gained momentum with the publication of his first novels. Although his first three—Cup of Gold, The Pastures of Heaven, and To a God Unknown—were critical and commercial failures, he achieved major success in 1935 with the publication of Tortilla Flat, a collection of stories about the ethnic working poor in California. During this time, Steinbeck began to gain recognition from critics for his short stories.

Steinbeck’s extensive travels in the 1930s partly inspired two of his finest works, Of Mice and Men, in 1937, and The Grapes of Wrath, in 1939. Both novels, fictional portraits of the western United States during the Great Depression, are still read widely. Steinbeck received the Pulitzer Prize for The Grapes of Wrath in 1940.
Steinbeck’s simple, touching novella The Pearl originally appeared in the magazine Woman’s Home Companion in 1945 under the title “The Pearl of the World.” The story explores the destructive effect of colonial capitalism on the simple piety of a traditional native culture. Set in a Mexican Indian village on the Baja Peninsula around the turn of the century, the novella tells the story of Kino, an Indian pearl diver who discovers a massive, beautiful, and extremely valuable pearl. The pearl fills Kino with a new desire to abandon his simple, idyllic life in favor of dreams of material and social advancement, dreams that run headlong into the oppressive resistance of the Spanish colonial powers that top the social hierarchy of Kino’s world.
While less complex than Steinbeck’s other works, The Pearl ranks among his most popular, and it is certainly one of his most accessible. The novella was originally conceived as a film project (and was in fact made into a motion picture in 1948); it features a simple, visually evocative style that in many ways recalls the narrative flow of a film. Additionally, The Pearl’s simple prose style echoes the traditional style of a moral parable, particularly the biblical parables of Jesus. The story clearly owes a great deal to the biblical story of the pearl of great price, and to a certain extent the familiar rhythms and easily understandable moral lessons of the novella help to explain its continuing power and its long-standing popularity.
The Pearl is not among Steinbeck’s most critically acclaimed works, but it has exerted a certain amount of influence in American literature. Its evocation of natural beauty and its use of the short, simple parable form may have influenced Ernest Hemingway in writing The Old Man and the Sea (1952). Because of its overwhelming popularity, Steinbeck reissued The Pearl as a single volume in 1947, and it has enjoyed a healthy readership ever since. Other widely read Steinbeck titles include Cannery Row and The Red Pony, both published in 1945, East of Eden (1952), and the unique travelogue Travels with Charley (1962).
Steinbeck was a prolific and popular writer, but few consider him to be an American writer of the absolute first rank. Whereas most of Steinbeck’s contemporaries—Hemingway and William Faulkner, for example—wrote in clear and consistent styles, making it easy to identify their artistry, Steinbeck never stuck with one style, and his choice of narrative form varied greatly from work to work. Nevertheless, Steinbeck received the Nobel Prize for literature in 1962, and although the quality of his writing suffered a precipitous drop in his final years, he left behind a body of work that marks him as a significant twentieth-century American voice.

T.Y.B.A

 Elizabethan Literature

Summary

England prospered in the second half of Elizabeth's reign, and many of the great works of English literature were produced during these years: art, poetry, drama, and learning in general flourished as the confidence and nationalism Elizabeth inspired spilled from the economic sector to cultural achievements. Elizabeth's reign saw playwrights like Christopher Marlowe, poets like Edmund Spenser, and men of science and letters like Francis Bacon. The era also saw the beginning of William Shakespeare's work. Many of the writers, thinkers and artists of the day enjoyed the patronage of members of Elizabeth's court, and their works often involved or referred to the great Queen; indeed, she was the symbol of the day. The "Elizabethan Age," generally considered one of golden ages in English literature, was thus appropriately named: these cultural achievements did not just happen to be created while Elizabeth was on the throne; rather, Elizabeth's specific actions, her image, and the court atmosphere she nurtured significantly influenced--even inspired--great works of literature.

From the beginning of her reign, Elizabeth was always a major patron of the stage, and drama flourished under her support. In the 1560s, the first blank verse tragedies appeared, ultimately giving rise to an art form that remains heavily studied today. In 1562, one of the earliest of these blank verse plays, Gorboduc, was performed for the Queen.

Initially, a certain amount of class conflict arose over the production of plays, as the puritanical Elizabethan middle class tried to shut down the London theaters on the basis of their "immorality." Thus, under major pressure, the Mayor of London attempted to close all of the city's theaters in 1580. The Privy Council, citing Elizabeth's fondness for plays, prevented this measure from taking place, although they did allow the crowded theaters to be shut down in times of epidemics. Elizabeth, who liked to invite theater companies to her palaces, was against shutting down the theaters because she wanted them to have fully practiced their plays before bringing them to her. As a result, plays became more socially respectable, and by the 1570s and 1580s, exclusive boys' schools like St. Paul's and Merchant Taylor's integrated the performance of both English and Latin plays into their curriculum, initiating the custom of the school play. The Queen even watched some of these school plays herself. In 1595, Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream was performed at Greenwich palace during the marriage celebration of Burleigh's granddaughter. The play contained several references to Elizabeth and her court, especially to the water-pageant Leicester had put on for Elizabeth at Kenilworth Castle in 1575. Then at Christmastime while Essex was gone on the campaign in Ireland, Elizabeth saw a performance of Shakespeare's Twelfth Night.
Elizabeth herself was known for being a very good dancer and a particularly talented musician. Although she only played for her closest friends, she spent considerable time perfecting her renditions of several of the more difficult pieces of the day. Once her practicing was overheard by an envoy from Mary Queen of Scots who, much to Elizabeth's pleasure, admitted that Mary Stuart, though "good for a Queen", was not nearly the musician Elizabeth was.
Edmund Spenser, whose patron was none other than Leicester himself, often drew from the lives of the big celebrities of the day as subject matter for his poems. In a 1579 poem, for instance, he subtly hints at Leicester's secret marriage to Elizabeth's cousin, Lettice Knollys. Spenser's famous Faerie Queene contains multiple references to Elizabeth, who appears allegorically as several characters, including the Faerie Queene herself. Other international figures, including Philip II, Alencon, Mary Queen of Scots, and Leicester are represented as well.

Commentary

It may seem odd that the Mayor of London so opposed the theater houses: in our own day, drama is considered a bastion of high culture; indeed, many people prefer TV or movies, as they contain more "action," more sensation and excitement; why would anyone want to ban the comparatively staid and civilized genre of theatrical drama? In the Elizabethan age, however, plays were the TV or movies of the time. In a day when there was not much entertainment, drama provided one of the few avenues of diversion and was wildly popular. Because the lower-class masses were illiterate, plays appealed especially to them. Thus, tension over the theaters revolved around a class conflict: the well-to-do middle class, obsessed with hard work and religion, hated plays, viewing them as a source of idleness. Moreover, because the lower classes often skipped church in order to arrive early to the theatres and secure a good view of the stage, the middle classes deemed the theatres ungodly. In fact, the situation regarding Elizabethan plays is not unlike the current state of affairs in the modern United States, where various groups busily blame many social ills on violence and other inappropriate behavior seen on TV. The Elizabethan middle classes and their religious spokespeople thought the violence and inappropriate behavior seen in the plays of Marlowe and Shakespeare would twist the minds and behavior of the population, leading them to violence and vice. Today, of course, these plays are considered among the greatest literary works of all time.

The commoners, however, had an ally in Elizabeth and her court. The leisured aristocratic classes had plenty of free time to fill, and most found plays delightful. Elizabeth was particularly fond of inviting theater companies to perform at her palaces during holidays, and these performances increased the theatre companies' repute. The dramatic presentations before the royal court became an important social event, and Elizabeth even proudly brought ministers from other countries to see them, in order to show off the achievements of English culture. Elizabeth, never the religious fanatic, refused to listen to the Mayor of London's claims that playwrights and actors were God's enemies. Yet the middle class never warmed to the theatre, and this gave playwrights a unique audience with which to contend: rather than writing for people of a continuous spectrum of backgrounds, they were writing for two groups separated by a huge gulf, the lower-class commoners and aristocracy. The plays thus have plots that could be appreciated by the relatively unschooled "groundlings," (those who could not afford real seats stood on the ground in front of the stage), but also are filled with allusions and literary references to delight the well-educated aristocracy of Elizabeth's court. This complexity of audience is part of the reason for the depth and complexity of the Elizabethan plays.

Edmund Spenser's poetry today seems a description of impossible fantasy scenes. However, a major inspiration for these faerie realms was the glittering splendor he saw in Elizabeth's court. We might also think that his emphasis on knights and jousting is another manifestation of fantasy; yet these, too, had their basis in Elizabeth's court: although gunpowder had put an end to the era of armored knights carrying lances on horseback in real battles, jousting and tournaments were much alive as forms of entertainment for Elizabeth and her aristocracy.

M.A.

The White Tiger Summary

The entire novel is narrated through letters by Balram Halwai to the Premier of China, who will soon be visiting India.
Balram is an Indian man from an impoverished background, born in the village of Laxmangarh. Early on, he describes his basic story: he transcended his humble beginnings to become a successful entrepreneur in Bangalore, largely through the murder Mr. Ashok, who had been his employer. Balram also makes clear that because of the murder, it is likely that his own family has been massacred in retribution.
In Laxmangarh, Balram was raised in a large, poor family from the Halwai caste, a caste that indicates sweet-makers. The village is dominated and oppressed by the “Four Animals,” four landlords known as the Wild Boar, the Stork, the Buffalo, and the Raven. Balram's father is a struggling rickshaw driver, and his mother died when he is young. The alpha figure of his family was his pushy grandmother, Kusum.

Balram was initially referred to simply as “Munna,” meaning “boy," since his family had not bothered to name him. He did not have another name until his schoolteacher dubbed him Balram. The boy proved himself intelligent and talented, and was praised one day as a rare “White Tiger” by a visiting school inspector. Unfortunately, Balram was removed from school after only a few years, to work in a tea shop with his brother, Kishan. There, he furthered his education by eavesdropping on the conversations of shop customers.
Balram feels that there are two Indias: the impoverished “Darkness” of the rural inner continent, and the “Light” of urban coastal India. A mechanism that he dubs the “Rooster Coop” traps the Indian underclass in a perpetual state of servitude. It involves both deliberate methods used by the upper class and a mentality enforced by the underclass on itself.
Balram’s father died from tuberculosis in a decrepit village hospital, where no doctors were present due to abundant corruption within all the government institutions in the Darkness. After the father’s death, Kishan got married and moved with Balram to the city of Dhanbad to work. There, Balram decided to become a chauffeur, and raised money to take driving lessons from a taxi driver.
Once trained, Balram was hired by the Stork - whom he crossed path with coincidentally - as a chauffeur for his sons, Mushek Sir (known as the Mongoose) and Mr. Ashok. Officially, Balram was the “second driver,” driving the Maruti Suzuki, while another servant, Ram Persad, drove the more desirable Honda City.
As a driver in the Stork’s household, Balram lived a stable and satisfactory life. He wore a uniform and slept in a covered room which he shared with Ram Persad. When Ashok and his wife, Pinky Madam, decided to visit Laxmangarh one day, Balram drove them there, and thus had a chance to visit his family. They were proud of his accomplishments, but Kusum pressured him to get married, which angered him since that would cede what he saw as his upward mobility. He stormed out of the house and climbed to the Black Fort above the village, spitting from there down upon the view of Laxmangarh far below.
Balram describes at length the corrupt nature of politics in the Darkness. A politician known as the Great Socialist controls the Darkness through election fraud. The Stork’s family, involved in shady business dealings in the coal industry, must regularly bribe the Great Socialist to ensure their success.

As part of these political maneuverings, Ashok and Pinky Madam made plans to go to Delhi for three months. When Balram learned that only one driver would be brought with them, he spied on Ram Persad to discover that the man was secretly a Muslim who had lied about his identity to gain employment. Once his secret was out, Ram Persad left, and Balram was brought to Delhi as the driver of the Honda City.
Balram considers Delhi to be a crazy city, rife with traffic jams and pollution, and with illogically numbered houses and circuitous streets that are difficult to navigate. Ashok and Pinky Madam rented an apartment in Gurgaon, the most American part of the city, since Pinky Madam hated India and missed New York. Balram lived in the servant’s quarters in the basement of the building. Teased and ostracized by the other servants, he nevertheless found a mentor in a fellow driver he refers to as Vitiligo-Lips, since the pigment of the man's lips is affected by the skin condition vitiligo. To escape the teasing, Balram chose to live in a tiny, decrepit room swarming with cockroaches.
After a while, the Mongoose returned to Dhanbad, leaving Ashok as Balram’s sole master in Delhi. One night, a drunk Pinky Madam insisted on driving the car, and she accidentally killed a child in a hit-and-run. The next morning, the Mongoose arrived and announced that Balram would confess to the crime, and serve jail time on Pinky Madam’s behalf. Balram was terrified by the prospect of going to jail, but was relieved when the Stork arrived and casually mentioned that they had gotten out of the incident through their police connections.
During this time, Balram's political consciousness grows more intense, and his resentment towards the upper class more violent. Much of the novel traces his growth from a meek peasant to an inflamed individual capable of murder in pursuit of his own success.
A few days later, Pinky Madam found Balram and asked him to drive her to the airport. With this abrupt departure, she ended her marriage to Ashok. When Ashok discovered that Balram took her to the airport without informing him, he furiously attacked the driver, who defended himself by kicking Ashok in the chest.
Dealing with the divorce, Ashok began to live a debauched lifestyle, frequently getting drunk and going out to clubs, while Balram cared for him like a wife. Ashok rekindled a relationship with his former lover, Ms. Uma. Their relationship grew more serious, but he remained anxious about telling his family about her. Meanwhile, on his family's behalf, Ashok frequently collected large sums of money in a red bag, using it to bribe government ministers.
Balram’s family sent a young male relative, Dharam, for Balram to care for. Dharam is a sweet and obedient companion. One day, Balram took Dharam to the zoo, where Balram observed a white tiger in a cage.
Finally deciding to break free of the Rooster Coop, Balram fashioned a weapon from a broken whiskey bottle, and lured Ashok from the car. He rammed the bottle into Ashok’s skull, and then stabbed him in the neck, killing him. He stole the red bag, filled with 700,000 rupees, and escaped with Dharam to Bangalore. In revenge for his actions, the Stork’s family likely murdered all of Balram’s family, though Balram remains unsure of their exact fate. Nevertheless, he chose to commit the murder knowing this was a likely outcome.
In Bangalore, Balram found great success. He launched a taxi service for call center workers, which he calls White Tiger Technology Drivers. By bribing the police, Balram was able to gain influence and make his business successful. Demonstrating how far he has come, he is able to cover up a fatal accident through his connection to the authorities. He considers himself to be a quintessential entrepreneurial success story that represents the future of India, and presents himself as such to the Premier.


Source: http://www.gradesaver.com/the-white-tiger/study-guide/summary