Elizabeth Barrett Browning and Fitzgerald both discern their exploration of the universal human concerns of love, hope and morality according to their own contextual influences. Notably one of the best known piece of American prose fiction, Fitzgerald’s Great Gatsby, critiques the hedonistic lifestyle of the roaring twenties and the failure of the fruitless promises of the American Dream to highlight the illusion of love and hope. Fitzgerald ultimately develops a pessimistic point of view on the materialistic and superficial society presented in the 1920’s, which prevented the ideas of pure love. Elizabeth Barrett Browning however, through her sonnets from the Portuguese, challenges the established patriarchal values of her time by subverting our expectations through the manipulation of the Petrarchan sonnets. Elizabeth Browning presents an idealistic and an optimistic view towards love and hope through sonnets I, XIV and XLIII.
Elizabeth Barrett-Browning’s sonnet sequence Sonnets from the Portugeuse, explores the experence of idealised love in the patriarchal confines of the Victorian era, juxtaposed against F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby, which comments on the unatanability of idealised love due to the corruption of the American dream. Through an exploration of love, both composers subvert societies preconcieved attitutdes to love through the reccurring motif of ‘Plato’s ladder of love’. Barrett-Browning’s poems highlight the realities of a spiritual, connected love, contrasting to Fitzgeralds commentary on the illusionary goals of ‘true’ platonic love in the post WWI hedonistic, materialistic society. Barrett-Browning conveys the Romantic ideals of platonic love, against the prudish rationalism of the Victorian era. The Petrarchan sonnet form has an inbuilt dialectic structure, enabling her to have a progressive narrative, which follows the path of the Platonic system.
“Dear Harriet, I give myself joy of this. It would have grieved me to lose your acquaintance, which must have been the consequence of your marrying Mr Martin.” (Page 52) This scenario conveys Emma’s concern about society as she expresses that she cannot keep friends of lower class than her. Emma’s behaviour reflects her society’s values towards the importance of social order. In this way, Austen criticises yet, by eventually uniting Harriet and Mr Martin in marriage, ultimately reaffirms the harsh divides within the social hierarchy of Highbury, a microcosm which represents the values of Regency England. While Austen questions her society’s views on social order, Amy Heckerling also challenges social
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, a female composer in a patriarchal society that is hi ghly religious and traditional, wrote reluctantly about her love for Robert Barrett Browning throughout her poems. Sonnet XIII specifically reflects on parochial Victorian age values and shows how Barrett Browning does not conform to female expectations as she wrote spontaneously about her obsession with love. Similarly, F. Scott Fitzgerald reveals the consequences of obsession with love and the impact of non-conformity in social and historical contexts through the characterisation of Gatsby, who refuses to conform to expectations of immorality and develops an obsession with this. Thus, the issue of different context and forms is significantly ineffective as the consequences of obsession relatively have the same effect even if the influence was different. Barrett Browning presents positive consequences of obsession as her sonnets, whilst being heavily influenced by religion and spirituality, also
It is this being so tangled in you” (11-12) in the ancient Egyptian love song called “Love of you is mixed deep in my vitals” because the writer also conveys the same message. Overall, both modern and ancient artists exemplify situations of mature love since each need their lover in their lives to feel complete. Immature love is a situation where a person loves the idea of having “love” causing it to be an unrealistic desire. “Been here all along so why can't you see? You belong with me” (12-13) quoted from Taylor Swift’s song “You Belong with Me”, describes her desperation for her crush by trying to persuade him that she is the one for him.
Ne-Yo makes it very clear that the women he is in love with stole his heart by being herself and taking care of herself. This is apparent through the repetition of lines one, two, and three which are “She got her own thing, that’s why I love her, Miss Independent” at the beginning of each stanza in the chorus, which basically make up a majority of the song. His praise for women who are self-determining reveals his motives for writing the song. I think that Miss Independent was meant to encourage women to be successful on their own terms. Often women are seen more as property and an assumption that they must be submissive and less powerful then the men in their lives comes into play and discourages them from following their dreams.
Austen, however, is at tension with her society’s values of education. In Pride and Prejudice, she expresses her disdain for the tradition of accomplishments when Caroline Bingley’s enthusiasm for Mr. Darcy’s ideal list of accomplishments is met with ironic authorial intrusion: “Oh! certainly,” cried [Mr. Darcy’s] faithful assistant, ‘no one can be really esteemed accomplished, who does not greatly surpass what is usually met with.’” Caroline Bingley then proceeds to list an extensive range of arts and wiles that a woman of the era ‘must’ possess to be accomplished. The ideas communicated by Miss Bingley are familiar to the society of the time, and are acceptable values’ regarding the expectations of women, but Austen’s humorous interjection portrays Miss Bingley as overeager and flattering. Miss Bingley is already an established unlikeable character: therefore, any opinions she expresses are treated with equal dislike.
Although not shown explicitly in Act 1 of the play, Ibsen seems to be somewhat critical of the institution of marriage in the 19th century by showing how Torvald, the husband, patronizes Nora, the wife. To Torvald, it may be an expression of love, but he is treating Nora as a child to be coddled. Also, Krogstad persuades Nora to help him in order to keep his job, which shows how easily women were subject to manipulation by the male. Therefore, Ibsen characterizes the institution of marriage in the 19th century as extremely traditional and very oppressive to women. Act I indeed shows Nora as a doll-like character: she is coddled, pampered, and patronized.
The word have is also used to suggest that women are objects to be owned, rather than an equal to love. Don Pedro tells Claudio to cherish his love for Hero, and one interpretation of this is that the intangible idea of love is more important in the 16th century than the woman being loved. Indeed, in Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 116”, he writes “it [love] is an ever fixed mark […] though rosy lips and cheeks, within his bending sickle’s compass come”. Shakespeare is saying that love itself is eternal, but the women (“rosy lips and cheeks”) and their beauty come and go, thus saying love as an intangible idea is more important than the receiver of love.
She cries out in tears that “[John] loved [her], and whatever sin it is, [he] loved [her] yet!” and she pleads for John to “pity [her]” (Miller 24). Abigail is reluctant to acknowledge that their relationship is over; she desires the physical love and lust because she wants more notice. Whether it be negative or not, she still wants