Mon., 24 Aug.:

Introduction to course, grades, books.  Henry Fuseli, "The Artist Moved by the Grandeur of Ancient Ruins," (1778-79).
*Joseph Warton, "The Enthusiast: or, The Lover of Nature" (1744).
 

Wed., 26 Aug.:

*Alexander Pope, "An Essay on Criticism" (1711).
*Thomas Gray, "Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College" (1747) NAEL8 1:2863-65 and "Elegy Written in a Country Church-yard" (1751) NAEL8 1:2867-70  and "The Bard: a Pindaric Ode" (1757), see John Martin's oil rendition, 1817.

Paper 1 assigned, due Fri., 11 Sept.

Vocabulary 1 exercise assigned, due Wed., 2 Sept.: click here for assignment
 

Fri., 28 Aug.:

*Samuel Johnson, Rasselas (1759),  "The Vanity of Human Wishes" (1749) NAEL8 1:2666-74 and excerpts from Prefaces to The Dictionary of the English Language (1755) and The Works of William Shakespeare (1765) NAEL8 1:2749-66.
*William Collins, "Ode to Evening" (1748) NAEL8 1:2873-74.
 

Mon., 31 Aug.:

A Pack of Useful Lies about the Eighteenth Century.

*Christopher Smart, excerpt from Jubilate Agno (1759-1763) and A Song to David (1759-1763) NAEL8 1:2874-76.
*Oliver Goldsmith, The Deserted Village (1770) NAEL8 1:2877-86.
*William Cowper, The Task (1785) NAEL8 1:2890-95 (excerpts) and "The Diverting History of John Gilpin" (1782).  See Caldecott's illustrations.

18th C English Hymnody. and The Cyber Hymnal.
Classic and Romantic music.
A Note on English Titles
 

Tues., 1 Sept.: 7 pm, Hoyt Hall, room 215:  Extracurricular showing of Oliver Goldsmith's, She Stoops to Conquer (1775).
 

Wed., 2 Sept.:

*Cowper, "The Castaway" (1799), NAEL8 1:2895-97.  See Kate Winslet teach Hugh Grant how to read this at 7:45 (from Sense & Sensibility).
Benjamin Franklin, selections from letters and Autobiography (c. 1781), NAALS7 1:218-92.
J. H. St J. de Crèvecoeur, selections from Letters from an American Farmer (1782), NAALS7 1:309-24.
Thomas Jefferson, personal and political writings, NAALS7 1:338-46.  Notes on the State of Virginia (1784), selections, see Frank Church's oil rendition of the Natural Bridge, 1852.
Alexander Hamilton and James Madison, Federalist Papers (1787), NAALS7 1:346-55.

Vocabulary 1 due: handout.  The publishers of the hard-copy glossary recommended for this course (see below) have this abbreviated website.
 

Fri., 4 Sept.:

"American Literature: 1700-1820," NAALS7 1:151-61.
William Cullen Bryant, NAALS7 1:476-82.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, NAALS7 1:643-52.
Washington Irving, NAALS7 1:453-66.
 

Tues., 8 Sept.: (Cancelled) 7 pm, Hoyt Hall, room 215:  Extracurricular showing of R. B. Sheridan's, The Rivals (1775).

Wed., 9 Sept.:

"The Romantic Period" NAEL8 2:1-25. *A Time-Line of English Poetry, 449-2006.
Joanna Baillie, NAEL8 2:212-26.
Macpherson and Chatterton. See *Norton Topics Online.
 

Fri., 11 Sept.:

Anna Letitia Barbauld, NAEL8 2:26-38.
Charlotte Smith, NAEL8 2:39-66.
Mary Robinson, NAEL8 2:66-76.
500 Years of Female Portraits in Western Art, Bach's Sarabande from Suite for Cello no. 1 in G Major, BWV 1007 performed by Yo-Yo Ma.

Paper 1 due
 

Mon., 14 Sept.:

Robert Burns, NAEL8 2:129-47.  Listen to soundclips of "Green grow the rashes," "Auld Lang Syne," and "A Red, Red Rose" by Jean Redpath.  Ballad revival.  Listen to The False Knight upon the Road (Child no. 3), sung by Frank Quinn, Coalisland, County Tyrone (from Topic 12T160). The false knight, better known as the devil, accosts a young boy embarked on life's pilgrimage. The knight tries to trap the boy with a series of questions, but the boy recognizes his interlocutor, responds successfully, and escapes.  Lady Isabel and the Elf-knight (Child no. 4), sung by Fred Jordan, Aston Munslow, Shropshire (source as above). The maid is charmed by a man of the north country, presents a dowry, rides out to the seaside, and is almost seduced. The man, a Bluebeard figure, announces the fate of her six predecessors, but the maid tricks him and reverses their fortunes.

Vocabulary 2 exercise assigned, due Wed., 23 Sept.: click here for assignment
 

Wed., 16 Sept.:

William Blake (stress Songs of Innocence and of Experience (1794)), NAEL8 2:76-128.

Fri., 18 Sept.:

Mary Wollstonecraft, NAEL8 2:167-212.

Mon., 21 Sept.:

William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge (stress Lyrical Ballads (1798)), NAEL8 2:243-62.
Wordsworth and Coleridge, "Preface" to Lyrical Ballads (1802) NAEL8 2:262-74.
Listen to an Eolian Harp.

Wed., 23 Sept.:

Coleridge, Conversation Poems, NAEL8 2:424-30, 464-73.
*"The Ballad of Sir Patrick Spens" (Child no. 58). 

Vocabulary 2 due: handout.
 

Fri., 25 Sept.:

Coleridge, Poems of the Supernatural, NAEL8 2:430-64, and excerpts from Biographia Literaria (1817), Lectures on Shakespeare (1808-12), and The Statesman's Manual (1816), NAEL8 2:474-91.
See Norton Topics Online.  
 

Mon., 28 Sept.:

"American Literature: 1820-1865," NAALS7 1:431-52. 
Nathaniel Hawthorne (stress "Young Goodman Brown," "The Minister's Black Veil," and "The Birth-Mark," NAALS7 1:589-642.
 

Wed., 30 Sept.:

Edgar Allan Poe (stress "The Raven," "Annabel Lee," "The Fall of the House of Usher," "The Purloined Letter," "The Imp of the Perverse," and "The Philosophy of Composition," NAALS7 1:671-732.

Vocabulary 3 exercise assigned, due Fri., 9 Oct.: click here for assignment
 

Fri., 2 Oct.:

Kenneth Clark: Civilisation (11): The Worship of Nature (1969).
 

Mon., 5 Oct.:

Wordsworth, misc. poems and sonnets, NAEL8 2:274-322.  Wordsworth, "Prospectus to The Recluse"(1814) and The Prelude (1798-1850), books I, II, and XIV, NAEL8 2:322-48 and 385-89.
Hip-Hop Daffodils. Click here for rapper text.
 

Wed., 7 Oct.:

Charles Lamb, William Hazlitt, and Thomas DeQuincey, NAEL8 2:491-576.
 

Fri., 9 Oct.:

Jane Austen, Emma (1816) vol. 1, pp. 1-98.

Vocabulary 3 due: handout.

Mon., 12 Oct.:

Austen, Emma (1816) vol. 2, pp. 98-204.
 

Wed., 14 Oct.:

Austen, Emma (1816) vol. 3, pp. 205-319.

Review, Midterm Exam Part 1 distributed.
 

Fri., 16 Oct.:

Midterm Exam, Part 1 (take home essays) due.
Midterm Exam, Part 2 (in class).

Paper 2 assigned, due Mon., 2 Nov.
 

 

William Holman Hunt (1827-1910), Lady of Shalott (des.1857, pinxit. 1889-1902),  Wadsworth Athenaeum, Hartford, Connecticut

Mon., 19 Oct.:

George Gordon, Lord Byron, NAEL8 2:607-741, and handout (stress lyrics, "Darkness," *Prisoner of Chillon, and Childe Harold's Pilgrimage).
Percy Bysshe Shelley (stress "Mont Blanc" and A Defence of Poetry), NAEL8 2:741-850.
John Keats (stress sonnets, odes, letters, "Eve of St. Agnes" and "La Belle Dame sans Merci"), NAEL8 2:878-955.
Listen to Luscinia Megarhynchos, the Nightingale.
 

Wed., 21 Oct.:  anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar, 1805, see BBC video.

Ralph Waldo Emerson (stress "Nature," "The American Scholar," "Self-Reliance"), NAALS7 1:488-569. See Norton Topics Online.
 

Fri., 23 Oct.:

Henry David Thoreau (stress Walden, ch. 1 "Economy"), NAALS7 1:825-886.
Thoreau (stress Walden, ch. 2 "Where I Lived and What I Lived For," ch. 5 "Solitude," ch. 17 "Spring," and ch. 18 "Conclusion"), NAALS7 1:886-920.
 

St. Crispin's Day, 25 Oct.: see the speech before the Battle of Agincourt from Shakespeare's Henry V.
 

Mon., 26 Oct.:

"The Victorian Age: 1830-1901," NAEL8 2:979-1001.
Thomas Carlyle, NAEL8 2:1002-33 (stress Sartor Resartus and Past and Present).  Browse the online Collected Letters of Thomas and Jane Welsh Carlyle.
John Stuart Mill, NAEL8 2:1043-77 (stress excerpt from Autobiography). 
 

Wed., 28 Oct.:

Alfred, Lord Tennyson, NAEL8 2:1109-1138 (stress  "The Lady of Shalott," "Ulysses," and "Morte d'Arthur). *Hear Sir Lewis Casson read "Ulysses" in an MP3 clip.  Tennyson's recording on an Edison cylinder in 1890 of "The Charge of the Light Brigade."
 

Fri., 30 Oct.:

Tennyson, NAEL8 2:1138-1212 (stress In Memoriam and Idylls of the King).

Vocabulary 4 exercise assigned, due Fri., 6 Nov.: click here for assignment
 

Mon., 2 Nov.:

Robert Browning, NAEL8 2:1248-1310 (stress "My Last Duchess," "Andrea del Sarto," and "Caliban upon Setebos").

Paper 2 due.


Wed., 4 Nov.:

Matthew Arnold, NAEL8 2:1350-1427 (stress "To Marguerite--Continued," "Memorial Verses," "The Scholar Gypsy," "Dover Beach," and "Stanzas from the Grand Chartreuse").
Hear Ralph Vaughan Williams's setting of "The Scholar Gypsy" and "Thyrsis" in "An Oxford Elegy" (1947-49).

Fri., 6 Nov.:

Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (1881 edn.), Preface to Leaves of Grass (1855), "Song of Myself" (stress 1-6, 11, 15, 20-21, 24, 30-36, 44, 48, 52), , NAALS7 1:991-1061. Also Emerson, stress "The Poet,"  NAALS7 1:550-65 and Letter to Walt Whitman, July 21, 1855.  Hear Whitman's recording on an Edison cylinder of "America":  "America / Centre of equal daughters, equal sons,  / All, all alike endear’d, grown, ungrown, young or old, / Strong, ample, fair, enduring, capable, rich, / Perennial with the Earth, with Freedom, Law and Love."
 

Mon., 9 Nov.:

Kenneth Clark: Civilisation (12): The Fallacies of Hope (1969)

Wed., 11 Nov.:

Ted Hughes narrates William Wordsworth: the Lake Poets (2004), 60 minutes--spoiler: ending will get cut!

(backup:) Kenneth Clark: Civilisation (10): The Smile of Reason (1969)
 

Fri., 13 Nov.:

Whitman, stress "Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking," "When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer," "A Sight in Camp in the Daybreak Gray and Dim," "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd," Letter to Ralph Waldo Emerson, August 1856, NAALS7 1:1062-88.

Vocabulary 4 due: handout.

Paper 3 assigned, due Mon., 23 Nov.

Mon., 16 Nov.:

Emily Dickinson, nos. 112 [67], 123 [131], 202 [185], 207 [214], 269 [249], 320 [258], 359 [328], 365 [338], 372 [341], 373 [501], 409 [303], 448 [449], 479 [712], 591 [465], 598 [632], 620 [435], 935 [1540], 1096 [986], 1263 [1129], 1489 [1463], 1773 [1732]. Letters to T. W. Higginson, NAALS7 1:1197-1225.
 

Wed., 18 Nov.:

Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass (1845), chs. 2, 3, 5-7, 10, NAALS7 1:920-91.
Abraham Lincoln, stress "Second Inaugural Address, March 4, 1865," NAALS7 1:732-36.
 

Barry Moser, woodcut for Arion Press edition, designed by Andrew Hoyem (Univ. of California, 1979)

Fri., 20 Nov.:

Introduction to Herman Melville, Moby Dick (1851), prefatory material.
Melville, "Hawthorne and his Mosses" (1850).

Mon., 23 Nov.:

Melville, Moby Dick (1851), chs. 1-43, Norton Critical edn. pp. 7-165.

Paper 3 due.

Mon., 30 Nov.:

Melville, Moby Dick (1851), chs. 44-61, Norton Critical edn. pp. 165-233.

Paper 4 assigned (optional), due Mon., 7 Dec.
 

Wed., 2 Dec.:

Melville, Moby Dick (1851), chs. 62-108, Norton Critical edn. pp. 233-361.
 

Fri., 4 Dec.:

Melville, Moby Dick (1851), chs. 109-135, Norton Critical edn. pp. 361-427.
Whitman, Passage to India (1870).
 

Final Exam: Monday, 7 December, 10:15 am - 12:15 pm, in our usual classroom.

Paper 4 due (optional).

Required Books:

M. H. Abrams, gen. ed.. Norton Anthology of English Literature, vol. 2, bundled with Jane Austen's Emma (New York: W. W. Norton, hardcover, 8th edn., vol. 2, 2006). 978-0393-17188-4 [NAEL8]

University Studies Criteria:

Since this course fulfills the core requirements in Cultural Context: Humanities (CH) in USP (2003), we:

1.  focus on understanding the historical place of the humanities in the lives of individuals and societies.
2.  recognize that through time, the boundaries of the humanities have proven to be flexible and changing.
3.  reflect the humanistic approach:

Inherent in the humanities is a values-driven examination of human life. The humanities address ideas we have about our own nature, about our place in the world, and about the ethical dimension of our action. Humanities courses study the meaning, value, history, literary and aesthetic expression, and/or justification of these ideas. Humanities courses may also examine how these ideas affect people’s actions (cited from the CH criteria review sheet, 9 January 2003).

 

Last updated: 06-Nov-09