ENG 430/545:
Victorian Masculinities

Topics for Paper #1


Directions: Choose one of the following topics to write about on your first critical paper. For this one, please confine yourself to Carlyle, Tennyson, Bronte, Kingsley, and Newman. Because these are only topics, you will need to find an issue worth arguing about and pose that issue as a question. Once you've identified a question, your general answer to that question can be your thesis. You should support your claims with evidence from the readings. Use MLA format for all citations, including citations from the Web.


1) Vampirism and Desire in Wuthering Heights and/or "In Memoriam."

2) Triangularity.

3) Identification and desire.

4) Violence as bonding.

5) The male community (Abbot Samson).

6) Woman as mediator.

7) Sucking leverets (childhood, infantile desire, etc.).

8) The problem of desire for the original.

9) Property and love.

10) Narrative framing.

11) "Conquest" versus "rule"

12) Newman's ideal of the gentleman and Heathcliff.


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