Author: Haley Nagy

The story begins with the worrisome thoughts of a young woman of color living in America. Trish, the narrator, depicts a scene in the Sahara in which, “Vultures circle around you smelling, sensing, your death. They circle lower and lower: they wait. They know. They know exactly when the flesh is ready, when the spirit [...]

[Daddy] By Sylvia Plath The poem starts off by giving the impression that it might follow the pattern of a common nursery rhyme. However, as we read on, it becomes clear that this is a haunting twist on the loving connotation of nursery rhymes. The narrator describes a black shoe that she has been forced [...]

[I Am Waiting] By Lawrence Ferlinghetti “I Am Waiting” is one of several poems from the Beat Movement that addresses this concept of the lost America. The narrator lists an abundance of things that he is waiting for, “a rebirth of wonder/someone to really discover America//the final withering away of all governments//the forest animals to [...]

This poem is split into three parts and it describes an alternative perspective on what it means to be a good American in the 1950’s. Allen Ginsberg is writing from his own personal experience and defies the definition of what “great minds” were in 1950’s America. According to Ginsberg, he watched as the great minds [...]

[A Good Man Is Hard to Find] By Flannery O’Connor This story is a sad representation of violent ageism in our society. From the beginning of the story we see patterns of disrespect toward, “the grandmother”. The very fact that she is not given a name is very telling. I think the true horror of [...]

This story written by Arthur Miller really takes a reader through a wild roller coaster of emotions. My initial impression of the story was that it was a sweet tale about the bonds of fathers and daughters. Although Eddie’s character is controlling from the start, I initially had the sense that his protective instincts and [...]

I have loved reading from a young age, and because of this I was exposed to complex literature very early in life. I remember the first time I read this novel, it was the first text that not only made me sad, but that had a haunting hold on me. The concept of murder of [...]

[The Negro Speaks of Rivers] This poem stood out to me because it gave me this eerie and exciting feeling of an immortal narrator that has witnessed the entire span of the earth’s history. The poem says, “My soul has grown deep like rivers”(2084) This line drew a connection between this soul and the earth [...]

This novel begins with two main characters; Clare and Irene. When beginning this novel it was aparent that Irene has an infatuation with Clare which I interpreted to be romantic initially, yet, I later realized that Irene was studying Clare’s “passing” as a white woman. It is almost as if Irene is studying a robot [...]

Hemingway and Fitzgerald’s stories have something very important in common. Both of these stories challenge the conventional “norm” of families and heterosexual relationships. The two stories are telling the stories of the modern conflicts people faced when family structures and dynamics began to evolve passed the norm. [Babylon Revisited] The story told by Fitzgerald is [...]