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JamCrackers: are you a Satanist by any chance?

You could always try writing your essay yourself.

Getting a good degree these days seems to be more a question of ingenuity in being dishonest rather than actually doing any work.

I was moved by your post.

I'm not a churchgoer but I have a conception of God as something that suffers with us. I think we should strive for an understanding of God that is more subtle than...

Hmm... with respect, I think you've missed the point. There is a seed of goodness in Gwendolyn that, to begin with, is buried under an inheritance of privilege and complacency. Grandcourt's cruelty...

It doesn't really make sense to pin Anna's downfall on any particular decision she makes, or any single aspect of her personality.

Her destiny can be summed up in one phrase: she was born under...

Indeed.

All higher animals engage in some kind of teaching of their young - whether it's flying, hunting or whatever. If the young were left to rely on their own "experience", they wouldn't last...

"Art is the lie that shows the truth."

What do history books actually teach us? Often, a load of facts that don't add up to a sense of the essence of a period. Of course, the best historians do...

This is something all religions seem to share: the idea of a primordial Fall - also the idea that that the mission of humankind is to reattain the state of grace before that Fall, in which all was...

I'm not an expert on Eastern religion so I can't really answer your question. Also, I haven't read Schopenhauer's works in full. "The World as Will and Representation" is 1000 pages long and I doubt...

Schopenhauer's ideas are largely derived from the Hindu Upanishads and Buddhism. He had an interest in the occult and the paranormal, which influenced his belief that mind or spirit lay at the root...

Note to moderators: I notice that two of my posts have been amalgamated into a single post (#21). Is this normal practice? I wanted to make two separate, easily-digestible points, not cram everything...

Hm. I don't buy that, to be honest. The poem doesn't need completing. The meaning is quite clear: it's making a statement about the poet, not about his partner (or whoever the owner of the plums is)....

Schopenhauer has some subtle ideas about religion... Basically, his argument is that man (well not just man, all life - "Will" to use S's term) took the option of abandoning timeless, desireless,...

The idea of hell is surely that you suffer torment. Having groovy people around you while you suffer torment wouldn't, I'd have thought, be much consolation.

I don't know whether Heaven and Hell...

Funnily enough, now you've written that without line breaks, I prefer it to the original poem. It's more immediate, somehow - in fact this is the first time I've had a clear image of the whole scene...

Music is a more immediate medium than the written word, because it can be apprehended without any effort: you just have to sit there passively. So I think it is easier to be moved by music, because...

Things are a little similar in the UK. I don't see the worst of it, because I work in a middle-class university town where there are a lot of foreigners. Most people here are very cosmopolitan in...

Just because something is artificial does not mean that it does not acquire meaning and power. The whole written language is a mere convenience for communication - but it makes types of communication...

Yes... It depends what you want from literature: truth or reassurance? Be sure you can't have both, and good literature opts for truth every time.

It's not just swearing, either; this question can...

Yes... It depends what you want from literature: truth or reassurance? Be sure you can't have both, and good literature opts for truth every time.

This question can be extended to all abhorrent...

Interesting... I write poetry and, although I use many poetic conventions, I don't use capital letters at the starts of lines. In a way I feel I should, because I'm a bit of a traditionalist; but...

Am I reading right? Are you telling me that people don't swear in real life? I can't imagine a life so sheltered that you really believe this.

Do you not believe that US soldiers in Vietnam used...

OK, I apologise on two counts: for arrogantly assuming you were younger than you are, and for not making it absolutely clear that I live in the UK.

My parents would never have used the word...

Jeez. What's wrong with swearing in a book if it's meant to be an accurate portrayal of how people talk?

To take an analogy with TV: one of my favourite series is "The Sopranos". In case you don't...

Then the reader can f**k off.

I read for the truth, not for some bland, reassuring lie.

I'm bald. Suppose a character in a novel says, "Bald men are ugly", and I feel a bit put out. Should I...