English Notes
Romantic writing
Learning Goal: I will understand the characteristics of the Romantic/Gothic era and the common
language features used by these authors
Romantic literature is marked by six primary characteristics: celebration of nature, focus o the individual
and spirituality, celebration of isolation and melancholy, interest in the common man, idealization of
women, and personification and pathetic fallacy.
The plot of a romantic novel is generally tied to the deep emotional conflicts of the character.
The romantic novel often employed elements of the spectral, fantastical, supernatural, and
uncanny
IMAGINATION was valued over the ACTUAL
There are two distinct elements to the romantic style to demonstrate in your own writing
- The sublime in romantic/gothic writing
- The power of emotion in romantic/gothic fiction
Sublime: of very great excellence and beauty it is beyond human comprehension
Techniques for Gothic/Romantic Writing
Allusion: a typically brief reference to a person, place, thing, event, or other literary work with which the
reader is presumably familiar with.
Caricature: a device where a writer exaggerates aspects of a subject for satirical reasons
Dialect/colloquialism: an essential part of realism and is a device that involves the writer mimicking the
manner of speaking and everyday language of the characters based on their specific region/area
Foreshadow: hints at events or developments that will come to light later in the novel, it can be direct
or indirect
Imagery: descriptive and figurative language being used to conjure up images (painting with words)
and/or evoke a sensory experience
Metaphor: comparing two things that seem unlike one another without the use of ‘like’ or ‘as’. Aids in
conveying abstract views and ideas
Personification/pathetic fallacy: pathetic fallacy is the attribution of human feelings (emotion) and
response to inanimate objects or animals while personification is giving any human attribute to an
object
Simile: like a metaphor, a simile is a form of comparison involving two seemingly different things,
generally using the words ‘like’ or ‘as’
Symbolism: the use of symbols in literary work, symbols that stand for or suggests something else,
representing something beyond literal meaning. Symbols like fire, rain, light, creature, etc.
Onomatopoeia: words that imitate the natural sound of things
Verisimilitude: likeness to the truth, such as the resemblance of a fictitious work to a real event
The Crucible
Context:
The Salem with trials were a series of hearings and prosecutions of people accused of witchcraft in colonial
Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. More than 200 people were accused, 30 people were found
guilty, nineteen of whom were executed by hanging
The “hunts” were efforts to identify witches rather than pursuits of individuals who were already thought to be
witches. Witches were considered to be followers of Satan who had traded their souls for his assistance. It was
believed that they employed demons to accomplish magical deeds, that they changed from human to animal form
or from one human form to another, that animals acted as their “familiar spirits”, and that they rode through the
air at night to secret meetings and engaged in sexual relationships that were frowned upon by the strict Christian
morals of the time. There is little doubt that some individuals did worship the devil and attempt to practice sorcery
with harmful intent. However, no one ever embodied the concept of a “witch” as previously described.
Moral absolutism: ethical view that distinguish right from wrong. It is the ethical belief that there are absolute
standards against which moral questions can be judged and certain actions are right or wrong, regardless of the
context of the act.
Theocracy: a theocracy is a government operated under divine rule, when government and religion are hand to
hand
Patriarchy: a societal model where men are placed in position of power and affect nearly all decisions and changes
where women are largely excluded
The Crucible
John Proctor:
- The centre of gravity in the heavily religious, small- minded environment of Salem
- Moral gravitas and rejection of unquestioning obedience
- Honest, upright, and blunt-spoken
- Represented as a good man, but with one fatal flaw
John Proctor’s reputation as a prudent and virtuous man belies his sordid affair with his household servant, Abigail
Williams, an act that threatens his standing as a putative leader in the community.
John Proctor agonise over this ruinous sin even as he remonstrates with the townsfolk about the malice, fanaticism
and greed governing their actions. Miller explicitly states this uncomfortable irony in his interpolated commentary
To what extent do you believe John Proctor is to blame for the events of the play ‘The Crucible’?
John Proctor is not to blame for the start of the Salem Witch trials as it was completely unexpected that it would
reach to this extent, however he is at fault for allowing the Salem Witch trials to extend for the duration it did. His
affair with Abigail Williams was completely wrong of him and he is to blame completely for it, but his affair is
separate from the witch trials to start. Abigail Williams is the one to blame as she is the one that cried witchcraft
on every person she saw, as well as threatening girls like her to follow her story. However, John Proctor did allow
his pride and name to take priority over the safety of the town. When Abigail was on trial for false accusations,
John refused to confess about committing adultery to the court to prove that Abigail was doing all this to get rid of
John’s wife, Elizabeth Proctor. Following this, Elizabeth would not have lied about John committing adultery
because she knows how deeply John cared about his reputation. If John was able to put his pride aside and told the
truth of the story, Abigail Williams would not have as much weight as she did when it came to accusing people of
witchcraft, possibly saving many people from being killed and shortening the amount of time she had enough
power to keep the witch accusations going.
Abigail Williams
Abigail Williams is a strikingly beautiful girl, but an orphan, with an endless capacity for dissembling.
John and Abigail’s Affair
Act I Act II Act III Act IV
Reverend Hale:
- In the early going, he is the force behind the witch trials, probing for confessions and encouraging people
to testify
- In tragic fashion, his about-face comes too late – the trials are no longer in his hands but rather in those of
Danforth and the theocracy, which has no interest in seeing its proceedings exposed as a sham
- As his belief in witchcraft falters, so does his faith in the law
- In his change of heart and subsequent despair, Hale gains the audience’s sympathy but not it’s respect
Structure
Intro
Background
Argument (Thesis)
- Thesis example: To what extent does John Proctor’s choosing of honesty and integrity over his own life
challenge or reflect Salem’s beliefs and existence as a puritanistic theocracy?
John Proctor’s choice to uphold his morals and integrity rather than betray his beliefs reflects Salem’s
puritanistic society as he valued upholding their strict religious beliefs over his own life and family.
The Crucible is a 1950’s play written by Arthur Miller as a criticism of the political landscape of America and it’s
conflict with Russia. The play uses Salem Witch Trials, which occurred in the 1600s in Massachusetts, as an allegory
for the rampant false accusations of communism and accompanying hysteria that were occurring at the time of
writing. Salem puritanistic theocracy mirrors the political and social landscape that Miller wanted to critique, and
the protagonist, John Proctor, serves as a symbol of the individual thought and resistance to groupthink that Miller
wanted to promote in the play’s observers. John Proctor’s choice to die, staying true to his own morals and beliefs
despite the societal pressure of the town, challenges Salem’s rigid socal and political ideologies and promotes him
as martyr of the dangers of moral absolutism, and the importance if individual thought. This can be seen through...
Blade Runner
Plot and Key Characters
Rick Deckard
• The film’s protagonist – a retired ‘Blade Runner’ (replicant hunter), bought out of retirement to
hunt down a particularly troublesome group of 4 rogue replicants who have escaped from “off-
world” – the human colonies in space where replicants are sent to be slaves.
• During the course of hunting these 4 replicants, Deckard begins to question the ethics of the
replicant program.
• He begins the story as a selfish, self-involved cop who seemingly sees no value in android life,
but his experiences cause him to develop empathy toward androids and all living things.
• This is for 2 major reasons – one, he meets Rachel, a special experimental replicant who has
been given false memories to make her indistinguishable from a “real” human, and two, the 4
replicants he is hunting, who are also an experimental batch that are closer to human.
• He spends most of the movie questioning himself and the ethics of the replicants, investigating
Tyrell corp for answers.
Eventually, he falls in love with Rachel and, after the events of the film, they leave the city together.
Roy Batty
• Roy Batty, the leader of the renegade Nexus 6 Replicants. Very intelligent, fast and skilled at
combat, and yet learning how to deal with developing emotions. He leads a few of his 'friends'
on what is inevitably a fruitless search for more life.
• He is technically the film’s “antagonist”, though it could be argued that the real villain is actually
Tyrell.
• His final monologue before his death (caused by his expiration; replicants only have 4 year life
spans), ‘tears in rain’, is one of the most well known monologues in movie history.
• It discusses Batty’s realisation that all life is sacred and connected, even those who are different
or opposite to us. This causes him to spare Deckard’s life, even though they had spent most of
the movie trying desperately to kill each other. They are nemeses, and Deckard killed everyone
Batty loved, including his girlfriend, Pris.
• In the end, Batty, a replicant, displayed more humanity and empathy than any of the actual
human characters in the film.
Assessment topic relevance: the concept of humanity, and fate and power over destiny.
Rachael
• Rachael is Deckard's love interest. Part of the problem of her identity is that she doesn't really
have one—at least, not one unique to herself. She's a replicant, and her memories have all been
implanted, copied from Dr. Eldon Tyrell's niece.
• Rachel is highly symbolic of the film’s ethical quandary – what really is the difference between AI
and humanity?
• She struggles with the realisation that her whole life is a lie, and her turmoil highlights the
cruelty of the Tyrell corporation and their lack of care for their creations.
Assessment topic relevance: the role of memory in creating individuality. Her juxtaposition to the
replicants without memory is highly significant to this topic. Her character is also relevant to the
responsibility of the creator to AI life, when combined with an analysis of the Tyrell corporation.
Eldon Tyrell
• The mastermind behind the Tyrell Corporation, which manufactures the replicants and other
artificial life forms, like owls and snakes. He expresses his ethos succinctly: "Commerce is our
goal here at Tyrell. 'More human than human' is our motto." Basically, Tyrell is creating and
enslaving super-humans in order to make money.
• Tyrell embodies the capitalistic or commercial worldview that has taken over in the futuristic
world of this movie. Sure, we don't know exactly what the replicants actually are, but they sure
as heck seem to be more than robots to anyone who takes a moment to interact with them.
Tyrell doesn't see any "soul" in them because he thinking solely in terms of dollars.
• The confrontation between Tyrell and Roy has some other implications, too. By creating life
forms from scratch, Tyrell has basically been playing god, and when Roy approaches him asking
why he can't have more life, it echoes a question a lot of people might like to ask God, or some
kind of higher power.
Assessment topic relevance: responsibility of creator to AI
Others
• Pris – one of the 4 escaped replicants – Roy Batty’s girlfriend. Killed by Deckard.
• Gaff – a fellow Blade Runner who, by the end, is also sympathetic to the replicant’s cause and
lets Rachael live to escape with Deckard.
• Zhora – 1st of the 4 escaped replicants. Killed by Deckard.
• Leon – 2nd of the 4 escaped replicants. Killed by Deckard.
• Sebastian – genetic designer. Worked for Tyrell to create replicants. Killed by Roy Batty.
Themes
AI and our Responsibility to it:
• Blade Runner raises the question of whether a constructed being should count as a person. In
the movie, replicants lack legal rights and are not regarded as human.
• Some viewers speculate that the name "Deckard" may be a deliberate reference, by Philip K.
Dick, to philosopher René Descartes; in any case, one of the replicants in the film, arguing for
her own personhood, uses Descartes' famous quote, "I think therefore I am".
• One of the major themes in Blade Runner is the increasing human mastery of genetic
engineering. This is a theme subtly reiterated by the chess game between J. F. Sebastian and
Tyrell symbolizing the struggle against mortality imposed by God. The Blade Runner FAQ offers
further interpretation of the chess game, saying that it "represents the struggle of the replicants
against the humans: the humans consider the replicants pawns, to be removed one by one”.
• It is also alluded to many times that Tyrell is “playing God”, drawing further attention to the idea
that humans, as the creator of these AIs, have a responsibility to them. It is Tyrell’s lack of care
for the replicants that causes them to rebel.
• The most obvious literary allusion in the film is to Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein.
Like many scholars, the filmmakers evoke a more sympathetic reading of this novel, where the central
view is of the monster as a tragic hero as opposed to a villain. The similarities between Batty and The
Creature are salient. They are both created by the hands of men (thus, both forms of AI) and seek to
exert some agency and control of their fate in the face of great prejudice. Neither had a childhood or
real memories. Both are brilliant, self-educated, insightful, powerful. They both want to have the
agency to pursue happiness but demonstrate ‘their agency in destructive ways’ because the position in
society has been determined. They are slave and outcast without any rights. Society does not
acknowledge their humanity, thus neither has agency or the right to choose their own fate. Hence, they
seek to be masters of their fate through violent retribution.
Blade Runner Theme
The role of memory in creating individuality
