Satyajit Reviews

“One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman... It is civilization as a whole that produces this  creature...which is described as feminine.”        – Simone De Beauvoir : The Second Sex (330) John Webster’s masterpiece The Duchess of Malfi is in many ways a remarkable pioneer to the adulterous and tragic heroines found in landmark 19th century novels. The Duchess, the protagonist of the tragedy, is completely an extraordinary figure from the typical Jacobean Era. Webster’s Duchess exercises transgressive, independent sexual agency in defiance of social conventions not through infidelity but through marriage, or more accurately, remarriage. Remarriage in the 17th century was not inevitably a recipe for tragedy. In this play, the Duchess defies social and sexual orthodoxies in ways that are not dissimilar to those of comic widows. Many of the famous critics agree that Webster's second tragedy, The Duchess of Malfi, is a more coherent play than The White Devil. T...

“Morality plays were dramatized allegories of a representative Christian  life in the plot from a quest for salvation, in which  the crucial events are temptations, sinning, and the climactic  confrontation with death.”   - M. H. Abrams (224) Doctor Faustus is the magnum opus of the central Sun of the University Wits, Christopher Marlowe. In the great Elizabethan drama, Marlowe has rightly been called the morning star. This play has been treated as a link between the miracle and morality plays and the illustrious drama of  Elizabethan period. A  morality play is a form of allegorical drama in which the protagonist, representing everyman, is persuaded by personified virtues to choose a divine way of life and shun evil. Marlowe constructed the character of Faustus as an Aristotelian tragedy intended to inspire pity and fear. Christopher Marlowe  (Picture Credit- wikipedia.org) Throughout the sixteenth century morality plays were continued to be perf...

Hello everyone, This is Satyajit Mallick, from Cooch Behar, a small city in the northern part of the Indian state of West Bengal. At present, I'm pursuing my Post Graduation in English Literature from University of North Bengal, Siliguri, Darjeeling. This is my first day of blogging. It's a great platform to share inner thoughts and connect with people and that's why I'm here. This blog intends to provide posts related to English Literature, Book Review, Travelogue and many more things. I would love to share my inner thoughts as well. I convey my heartiest welcome to all of you to my blog. Do let me know if you have any suggestions for me in the comment section below. Thanks for visiting! Happy reading. Jan 19, 2020 Satyajit Mallick NBU, Siliguri