This thesis will discuss how Le Guin has adapted both the standard medieval dragon and the dragons in the narratives of Tolkien and Lewis in her own work, The Books of Earthsea.
In this thesis, I explore depictions of fascism in 1930s American literature. Specifically, I analyse William Faulkner’s Light in August, John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, and Sinclair Lewis’s...Show moreIn this thesis, I explore depictions of fascism in 1930s American literature. Specifically, I analyse William Faulkner’s Light in August, John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, and Sinclair Lewis’s It Can’t Happen Here. The former two novels do not explicitly engage with fascism, but aspects of the texts were linked to fascism by their authors. Faulkner retroactively referred to the character Percy Grimm from his book as a fascist, and Steinbeck linked the agriculture sector in California, which features heavily in his novel, to fascism. Lewis engages with fascism directly in It Can’t Happen Here as he envisions a fascist dictatorship in the United States. These texts are relevant today as fascism is not a concept of the past. They can be used to discuss visions of fascism in 1930s American Literature and what fascism may look like in the United States. I use a combination of close reading and the theory provided by Robert O. Paxton in The Anatomy of Fascism, as well as additional sources for necessary historical context to analyse each of the novels. I will argue that while only one of the novels explicitly engages with fascism, all three texts portray fascism to some extent and can be used to identify possible bases of fascist action.Show less
I appeal to analytic functionalism and the ability hypothesis to address the problems posed by inversions arguments. I argue that it is reasonable to reject inversion arguments if we accept a...Show moreI appeal to analytic functionalism and the ability hypothesis to address the problems posed by inversions arguments. I argue that it is reasonable to reject inversion arguments if we accept a combination of analytic functionalism and the ability hypothesis, and that alternative theories are fundamentally more problematic.Show less
This thesis gives an analysis of Sinclair lewis’s Character George Babbitt in his novel Babbitt. The analysis shows that Babbitt is unsatisfied with his life. This is because Babbitt is, unlike...Show moreThis thesis gives an analysis of Sinclair lewis’s Character George Babbitt in his novel Babbitt. The analysis shows that Babbitt is unsatisfied with his life. This is because Babbitt is, unlike Benjamin Franklin, not a self-made man. Franklin set an example of how to live your honourable. Ralph Waldo Emerson created with his essay Self Reliance a view that stated that man should be nonconforming to society. Emerson believed that conforming to society and neglecting personal dreams would lead to an unhappy life. Therefore, this thesis states that Babbitt is also unsatisfied because of his conformism to the materialistic American society of the 1920s.Show less
