This course offers a brief tour of six hundred years of British literature. We'll limit ourselves to select things—poems and novels, a play and an essay—which readers over the centuries have regarded as literary touchstones. They are, mostly, brief works leaving us time to introduce some topics in literary, social, and political history which influenced literature in various ways, and time to introduce some themes in literary criticism. The class format with be lecture-with-discussion, so regular attendence will be required. Course requirements include: 3 short commentaries (50%) a 6-8 pp paper (20%) and a final examination (30%). Students requiring special assistance should speak to the professor; ditto for students seeking ordinary assistance. All work should be your own (vide honor system).
Texts: At the request of students, instead of ordering the Norton Anthology of English Literature: Major Authors as our textbook—it is expensive and we don't use much of it—I have linked to etexts for material in the public domain. However, I suggest that you order a second-hand copy of the Norton Anthology since it includes helpful things like headnotes and footnotes, line numbers, and other bells and whistles. Any edition will do, and since it has been around for more than half a century older editions may be had for almost nothing. I recommend the two-volume complete (not major authors) edition in hardback. Link to Norton
Week 1 (August 22) Introduction
Week 1 (August 24) Gawain and the Green Knight
Week 2 (August 29) Gawain and the Green Knight
Week 2 (August 31) Chaucer, Canterbury Tales: "Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale"
Week 3 (September 5) Labor Day Holliday
Week 3 (September 7) Wyatt, "Whoso Lists to Hunt", Shakespeare, "Sonnet 18," Marlowe, "The Passionate Shepherd," Raleigh, "The Nymph's Reply"
Week 4 (September 12) Donne, "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning," Marvell, "To his Coy Mistress"
Week 4 (September 14) Jonson, "Inviting a Friend to Supper," "Still to be Neat," Herrick, "Delight in Disorder," "To the Virgins," Lovelace, "To Lucasta, going to the Wars," "The Grasshopper"
Week 5 (September 19) 2-3 pp. commentary due
Week 5 (September 19) Paradise Lost: Book I
Week 5 (September 21) Paradise Lost: Book IX
Week 6 (September 26-28) Congreve, The Way of the World
Week 7 (October 3) Gray: "Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College," "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard"
Week 7 (October 5) Collins: "Ode to Evening," Blake: "The Ecchoing Green," Burns: "To a Mouse"
Week 8 (October 10) 2-3 pp. commentary due
Week 8 (October 10-12) Austen: Pride and Prejudice
Week 9 (October 17-19) Austen: Pride and Prejudice
Week 10 (October 24) Wordsworth: We Are Seven," "The Solitary Reaper," "Tintern Abbey"
Week 10 (October 26) Shelley: "Ozymandias," Keats: "Ode on a Grecian Urn"
Week 11 (October 31) 2-3 pp. commentary due
Week 11 (October 31-November 2) Charles Dickens: A Christmas Carol
Week 12 (November 7) Tennyson: "The Lotos-eaters," Browning: "My Last Duchess"
Week 12 (November 9) Yeats: "The Lake Isle of Innisfree," "Easter, 1916," "The Second Coming"
Week 13 (November 14-16) Conrad: Heart of Darkness
(Thanksgiving break November 19-27)
Week 14 (November 28) 8-10 pp. Essay due
Week 14 (November 28) T. S. Eliot: "Tradition and the Individual Talent," "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock"
Week 14 (November 30) Sayers: Gaudy Night
Week 15 (December 5-7) Sayers: Gaudy Night
Final Examination: December 14, 7:45 AM