Topics for Further Study
Last Updated on July 29, 2019, by eNotes Editorial. Word Count: 178
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Read Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s Frankenstein and watch one or more of the many films that were inspired by the book. How do the book and film differ? How are they the same? In particular, how is the character of the monster portrayed in each?
During the romantic period, opium was cheap and widely available, and people did not know its use could be harmful. Read some works by romantic writers who claimed to be inspired by opium, such as Coleridge’s “Kubla Khan” and Thomas de Quincey’s Confessions of an English Opium-Eater (1822). Write an essay explaining the ways the drug may have affected the writing, citing specific examples from the work.
Read Blake’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience, and write your own poetry in the same style. Or, write an ode in the style of Keats.
Read about the life of Mary Shelley or Jane Austen. Write an essay explaining how they were affected by cultural attitudes and expectations of women in their time period? How did they rebel against those attitudes and expectations?
