Both heroes and anti-heroes share a common goal in life to find his or her form of happiness by conquering any problem he or she faces to achieve his or her goal. In Todd Phillips’ film, Joker (2019), the audience is challenged to perceive the protagonist Arthur Fleck, a party clown and...

Literature provides us with some of the strongest women in the history of fiction. The connections that form between the reader and the characters can be felt on a deep and personal level. But what does it mean for a female character to be “strong”? What and how can we...

UBC is an alarmingly inaccessible campus. It was when I began my undergraduate degree on crutches, it continued to be when I transitioned to a cane, and occasionally still is now that I am mobility-aid free in my daily life. Navigating the campus as a freshman is difficult enough, but when...

Part of the appeal of studying literature in university is bearing witness to the human experience through the centuries. Victorian gothic literature explores a variety of emerging anxieties, and the emergence of medicine as both a profession and an authority throughout the nineteenth century became intertwined with gothic literature. Laurence...

“The death, then, of a beautiful woman is, unquestionably, the most poetical topic in the world.” — Edgar Allan Poe, The Poetic Principle  Poe’s treatment of women, throughout his stories, can be directly tied back to this claim and its implication that women’s lives are determined and valued based on their...

The English Students’ Association is officially calling for submissions to our sixth annual conference, The Colloquium! This conference features presentations from English undergraduate students, graduate students, and faculty members. The Colloquium offers the opportunity to share your work and discuss ideas with other students and faculty members in the English...

Jacobean dramatist John Webster approached the taboo and the questionable with inexhaustible determination, plunging the contemporary reader into those dark, uncomfortable spaces we prefer to skirt around, never lingering for too long for fear of what we might uncover. For Webster, a preoccupation with the gruesome side of mortality manifests...