The untimely death of Mercutio, who is one of Shakespeare's original characters, makes me think that he was made to live and die by the dramatist in the process of writing Romeo and Juliet. The aim of this paper is to search for the meaning of the roles of Mercutio to both Romeo and Juliet and the play as a whole. First, Mercutio's lack of information is examined. Although he notices some change in Romeo, he is not informed that Romeo loves Juliet. He understands Romeo loves Rosaline. The more he teases Romeo about Rosaline using sexual metaphor, the more apparent the love of Romeo and Juliet becomes. Second, the relation between Mercutio and Romeo is compared with the relation between Romeo and Juliet. Even though there is no homosexuality between Mercutio and Romeo, Juliet can be regarded as Mercutio's rival because the advent of Juliet changes their male friendship. Finally, the meaning of Mercutio's death in the play is thought in the context of a comedy and a tragedy. The death of Mercutio, who contributes as a comical factor during his life, leads the play to the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet. His death is a starting point of the tragedy.

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There are several images of mole in the dramatic works of Shakespeare. In Hamlet, for example, the "old mole" signifies the ghost of the former king. In Pericles, the act of a mole which casts away earth towards heaven (such earth is called mole-hill) symbolises a rebellion against the tyrant. And in The Tempest, the acute hearing of a mole has humour to make us smile. In this essay have I taken up mole and mole-hill imagery in Shakespeare, and examined the playwright's treatment of them, with special reference to Edward Topsell's The Historie of Foure-footed Beastes (1607), an encyclopaedic handbook of animals published in London. Shakespeare seldom uses images merely as decoration, but obviously uses them to comment on theme and character. The images of mole, however, do not have any important dramatic function, because they are often isolated and individual. They rather reveal Shakespeare himself as a dramatist.

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Oscar Wilde's Salome (French 1893; English 1894) is generally regarded as the most illustrative of Wilde's particular style and the most aesthetic drama of his works. Although over a century has passed since the play was written, Salome continues to be produced or directed by the modern theatre-artists known as 'prodigies.' One must presume that there is a mysterious appeal to Salome, a biblical one-act piece, that is not evident on the surface of the story itself for it to have such an enduring popularity. Here, I analyse why Salome has entranced those theatre-artists all these years by delving into the charm of the play itself by discussing two major aspects of the play. Firstly, I will look at the reasons why Wilde wrote the play in French. Secondly, this paper will analyse three important elements of the play: namely, the action of 'looking'; the symbolism of the moon; and 'the dance of the seven veils.'

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The significance of D.H. Lawrence's letters cannot be overstated from the view point of biographic research. His journey to the New World clearly marks a milestone in his career. The present computer analyses are based on the text file prepared by the authors to investigate his letters sent from the New World in two periods in his life from 1922 to 1923 and from 1924 to 1925 with only a three-month interval. His style in letter writing, increases in income and his idealism are described.

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The aim of this paper is to analyze Rosie's character in Cakes and Ale. Rosie is conspicuous for her brightness and mysterious beauty in spite of her bad behavior. Her bad behavior is based on her instinct. She is always honest with herself and behaves as she pleases. In Cakes and Ale, "I"or narrator Ashenden, recalls her. "I" has memories of Rosie from when he was young and about fifty years later she reappears before him lively. "I" admires Rosie though she betrayed him in past days. Rosie must be the source of the warmth of Cakes and Ale because Maugham evidently loves his heroine and this love suffuses the whole book. In this paper I will try to examine Rosie in two separate appearances in the recollections of "I" and analyze why she attracts "I" and the readers' mind.

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The playwright Brian Friel who was born in Northern Ireland intentionally avoided to write plays about the conflict in the province. However, since the formation of Field Day Theatre Company, he has changed his strategy: Friel offers responses to the problem through art. In his plays Translations and Making History, he applies historical dimensions to assist an effort to understand the current situation in Ulster. In the former, he depicts how Irish language and culture were deprived of by the English in the 19th century and examines the role of language in terms of national identity. In the latter, he centres on a historical figure, Hugh O'Neill, who is regarded as a national hero in Ireland. However, Friel presents O'Neill in a different perspective than the legend and investigates the validity of history. In both plays Friel attempts to define Irishness newly, which is free from partisan myths.

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Throughout the nineteenth century philanthropy was not only a respectable alternatives to idleness but also the very popular vocation which was the leisured woman's outlet for self-expression and a purpose in life. And furthermore it enabled them to contact with the people of other classes and widen their sphere and enlarge their horizon. It gave women, from upper and middle-class women to working women, common experience, compassion, and first-hand knowledge of widespread poverty, inadequate housing condition brought about by industrialization and urbanization. As charity organizations and government institutions provided more and more services, skilled professionals were needed to train many volunteers. The experience women gained in workhouses, hospitals, and settlements enabled them to play a role in public affairs later. Most of the women who were devoted to the charity work served as poor law gurdians and on school boards, as well as in lesser government offices. Through their contact with charitable organization women increased their interest in the problems of poverty and the social services. When agitation of women's movement was revived in the early 20th century such public services proved that women were worthy of vote. The interest of women suffrage was caused by a certain of their activities, because they realized that compassion and religion alone were inadequate instruments to change the social conditions which bred the problems and there were limits to a charitable action without political power. The early women's suffrage societies were regarded by them as another branch of philanthropy. The connections which linked various committee women in the 19th century enabled the female suffrage societies to be established rapidly all over Britain.

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Australia began its history as a penal settlement in 1788. Among the convicts transported from England were young boys and girls, some of whom were even under twelve years of age, and most of whom had been guilty of merely very minor charges. Still more, causes of such misdemeanors were due to their poverty-stricken life, as the members of the lowest ladder of social classes. Common Law based on the concept of laissez faire had not yet acquired the modern ideal of welfare state. The convicts were expelled from their own home country for the preservation of its peace. The needs of labour then keenly felt in Australia were behind this process. In this sense, it can be said that those convicted adolescents were the victims of such prevailing laissez-faire philosophy.

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On the edge of the 20th century, American feminists have started to talk and publish about menopause and aging, and have begun to review each with a feminist perspective. Feminist activists like Betty Friedan, Colette Dowling, Erica Jong, etc., were concerned with menopause and aging. As a result, they published books about these issues based on interviews with many women and their experiences in the 1990s. A common point among such feminist writers was that they considered the age of fifty as a turning point in life, with life after fifty viewed as a new stage of life. Considering that the average life span of females in the United States is over eighty, not only feminists but also all women are concerned about aging. While feminists criticized the negative images and stereotypes for the aged widely held by society, they also urged all women to pursue self-realization in order that they may freely live their own lives. The subject of aging gave feminists the opportunity to search the self at the second stage of life. Based on feminist publications in the 1990s, I analyzed the reasons why American feminists started to publish about menopause and aging. Or more, I compared the old stereotypes about aging and the new perspectives which feminists sought.

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In spoken English, contraction of the past-perfect auxiliary had after a vowel-final pronoun is quite common (e.g. I'd, they'd, etc.); this can (at least partially) be accounted for by English speakers' propensity to preserve the regular alternation of weak and strong syllables. On the other hand, written English (typically in the expository mode) normally excludes the use of contractions as factors of informality and vulgarity. This study is concerned with how fiction writers deal with their dilemma in narrative writing. Some of them keep to the full forms, leaving the task of "transforming full forms into the surface-level phonetic representations" to the reader, while others take on part of the reader's interpretative task and contract auxiliaries in certain contexts to varying degrees. It is difficult to establish absolute criteria to predict their choice with a small sampling, yet it is of extreme importance to call attention to the significant role of contractions in creative writing, thus laying the foundations for future research on subtle usage or nuances that native speakers evoke by intuitive judgment.

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The major purpose of this study is to present evidence against a well-known stereotype, the Japanese being more indirect, inexplicit and ambiguous than Westerners regarding how to say "no". The author shows how Japanese and New Zealand students respond when asked to do something undesirable from a lecturer and a friend, and also presents differences and similarities of their refusals. Data were collected through a questionnaire study using 72 New Zealanders (21 males and 51 females) and 135 Japanese (55 males and 80 females). In the questionnaire, the subjects were asked to indicate their response to annoying requests, embarrassing offers, unpleasant invitations and unacceptable suggestions in twelve situations. The results indicated that the Japanese tended to accept some of the undesirable situations and to apologize more frequently than the New Zealanders. However, the results also provided evidence that the Japanese and New Zealand subjects shared some similarities: excuses were the most important element in refusals, and "I'll think about it" was used by Japanese and New Zealanders to the letter and as an ambiguous refusal. Moreover, it was revealed that the Japanese can be more direct, explicit, or even harsh than the New Zealanders in particular situations, especially speaking to an equal status person.

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The purpose of this paper is to investigate two relationships related with SLA theory and debating. One is the relationship between debating and motivation in oral communication skills and the other is the relationship between intelligence/academic skills and linguistic proficiency. Collected data based on students' self-report were examined in two ways. One is by the experiences of debating and the other by the level of communication skill which is evaluated by students. The results confirm that, regardless of their debating skills, all level of students are strongly motivated to communicate their ideas through debating. The analysis also reveals that intelligence or academic skills and linguistic proficiency are strongly related.

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Mastering the art of speaking is one of the most important aspects of learning a second language. It often happens that the success of language acquisition is measured in terms of the ability to converse in the language. However, in a monolingual society, students often face difficulties in speaking in their second language in the classroom. This study tries to explore what it means to speak in the language classroom where all students have the same native language. The various methodological options available for the teaching of oral communication will be outlined. In section one, the definition of speaking is given and discussed. The ideas of Brown and Yule (1983), Richards and Rodgers (1986), and McDonough and Shaw (1993) are outlined. The relationship between transactional and interactional language functions are reviewed. Section two deals with the analysis of the speaking in monolingual society with reference to Japanese English education. The options of Bailey (1991), LoCastro (1989), Alga (1990), are stated. In section three, the ideas of McDonough and Shaw (1993) for promoting speaking skills are discussed. In section four, teachers' roles in teaching speaking skills are stated mainly through the ideas of Bresnihan and Stoops (1994). In section five, the problems of large classes are discussed. And in conclusion, the answer to these methodological options are put forward.

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