Most important Works Flashcards
Don Quixote
Spanish novel by Miguel de Cervantes
A middle-aged man named Alonso Quixano, a skinny bachelor and a lover of chivalry romances, loses his mind and decides to become a valiant knight.
https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/donquixote/summary/
CHARACTERS: Sancho Panza
Alonso Quijano
Dulcinea del Toboso
Rocinante
Bachelor Sansón Carrasco
Cide Hamete Benengeli
Ginés de Pasamonte
Clavileño
Cardenio
Pero Perez
Ricote
Antonia Quijana
Don Quixote
The Great Gatsby
1925 novel by American writer F. Scott Fitzgerald
it tells the story of Jay Gatsby, a self-made millionaire, and his pursuit of Daisy Buchanan, a wealthy young woman whom he loved in his youth, told in the view point of Nick Carraway
catch phase Gatsby uses = “old sport”
CHARACTERS:
Jay Gatsby
Nick Carraway
Daisy Buchanan
Myrtle Wilson
Tom Buchanan
Jordan Baker
Meyer Wolfsheim
George B. Wilson
Trimalchio
Mr. Gatz
1984
Dystopian novel and cautionary tale by English writer George Orwell
based on a dystopian vision of the future where the freedom of the individual is subjugated to the conformity of society. The novel focuses on Winston Smith, who works for the Ministry of Truth, a branch of the government responsible for the dissemination of information.
(In an uncertain year, believed to be 1984, civilisation has been ravaged by world war, civil conflict, and revolution. Airstrip One (formerly known as Great Britain) is a province of Oceania, one of the three totalitarian super-states that rule the world. It is ruled by “The Party” under the ideology of “Ingsoc” (a Newspeak shortening of “English Socialism”) and the mysterious leader Big Brother, who has an intense cult of personality. The Party brutally purges out anyone who does not fully conform to their regime, using the Thought Police and constant surveillance through telescreens (two-way televisions), cameras, and hidden microphones. Those who fall out of favour with the Party become “unpersons”, disappearing with all evidence of their existence destroyed.
In London, Winston Smith is a member of the Outer Party, working at the Ministry of Truth, where he rewrites historical records to conform to the state’s ever-changing version of history. Winston revises past editions of The Times, while the original documents are destroyed after being dropped into ducts known as memory holes, which lead to an immense furnace. He secretly opposes the Party’s rule and dreams of rebellion, despite knowing that he is already a “thought-criminal” and is likely to be caught one day.
While in a prole neighbourhood he meets Mr. Charrington, the owner of an antiques shop, and buys a diary where he writes criticisms of the Party and Big Brother. To his dismay, when he visits a prole quarter he discovers they have no political consciousness. As he works in the Ministry of Truth, he observes Julia, a young woman maintaining the novel-writing machines at the ministry, whom Winston suspects of being a spy, and develops an intense hatred of her. He vaguely suspects that his superior, Inner Party official O’Brien, is part of an enigmatic underground resistance movement known as the Brotherhood, formed by Big Brother’s reviled political rival Emmanuel Goldstein.
One day, Julia discreetly hands Winston a love note, and the two begin a secret affair. Julia explains that she also loathes the Party, but Winston observes that she is politically apathetic and uninterested in overthrowing the regime. Initially meeting in the country, they later meet in a rented room above Mr. Charrington’s shop. During the affair, Winston remembers the disappearance of his family during the civil war of the 1950s and his tense relationship with his estranged wife Katharine. Weeks later, O’Brien invites Winston to his flat, where he introduces himself as a member of the Brotherhood and sends Winston a copy of The Theory and Practice of Oligarchical Collectivism by Goldstein. Meanwhile, during the nation’s Hate Week, Oceania’s enemy suddenly changes from Eurasia to Eastasia, which goes mostly unnoticed. Winston is recalled to the Ministry to help make the necessary revisions to the records. Winston and Julia read parts of Goldstein’s book, which explains how the Party maintains power, the true meanings of its slogans, and the concept of perpetual war. It argues that the Party can be overthrown if proles rise up against it. However, Winston never gets the opportunity to read the chapter that explains why the Party took power and is motivated to maintain it.
Winston and Julia are captured when Mr. Charrington is revealed to be an undercover Thought Police agent, and they are separated and imprisoned at the Ministry of Love. O’Brien also reveals himself to be a member of the Thought Police and a member of a false flag operation which catches political dissidents of the Party. Over several months, Winston is starved and relentlessly tortured to bring his beliefs in line with the Party. O’Brien tells Winston that he will never know whether the Brotherhood actually exists and that Goldstein’s book was written collaboratively by him and other Party members; furthermore, O’Brien reveals to Winston that the Party sees power not as a means but as an end, and the ultimate purpose of the Party is seeking power entirely for its own sake. For the final stage of re-education, O’Brien takes Winston to Room 101, which contains each prisoner’s worst fear. When confronted with rats, Winston denounces Julia and pledges allegiance to the Party.
Winston is released into public life and continues to frequent the Chestnut Tree café. He encounters Julia, and both reveal that they have betrayed the other and are no longer in love. Back in the café, a news alert celebrates Oceania’s supposed massive victory over Eurasian armies in Africa. Winston finally accepts that he loves Big Brother.)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nineteen_Eighty-Four#Plot
CHARACTERS:
Big Brother
Winston Smith
Julia
Emmanuel Goldstein
O’Brien
Syme
One Hundred Years of Solitude
novel by Colombian author Gabriel García Márquez
Original language: Spanish
One Hundred Years of Solitude is the story of seven generations of the Buendía Family in the town of Macondo. The founders of Macondo, José Arcadio Buendía and Úrsula Iguarán, leave their hometown after José Arcadio kills Prudencio Aguilar after a cockfight for suggesting José Arcadio was impotent.[15] One night of their emigration journey, while camping on a riverbank, José Arcadio dreams of “Macondo”, a city of mirrors that reflected the world in and about it. Upon awakening, he decides to establish Macondo at the riverside; after days of wandering the jungle, his founding of Macondo is utopic
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Hundred_Years_of_Solitude#Plot
CHARACTERS:
José Arcadio Buendía
Colonel Aureliano Buendía
Remedios Moscote
Úrsula Iguarán
Rebeca
Aureliano José
Santa Sofía de la Piedad
Amaranta
Arcadio
Pride and Prejudice
the second novel by English author Jane Austen
character development of Elizabeth Bennet, the protagonist of the book, who learns about the repercussions of hasty judgments and comes to appreciate the difference between superficial goodness and actual goodness.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pride_and_Prejudice#Plot_summary
CHARACTERS:
Mr. Darcy
Elizabeth Bennet
Mr. William Collins
George Wickham
Charles Bingley
Lydia Bennet
Jane Bennet
Charlotte Lucas
Lady Catherine de Bourgh
Mr. Bennet
Caroline Bingley
Mrs. Bennet
Mary Bennet
Kitty Bennet
Mrs. Gardiner
Georgiana Darcy
Mr. Gardiner
To Kill a Mockingbird
novel by the American author Harper Lee
the novel is a bildungsroman, or coming-of-age story, and chronicles the childhood of Scout and Jem Finch as their father Atticus defends a Black man falsely accused of rape.
CHARACRTERS:
Atticus Finch
Boo Radley
Jean Louise ‘Scout’ Finch
Jem Finch
Dill Harris
Tom Robinson
Mayella Violet Ewell
Robert Ewell
Maudie Atkinson
Alexandra Hancock
Calpurnia
Brave New World
dystopian novel by English author Aldous Huxley
The novel opens in the Central London Hatching and Conditioning Centre, where the Director of the Hatchery and one of his assistants, Henry Foster, are giving a tour to a group of boys. The boys learn about the Bokanovsky and Podsnap Processes that allow the Hatchery to produce thousands of nearly identical human embryos. During the gestation period the embryos travel in bottles along a conveyor belt through a factory-like building, and are conditioned to belong to one of five castes: Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, or Epsilon. The Alpha embryos are destined to become the leaders and thinkers of the World State. Each of the succeeding castes is conditioned to be slightly less physically and intellectually impressive. The Epsilons, stunted and stupefied by oxygen deprivation and chemical treatments, are destined to perform menial labor. Lenina Crowne, an employee at the factory, describes to the boys how she vaccinates embryos destined for tropical climates.
https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/bravenew/summary/
CHARACTERS:
Bernard Marx
Lenina Crowne
Mustapha Mond
John the Savage
Helmholtz Watson
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
picaresque novel by American author Mark Twain
story of Huckleberry Finn’s escape from his alcoholic and abusive father and Huck’s adventurous journey down the Mississippi River together with the runaway slave Jim.
