I am currently reading “Improvement of the Mind” by Isaac Watts, and at various instances in the book he mentions people who I have a hard time of tracking down. For example, on Page 14: Sobrino is a temperate man and philosopher (...) Or on page 11: Lucidas and Scintillo are young men of this...

From The Fellowship of the Ring, book II, chapter II, page 273: 'And not so many, nor so fair, as when Thangorodrim was broken, and the Elves deemed that evil was ended for ever, and it was not so.' What does "broken" mean here?

It seems like related to history, and the life of Napoleon. I have found this metaphor here

When Macduff's son defends his father's honor when the murderers sent by Macbeth call Macduff a traitor in Macbeth, they wind up stabbing the son: Enter Murderers. FIRST MURDERER: Where is your husband? LADY MACDUFF: I hope, in no place so unsanctified where such as thou mayst find him. FIRST MU...

I'm reading Ted Hughes' "The Smile" (text version), and I'm trying to understand its plotline. More specifically: what's the nature of the scenes wherein the poem's protagonist, the smile, goes through? and how does each scene connects to its subsequent? Here's how I see it, and my explanation fo...

Miroslav Krleža was one of the most important 20th-century Croatian authors. The Wikipedia article about him lists several influences on his work, including "key authors like (...) Proust". However, that statement has no source and there is no similar statement (with or without a source) in the F...