Subject That Encourages Innovation In Written Form

Literature is a single subject that does not abide by any laws, rules, or restrictions. Instead, it encourages innovation in written form, valuing the unconventional disciplines of approaching life through storytelling, a medium that serves to expand on the human experience. Philosopher J.P Satre emphasizes this in his essay defining literature, with the assertion that “reading is a free dream”. Countless movements reinforce Sartre’s remark, from Romanticism, which glorifies nature, Neoclassicism, which gives history its color from black and white by molding stories with a factual basis, and my personal favorite, Modernism, that authenticates the deeper realms of consciousness with literary experimentation and shrewd wordplay. My passion for the literary arts was set in stone after discovering these movements; they come as bursts of creativity in time to evolve literature into something greater, to alleviate human ignorance, enjoining me in learning life lessons and of morality in liberty.

My admiration for prose, poetry and plays stems from their power to move me, from O.Wilde’s “The Picture of Dorian Gray” inducing fear for my vanity, S.Plath’s heartened “You’re” invoking hopefulness in me in times of despair, to S.Beckett’s tragic-comedy “Waiting for Godot” revealing to me how beauty is all-inclusive by establishing the ironic appeal of boredom. Literature itself is all-inclusive as there is no end to how much can be learned. It discusses history and science, passion and motive, which is why I wish to read into literature further, to broaden my comprehensive knowledge.

A-level English made me aware of the essence of language manipulation in stories for writers to conceive our impressions on a character. Exploring J.Steinbeck’s views on feminism, I came to realize that Ames, the villain of “East of Eden”, was painted as an emblem of his gender-based fears in society, then making it the subject of my coursework. Ames, as a symbol of his fears, became a symbol of my fascination for the message writers desire in putting across their works, whether right or wrong.

What interests me greatly is the connections made between notable literary works. Watching M.Boyd’s adaptation of C.Marlowe’s “Tamburlaine” in the RSC, I noticed how the eponymous hero strives to “turn Fortune’s wheel”, allusive to Lear’s bequeathing of fortune among his daughters and Macbeth’s claiming of fortune through murder. Both Shakespearean heroes and Tamburlaine attempt to overcome nature, but all fail and meet their inevitable demise. Comparing these texts and listening to Oxford’s “Challenging the Canon” podcast opened my eyes to other texts around the world. Translations of H.Murakami and R.Tagore’s works heightened my understanding of culture’s significance in the prose and demonstrated how minuscule English is in the body of literature as a whole. I aspire to investigate the world’s literature to seek comparisons in a more demanding academic environment.

My fondness for analyzing art coincides with my love for English. I realized the shadings of a painting lack disparity from the nuances in a story and how impressionistic art resembles light’s prominence in a thematic setting. Recreationally, I play 3 instruments and explore music, especially those carrying poetic expression. T.S Eliot states the condition of “genuine poetry” is that it can “communicate before it is understood” which applies to both art and music. Volunteering in several fundraising campaigns as part of my DofE award overcame my indifference in exploring the cultures in my community, just as in literature. Assigned to do public speaking in Norway through Erasmus and joining debating society assisted me in conveying my own stance incisively in my essays.

Satre follows his assertion with how literature is a “modulation” of our freedom. It gives me the freedom to explore the worlds that stood the effects of time, to make each of my interpretations and criticisms as valuable as the next and I wish to see where this freedom takes me.