English Literature

Among the most controversial books ever published,  The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn  first appeared in the United States in January 1885. Of all Mark Twain’s books,  Huckleberry Finn  had the largest success upon its initial release from a sales standpoint. It is frequently looked upon as a work of art and as a cultural artifact, not as simply a novel. It was also rejected as being base and racist, being banned from some libraries in 1885, and continuing to appear on lists of commonly banned books to this day. It was one of the earliest works of American literature to be written in the  vernacular  and was an early example of a text relaying heavily on regionalism. Huckleberry Finn, first introduced to readers as a character in Twain’s  The Adventures of Tom   Sawyer , is the first person narrator. The book contains vivid descriptions of life along the Mississippi River, as society existed several decades before the book’s publicati...

American author Harriet Beecher Stowe’s anti-slavery novel  Uncle Tom’s Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly  was published in 1852 after having originally appeared as forty weekly installments in the abolitionist periodical  The National Era  beginning in June of 1851. It was not intended to become a full-length novel, but its huge popularity led a publisher to contact Stowe and convince her to expand it. Though already an active abolitionist, the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 was the impetus for Stowe to write the novel, which became a symbol of the power of literature in social reform.  Uncle Tom’s Cabin  was the best-selling novel of the nineteenth century and was only outsold by the Bible. The novel became a cultural phenomenon, spawning “Uncle Tom Plays” and giving birth to character tropes “Uncle Tom,” “Topsy,” “Simon Legree,” and others. The novel was banned in many of the Southern states and later in the Confederacy. Its popularity helped sprea...

Moby Dick , published by Herman Melville in 1851, is about a captain named Ahab who becomes obsessed with defeating a whale, a whale that has already gotten the best of him.  The story is told by a sailor named Ishmael, and Ismael explains that he goes to sea whenever he feels down. One day, in the port of New Bedford, Ishmael stays at the Spouter Inn.  At the inn, Ishmael encounters a man named Queequeg.  At first, Ishmael is frightened by Queequeg and his tattooed appearance, but soon they become friends. Ishmael then attends a service at the Whaleman’s Chapel where Father Mapple gives a sermon about Jonah and the whale. The next day, Queequeg and Ishmael travel together to Nantucket where they can get on board a whaler.  During the ferry ride to the island, a man makes fun of Queequeg.  Later, this same man falls overboard, and Queequeg is the one who saves his life.We learn more about Queequeg and his religious beliefs when he practices Ramadan a...

Billy Budd Posthumously published in London in 1924,  Billy Budd, Sailor  was the final novel written by American writer Herman Melville. Melville began working on the story in 1888, but the work remained unfinished until the time of his death in 1891. The novel was discovered in 1919 by Columbia Professor and Melville biographer Raymond M. Weaver, who edited the novel for publication. Considered a masterpiece by British critics, the novel became an instant classic when it was published in America. Set during the Napoleonic Wars at the end of the eighteenth century, the story follows Billy Budd, a handsome British seaman with a verbal stutter who is falsely accused of staging a mutiny aboard the HMS  Bellipotent . The novel was adapted as a stage play in 1951, the Broadway production of which went on to win the Donaldson Awards and Outer Critics Circle Awards for best play. In 1962, the play was adapted as a feature film produced, co-written, directed, and sta...

Nectar in a Sieve Set in rural India during a phase of urban development, Indian author Kamala Markandaya’s acclaimed novel,  Nectar in a Sieve  (1954), follows Rukmani, an elderly woman who reflects on the various hardships and triumphs of her lifetime. Married at twelve years old to Nathan, a farmhand, Rukmani struggles to find happiness as she toils in the fields, grapples with unthinkable loss, and deals with sweeping changes in her homeland. The title of the novel derives from the 1825 poem “Work Without Hope” by Samuel Taylor Coleridge.  Nectar in a Sieve  has sold more than one million copies. It has been called “very moving” by  Harper’s Magazine , “a novel to retain your heart” by  Milwaukee Journal , and “an elemental book. It has something better than power, the truth of distilled experience” by  New York Herald Tribune . Narrated by Rukmani, an elderly Indian woman, the story begins in rural India. Rukmani is the educated daught...

Henry James’s novel  The Portrait of a Lady  opens at Gardencourt, the country home of Mr. Touchett. Mr. Touchett and his son, Ralph, are having tea with his friend Lord Warburton when Mrs. Touchett returns home from America. She has their niece Isabel Archer with her. Isabel is a young woman recently orphaned. She has two older sisters, who are each married. Mrs. Touchett hopes that Isabel will learn sophistication and find a husband. Before Isabel’s arrival, Lord Warburton assures Mr. Touchett and Ralph that he is disinclined to marry—unless he meets a particularly interesting woman. Warburton meets Isabel, finds her interesting, and falls in love. He invites her to visit him at home, where she meets his two sisters. She likes all three of them—finding Warburton kind and sensitive in addition to being wealthy and well placed, socially. Later, she hears from her friend, Henrietta Stackpole. Henrietta is an American journalist working in Europe. Isabel invites her ...

Coolie Coolie , by Mulk Raj Anand, was first published in 1936 and helped to establish Anand as one of the foremost Anglophone Indian writers of his day. Like much of his other work, this novel is concerned with the consequences of British Rule in India and with the rigid caste system that structured Indian society. “Coolie” is a term for an unskilled laborer, though it can also be used as a pejorative. Anand’s novel tells the story of Munoo, a young boy from the Kangra Hills in Bilaspur. He is an orphan who lives with his aunt Gujri and uncle Daya Ram ; however, early in the novel they reveal they can no longer support Munoo and insist that he get a job. This is the beginning of a journey that will take Munoo to Bombay and beyond, but it also marks the end of his childhood. With his Uncle, Munoo travels to a nearby town where he finds a job as a servant to a bank clerk, Babu Nathoo Ram. Munoo is mistreated by his master’s wife ( Bibi  Uttam Kaur) but he admires his m...