Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe

Summary / Riassunto

Robinson Crusoe is a young man of about 18 years old who lives with his parents in York, England. Although his father wishes him to become a lawyer and advises him to choose a suitable life, he ignores him and leaves his hometown without saying goodbye. During his trip to London he is caught by a big storm. Robinson is so scared, that he promises himself to obey his parents and to give up his dreams. He thinks briefly about going home, but he can’t stand to be humiliated, so he decides to set sail to Guinea. On the way the ship is attacked by the Moorish pirates and Robinson is sold as a slave in North Africa.

For two years he plans to escape. One day, providing himself with a gun and some provisions, he escapes in a little boat with another slave called Xury. Fortunately a Portuguese ship rescues them, takes them aboard for free and brings them to Brazil. There Robinson takes up a sugar cane plantation. As manpower is needed to work the plantation, Robinson embarks on a ship to Guinea in order to get slaves for the plantation. On the way the ship shipwrecks and all his fellow sailors drown. The ship sinks and he reaches the coast of a desert island. After an initial examination he builds a house for himself near the top of a hill and surrounds it with a wall for protection against animals and intruders. He is able to rescue some provisions, sets a calendar, writes a journal, teaches a parrot some words and domesticates goats in order to have meat provisions during the season of bad weather. He begins to grow corn and make bread. He tries to build a boat and explore the coastal areas, but strong seas force him back to the island. After twelve years of loneliness, Crusoe finds a footstep on the beach, then he finds out rests of human bones. He realises that the island is periodically visited by the cannibals for their rituals. One day a Spanish ship is wrecked off the coast of the island. There aren’t survivors, but this supplies Robinson with new and fresh provisions.

Some years later the cannibals return and Robinson helps one of the prisoners to escape. The savage is named Friday and becomes his servant. Crusoe teaches him English, some Christian religion principles and civil habits. Friday reveals Robinson that the cannibals have Spanish prisoners. When the cannibals come to the island again, Friday and Crusoe rescue two of their prisoners, a Spaniard called Christianus and Friday’s father. In the meantime an English ship arrives. The ship is under the command of mutineers, but Crusoe and Friday make a strategic plan to persuade the mutineers and recover the ship. Crusoe finally sails from the island and after twenty years living on the island reaches England with Friday. Robinson is a rich man (his plantation in Brazil has thrived), he marries and has three children. When his wife dies, he returns to his old island, where he finds out that the mutineers have become a completed colony with men and women from Spanish America. He also thinks about returning to live there one day.

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Othello by William Shakespeare

Summary / Riassunto

The very first scene opens on a street in Venice. It is night. Roderigo, a Venetian gentleman and persistent suitor of Desdemona, and Iago, a 28 year old low ranked officer in Othello’s army, are engaged in a heated discussion over the recent failure to perform the services he has been paid for, that is, to keep Roderigo informed of Desdemona’s affections. Her elopement with Othello The Moor has just come into Roderigo’s attention. Roderigo doesn’t really hate the Moor, while Iago’s hatred for Othello is a real one, especially since the general has refused to appoint him lieutenant and has chosen Cassio, an educated military theoretician of Florence, in his stead.
The pair arrive at Brabantio’s house and inform him that his “white ewe”, Desdemona, has gone with the Moor. The Venetian Senator calls for lights, checks Desdemona’s room and, indeed, founds that she is gone.
On another street in Venice Othello, Iago and several attendants appear bearing torches. Iago now attempts to goad Othello into anger against Brabantio, stressing Brabantio’s vilifications of the Moor and his power in the senate. Othello’s reaction is one of calm and dignity. Lights are seen in the darkness as Cassio and several officers with torches arrive. Iago warns Othello to retreat and hide. Othello proudly refuses and states confidentially “ My parts, my title and my perfect soul / shall manifest me rightly”. At this point, Brabantio, Roderigo and armed officers arrive on the scene. Brabantio demands Othello’s arrest, but patiently and with great dignity Othello assures Brabantio that he has no intention of resisting and agrees to answer his charges.
It is still the same night. In the Duke’s council chamber, the Duke and senators discuss various conflicting reports received from the navy. Othello and Brabantio enter the chamber and Brabantio informs the Duke that his daughter has been” abused, stol’n…,and corrupted” by Othello. Othello agrees that he has taken Brabantio’s daughter, but rather than deny the crime, he wisely stresses his virtues, his skill in combat and suggests to call Desdemona to speak before her father. He also offers to recount his courtship. At the conclusion of Othello’s story, Desdemona appears and confirms that she has married Othello through her free choice. Brabantio, thus still unreconciled to his daughter’s marriage, asks the Duke to move on the business of the state. The Duke appoints Othello Commander-in- Chief for the military defence of Cyprus.

Some weeks have passed. The action moves on to Cyprus. Cassio has arrived in Cyprus, Othello, who has been given the full powers of governor of the island, is still at sea. Desdemona’s ship has arrived. She is accompanied by Iago, Roderigo, and Emilia, Iago’s wife. At last Othello arrives. He embraces Desdemona and expresses his supreme happiness at this moment of reunion.
The night of the public festival – to celebrate the destruction of the Turkish fleet – Othello exhibits his wisdom as commander of the army and leaves with his wife and attendants early. During their watch, Iago invites Cassio to a “stop of wine” and Cassio, caught up by the spirit of the feast, accepts. He then has a quarrel with Roderigo, Montano intervenes and Iago slyly directs Roderigo to run off and rouse the town. Othello arrives at once and charges Iago to identify the trouble-maker. Iago informs him about the fight and is ordered to placate any Cypros who have been disturbed by the commotion. Othello is especially concerned about restoring order in Cyprus now that the war with the Turks is over, so he has no other choice than dismiss Cassio, even though he loves him. Cassio is distraught by the public loss of his reputation and Iago advises him to get his post back through Desdemona’s influence.

In the morning Cassio asks Emilia to arrange an interview with Desdemona. In the garden of Othello’s castle Cassio implores Desdemona to take swift action in his behalf. She assures Cassio that she will plead his cause as if it were her own. Towards the end of the conversation, Othello and Iago are seen approaching. Cassio is too embarrassed to face the General he has offended and abruptly takes his leave of the lady. This aids Iagso’s machinations from the start. Iago, by subtle insinuation, imparts his suspicions of Desdemona’s adultery to the General, who asks him to tell him if he perceives anything more and to set his wife Emilia to observe Desdemona. He is certain that Iago knows more than he is willing to tell. The psychological stress to which Iago has submitted him now, has its physical effects. He has headache and Desdemona offers him a handkerchief to bind his forehead. Othello drops it and it is retrieved by Emilia, and then taken by Iago, who will plant it in Cassio’s lodging. Othello’s capacity for judgement has deteriorated. Reason is less able to guide him as his passion takes over. Iago claims that he has seen Cassio wipe his beard with Desdemona’s handkerchief, giving Othello the proof of Desdemona’s treachery. Othello, totally convinced of Desdemona’s guilt, is determined to kill her and asks Iago to get him poison. But Iago suggests a more symbolic gesture: “Strangle her….in the bed she hath contaminated.”. Othello is pleased with the justice of this method.

After supper, that night, he orders Desdemona to go to bed, to dismiss Emilia, and to await his return. When he enters the room, he suffocates Desdemona, declining to shed her blood or scar “that wither skin of hers than snow / And smooth as monumental alabaster”, then draws the curtains around Desdemona’s corpse.
Meanwhile on a street of Cyprus Iago and Roderigo are preparing to ambush Cassio. In the fight Cassio is wounded and Roderigo dies. Emilia is sent to inform Othello and Desdemona of the disaster, but when she comes to the castle, she finds her mistress dying. Othello explains the cause of the murder and mentions the handkerchief, Emilia understands the whole plot and tells Othello the truth, then she is stabbed by her husband and dies in the final act. Too late Othello learns that his suspicions are unfounded. Othello dies, a self-murderer, declaring that he was “one not easily jealous”, but “ perplex’d in the extreme”.

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To the North by Elizabeth Bowen

Summary / Riassunto

To the North was published in 1932 and is Elizabeth Bowen’s fourth book. It is a tragedy that centres on the life of two young women in 1920s London.

Cecilia Summers, a widow aged only 29, lives in London with her sister-in-law Emmeline. Cecilia loves travels and Emmeline owns a travel agency, she’s very proud of her job. They get on well, but they both realize that the refuge they have comfortably built is “a house built on sand”.

For some reason, Cecilia decides, reluctantly, to get married to Julian Tower, 39 years old, a kind but passionless man and Emmeline starts a relationship with Mark Linkwater, a young cad. The friendship between Cecilia and Emmeline comes to an end, and so does their comfortable ménage.

The love-affair between Emmeline and Mark is secret. At first, Emmeline yields to Mark’s terms and accepts that their relationship will not end up with a marriage. But the situation pains her, and the relationship comes to an end. When they meet at a dinner, they seem to get on well and Emmeline proposes Mark, who doesn’t drive a car, to take him home. Emmeline is very upset, lost in her thoughts, and she drives very fast. They have a car crash and die. Mark had just made her a marriage proposal.

The value of the book is to be found in Bowen’s ability to reveal the deep motives that influence human choices and behaviour. Especially the female characters have an interesting psychological depth and Bowen is very good at bringing out the emotional recesses and torments.

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Emma by Jane Austen

Summary / Riassunto

Emma was published in 1816; the author, Jane Austen, wrote it in fifteen months. It is a brilliant comedy about love, or we should say it is about marriage. But with Jane Austen marriage is never a simple matter of social behaviour, it is much of an ordeal, since it is hard to find any character in her novels who succeeds in getting to marriage without facing a series of difficulties before. This is why Emma is referred to as “the happiest of love stories, the most fiendishly difficult of detective stories and a matchless repository of English wit”, as the critic and writer Ronald Blythe points out.

The protagonist of the novel, Emma, is a young girl who is presented to the reader as a vital and witty and beautiful girl devoted to the follies of youth, since she “had lived nearly twenty-one years in the world with very little to distress or vex her”. She lives with her father, old Mr. Woodhouse, a timid and anti-social man who hates all change, at Hartfield (let’s take note of the names, by-words that contain a piece of information about the soul of characters and places). Her favourite hobby is to ordeal matching and marriages between her friends. She has already succeeded in getting her governess, Miss Taylor, and Captain Weston married, and other marriage ordeals and love affairs – Harriet and Mr Elton, Jane Fairfax and her secret engagement with Mr. Frank Churchill, for example – are to follow.

From the very beginning, it is clear to the reader that Emma and Mr Knightley, the brother of Emma’s sister’s husband and an habitué of Emma’s house, are perfectly suited for each other, but Emma is only interested in other people’s marriage, not in her own, and her progression towards self-consciousness is also a progress towards independence from her selfish father and the dissatisfaction she hides behind her liveliness. So, Emma is also a story of self-deceit and self-discovery.

After a long series of misunderstandings, errors, intrigues coups de théâtre that discover the protagonists’ true feelings, the unconscious unity Emma and Mr Knightley have takes the right direction and the reader is finally given “the perfect happiness of the union”.

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Pamela by Samuel Richardson

Summary / Riassunto

This novel – appeared in 1740 in two volumes with the title of Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded – was an immediate success, we should say a best-seller, and it originated a sort of Pamela rage: everybody read it and Pamela motifs were used on teacups or fans. It is written in the form of letters, that appeared one after the other and were supposed to be from Pamela. This characteristic allowed all the ladies and girls that followed the story of Pamela to try and persuade his author, Samuel Richardson, to make Pamela do what they wanted and asked for.

Samuel Richardson was a printer by trade and when he composed this novel he was already 50. With this book he proposes an acute examination of the human heart and of social customs. The story is very simple: a good girl, Pamela, is rewarded for her virtue (let’s consider the complete title of the novel). Pamela Andrews is a serving maid; when her mistress dies, she is pursued by the lady’s son, Mr. B, who tries to seduce her “by all manner of temptation”, using all his power as a man, an employer, and a member of the upper class. But Pamela is honest, and she repels all the temptations of Mr. B’s, with “many innocent stratagems to escape the snares laid for her virginity”. At the end, the young girl’s virtue is rewarded and the wedding of Mr. B and Pamela comes at last. But it is not meant as the end of the story, but as a beginning of the life of the protagonists and also a continuation of their choices.

Pamela has always been a controversial novel. Many exalted its liveliness and morality, but there were also those who condemned it as low and vulgar and undignified. Anyway, it was certainly a revolutionary work, and it greatly influenced not only English writers, but also European ones. An important aspect of the book is its language. Since the letters are supposed to be written by Pamela herself, they show a country style. The heroin writes “to the moment”, and she uses a good number of common expressions, even vulgarisms, and when we consider the novel as a whole with all the characters it contains we pick up a mix of different languages, also according to the different social status each characters belongs to.

Pamela is not a simple character as she might seem. She is the result of her social position as a servant and a girl. She rebels against the code that, at that time, used to indicate lower-class girls not to set any value on their chastity and morality. When she refused Mr. B’s attacks, she does not consider that marriage will be the logical outcome of her honest behaviour, she is too conscious of her social position. It is the reader that first sees the marriage as the right end of the story, because it is the only way a relationship of equality between Pamela and Mr. B can be fulfilled, thus acknowledging the values of Pamela as a person, regardless of her social position.

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Nineteen eighty-four by George Orwell

Summary / Riassunto

George Orwell can be considered as a modern champion of the great tradition English literature has always had in satire. In fact, Orwell’s satire is often compared with Swift’s.

But in this novel, Orwell’s last work, satire is only an exterior element that gives the reader the framework for a story of a human rebellion, that of the protagonist Winston Smith against the Party. Winston’s attempt is not successful and also in this failure of his a political thought is to be found.

The title of the book, 1984, refers to the year in which Orwell imagines that his story happens. He imagines a totalitarian state, where everything and everyone are controlled by the Party that brainwashes people using slogans such as “war is peace, freedom is slavery, and ignorance is strength”. According to Orwell’s vision, in the year 1984 the world is divided into three great powers: Oceania, Eurasia, Eastasia, that are always at war. In Oceania society is rigidly divided into classes, and at the top of the Party there is the Big Brother, a character that was inspired by Stalin.

The Party is the master and the governor of the whole Oceania, its rule is guaranteed by four ministries: the Ministry of Peace deals with war, the Ministry of Love is in charge of law and order, the Ministry of Plenty deals with scarcities, and the Ministry of Truth deals with propaganda. Their power is absolute and thanks to scientific devices they control every action, thought, word of every single man.

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A Passage to India by Edward Morgan Foster

Summary / Riassunto

This novel was written in 1924, it is generally considered as one of the masterpieces of modern literature and has sold almost a million copies. His author was born in London in 1879, during the so-called Victorian Age, and attended the King’s College in Cambridge together with Keynes and Bertrand Russell. As an author, he belongs to the generation of Virginia Woolf, Joyce, Lawrence and shared the ideals and themes of the “Bloomsbury group”, that is liberalism, the critics against the hypocrisy of the Victorian society and, on the contrary, the exaltation of other and more authentic cultures. All these themes find their best expression in A Passage to India, which is set in India at the beginning of the XXth century, when India was a British colony.

The protagonists are a Muslim doctor and a young English professor who is disapproved of by the other British living there because of the broad-mindedness and sympathy he shows towards the native people. When two British ladies arrive, the reaction of the community is at first a positive one: all the racial contrasts disappear and life in the village becomes easier and more tolerant. But it is just an illusion, because a mysterious and prosaic accident makes all the ancient difficulties in relationship and mutual trust between the British and the Indians come to life again; harmony is lost.

Miss Quested is on a visit from England to the man she is expected to marry, she is really interested in understanding the Indian culture and way of life, but the British community is not so happy with her attitude. After an excursion to the Caves with a young Indian doctor, Doctor Aziz, she comes back alone, upset and distressed. This makes all the British think something serious has happened and they follow their very strong prejudice against the possibility of contact between the British and the Indians. Thus the Indian doctor is arrested on a charge of attempted assault, and things arrive till the trial.

It is then that the story changes and the reader is asked to consider facts from another point of view. Miss Quested, in fact, withdraws her accusation and the trial ends with the doctor who is set free. A possible explanation is that she had been the victim of an hallucination or perhaps of such a deep prejudice that she could not overcome. For sure we can say that the friendship between Miss Quested and the Indian doctor fails because of a misunderstanding. The psychological dimension is more important than the social/historical/political one in this novel.

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Macbeth by William Shakespeare

Summary / Riassunto

Macbeth, the Thane of Glamis, and Banquo have just defeated the allied forces of Norway and Ireland, they are talking when three witches appear and address to Macbeth. The first witch tells he will be “Thane of Glamis”, the second witch tells he will become “Thane of Cawdor”, and the third that he will “be King hereafter”. Macbeth appears to be stunned to silence, so it is Banquo who challenges them. The witches inform Banquo that he will father a line of kings, though he himself will not be one. While the two men wonder at these pronouncements, the witches vanish, and a messenger from the King arrives and informs Macbeth of his newly bestowed title: Thane of Cawdor. The first prophecy is thus fulfilled.

Immediately, Macbeth begins to dream about becoming king and writes to his wife about the witches’ prophecies. So, when King Duncan decides to stay at the Macbeths’ castle at Inverness, Lady Macbeth plans to murder him and secure the throne for her husband. Lady Macbeth succeeds in persuading her husband and, on the night of the king’s visit, Macbeth kills Duncan. This is only the first of a series of crimes, in fact they also kill the king’s guards.

Macbeth assumes the throne as the new King of Scotland, but Duncan’s sons, Malcom and Donalbain, escape and want to take their revenge. Moreover, Macbeth is uneasy also for the prophecy about Banquo so he invites him to a royal banquet and discovers that Banquo and his young son, Fleance, will be riding out that night. He hires two men to kill them. Later, at the banquet, Banquo’s ghost enters and sits in Macbeth’s place. Only Macbeth can see the ghost; the other guests panic at the sight of Macbeth raging at an empty chair, until a desperate Lady Macbeth orders them to leave.

Macbeth, disturbed, visits the Three Witches once more. They conjure up three spirits with new warnings and prophecies, for example to “beware Macduff,” but also that “none of woman born shall harm Macbeth”. Since Macduff is in exile in England, Macbeth assumes that he is safe and puts to death everyone in Macduff’s castle, including Macduff’s wife and their young children.

On her turn, Lady Macbeth gets crazy because she cannot stand the weight of her crimes. She sleepwalks and tries to wash imaginary bloodstains from her hands, all the while speaking of the terrible things she knows. In England, Macduff is informed that the castle has been taken and his wife and children have been murdered, so together with Malcolm, the assassinated king’s son, he organizes an army against the Castle. Lady Macbeth commits suicide. Because of the prophecy that he cannot be killed by any man born of woman, Macbeth thinks he has no reason to fear Macduff, but he’s wrong. Macduff, in fact, says that he was “from his mother’s womb” and was not “of woman born” and thus, although too late, Macbeth realizes that he has misinterpreted the prophecy. After Machbeth’s death, Malcolm is placed on the throne.

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The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer

It is a collection of stories that come after a prologue. A company of thirty people are leaving on a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Thomas at Canterbury and they meet at the Tabard Inn in Southwark. The host, Harry Baily, proposes that each of them should tell two stories on the way to and two on the way back, a proposal that is readily accepted. Then, the tales follow accompanied by short “links” which string them together and carry on the design of the Prologue. The Prologue is considered the most important part of the work and contains superb portraits of the various pilgrims, forming a delightful gallery of English medieval society. All classes, except the highest and the lowest, are represented. There is the knight, the Squire, the Prioress, the Monk, the Wife of Bath, the poor Parson, the Ploughman, the Carpenter, the Miller, and many other characters and they are all portrayed with extraordinary vividness, humour and verve.

Characterization is an attempt to describe the medieval middle class with its positive and negative aspects. Let’s take the knight. It is the first character to be introduced and is, in a sense, a traditional character, the man of continuity with the past who aims at keeping order and respecting the idea of chivalry.

The portrait of the Knight’s son, the Squire, is quite different. Their different set of values is underlined with irony and whereas the father represents nobleness, the son embodies the pursuit of personal interest.

A female equivalent of the knight is provided by the Prioress, daughter of nobility, fascinated by manners as a sign of distinction, much more important than matters. With her Chaucer uses humorous hints that become open satire when it becomes evident that the pity she directs to animals would hardly reach Christians and human beings.

The Monk is an ambiguous character too. Instead of following the rules of order and respect, as his social role would request him to, he only cares about himself. His portrait is bitter and the denunciation of his abuses makes him repulsive, without the humorous traits we find with the prioress. His physical traits reveal his greed and his capacity of exploiting others.

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A Room with a View by E. M. Forster

Lucy Honeychurch, a young upper middle class woman, visits Italy under the charge of her older cousin Charlotte. At the Pensione Bertolini, in Florence, they are given rooms that look into the courtyard and not out over the river Arno. Lucy is disappointed since she wanted a room with a view. Mr. Emerson, a fellow guest who is there with his son George, generously offers them their rooms. Although Charlotte is offended by Mr. Emerson’s lack of tact, she finally accepts the swap, thanks to the intervention of Mr. Beebe, another guest of the pension and an Anglican clergyman. It is Mr. Beebe who, realizing how an avid pianist Lucy is, predicts that someday she will live her life with as much gusto and passion as she plays the piano.

Lucy’s visit to Italy is marked by several encounters with the Emersons. Their manners are awkward, but Lucy likes them. One day, in Piazza della Signoria Lucy witnesses a murder. One man is stabbed and Lucy faints. It is George who catches her. Till on a trip he kisses her, much to her surprise. She keeps the secret, but a second kiss follows on an afternoon trip to the countryside and this time Charlotte sees everything. The next day the two women leave for Rome, before Lucy can bid goodbye to George.

The second half of the book centers on Lucy’s home in Surrey, where she lives with her mother, Mrs. Honeychurch, and her brother, Freddy. A man she had met in Rome and had already refused, the snobbish Cecil Vyse, proposes to her for the third time, and she accepts. He disapproves of her family and the country people she knows, finding them coarse and unsophisticated. Things get complicated when the Emersons arrive as the new tenants of a small villa available for rent in the town. Lucy tries to play down the situation, but on a Sunday, after a tennis match, Cecil starts reading a novel that tells of a love scene that is very much alike the scene of the kiss George gave Lucy in Florence. Since the author of the book is Miss Lavish, a woman who stayed at the pension in Florence with Lucy and Charlotte, Lucy realizes that her cousin Charlotte must have told her about the kiss. Anyway, this reading gives George the inspiration, and he kisses Lucy again. She tells him to leave, but George insists that Cecil is not the right man for her. Lucy sees Cecil in a new light, and breaks off her engagement that night, even if her plan is not to marry George but to leave and travel to Greece with some elderly women she met in Italy. By chance she meets old Mr. Emerson, who insists that she loves George and should marry him, because it is what her soul truly wants. He succeeds in making Lucy realize he is right, and though she must fly against conventions, she marries George. The novel ends with the happy couple staying together in the Florence pension again, in a room with a view.

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