Updated December 2, 2013
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Office: 428 N. Glassell, Office 101
Office Hours: Tuesday
& Thursday, 9-11 am, and by appointment.
Phone: 997-6754 (office)
Email: ruppel@chapman.edu
Class Meetings: Monday & Wednesday:
1-2:15 pm. Argyros Forum 206A
Text: The Norton Anthology of English Literature, 9th edition, Volumes D, E, & F
Course Description and Objectives:
This course introduces a wide range of literature written in Great Britain between
1789 (when Blake published Songs of Innocence) and the present (we'll
conclude with a Harold Pinter play: The Dumb Waiter, and “The Waiter’s Wife,” a story by Zadie Smith, who was born in 1975). An enormous
amount of important work was written over these two centuries, and they span
four major periods: Romantic, Victorian, Modern, and Post-Modern. We'll read a
relatively small, representative sample, but you'll still need to do a lot of
reading, and the poetry, essays, fiction, and drama will require your full
attention, so don’t fall behind. My lectures and our class discussions
will be much more interesting and useful to you if you keep up.
I make significant use of the Web. Our
syllabus will be updated on this Web page, where I will post assignments &
useful Web links. I will also ask you to contribute regularly to threaded
discussions in Blackboard, and I may ask you to engage in other online
activities.
Since this course is the second part of a historical survey, we'll pay attention to the historical context as we read each of these authors, and we'll pay attention to the way British literature changed through these decades. We'll become more familiar with the characteristics of the poetry and prose of each period, but we'll also pay attention to what makes the work of each of these writers unique.
As in most literature
courses, this class has an important writing component, both for the Blackboard
threaded discussions and for your two required essays. We will devote
class time to developing your essay topics, and we'll go over the criteria I'll
use to evaluate your essays. You will discuss and clear your topics with
me, and I will accept a revision of one of your essays. You can expect me
to read your essays closely.
Finally, 238 is one of
the electives you may take to fulfill the English literature major. We will pay special attention to numbers 1,
2, 4, and 6 of the English Literature
Program Learning Objectives listed below, and you will be able to develop
and demonstrate these skills in your discussion board responses, formal essays,
and essay exams:
1.
Skill
in critical reading, or the practice of identifying and interpreting the
formal, rhetorical, and stylistic features of a text
2.
Ability
to identify and compare key literary movements and genres
3.
Ability
to explain and apply significant theoretical and critical approaches in the
field of English studies
4.
Skill
in writing grammatically, coherently, and persuasively
5.
Skill
in finding, analyzing, and utilizing secondary sources (including the
appropriate methods of citation)
6.
Skill
in crafting a compelling thesis-driven essay, with substantiating evidence
Our
Course Learning Outcomes are the
following:
1.
We’ll
practice a good deal of critical reading, especially of poetry, leading us to
identify the formal, rhetorical, and stylistic features not only of individual
texts but of the texts we associate with particular literary movements – this
should help you identify and compare the key literary movements and genres of
the Romantic, Victorian, Modern, and Post-Modern periods.
2.
You
will improve your understanding of the development of English literature from
1789 to the present within its historical context.
3.
We’ll
work on your writing this semester. We will
have writing workshops before the first essay is due, and you will be allowed
to revise one of your essays.
Weekly Syllabus*
Week 1
- August 26-28: Introduction
and William Blake
Week 2 - September 4: Blake
Week 3
- September 9-11: William Wordsworth
Week 4 - September 16-18: Samuel Taylor
Coleridge
Week 5 - September 23-25: Coleridge,
Percy Bysshe Shelley & Dr. Susan Oliver Visit
Week 6 - September 30-October 2: John Keats
(Discussion of paper topics & papers)
Week 7 - October 7-9: Alfred
Tennyson. (Paper 1 due, October 9)
Week 8 - October 14-16: Robert Browning
Week 9 - October 21-23: G B Shaw’s Mrs. Warren’s
Profession
Week 10 - October 28-30: Oscar Wilde, The Importance of
Being Earnest, Robert Louis Stevenson,
“The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” Arthur Conan Doyle, “The
Speckled Band,” and Rudyard Kipling, “The Man Who Would be King.”
Week 11 - November 4-6: W.
B. Yeats.
Week 12 - November 11-13: Virginia
Woolf, A Room of One's Own & “Professions
for Women.” James Joyce, "The Dead”
Week 13 - November 18-20: Doris
Lessing, "To Room Nineteen," Harold Pinter, The
Dumb Waiter.
Week 14 - November 25: Salmon
Rushdie, “The Prophet’s Hair." Thanksgiving.
Week 15 - December 2-4: Zadie Smith, “The
Waiter’s Wife.” Last words, preparation for
final. (Paper 2 due, December 4)
Week 16 - Final: Friday, December 13: 8-10:30 am.
*These
authors or works may change, but I'll give you plenty of notice, and I'll keep
the syllabus updated on the Web.
Grades:
Assignments & Participation*: 25%
Essay 1: 20% (5-6 pages)
Essay 2: 25% (6-7 pages)
Final: 30%
*This
is primarily your grade on the Blackboard Discussion Board posts. Here are my criteria for evaluating your
posts:
1. The posting should
respond as specifically as possible to the prompt (or you should indicate why
you’re modifying the prompt).
2. The posting should reveal close engagement with the work under discussion.
3. The posting should contribute to the discussion, so later postings should
not simply repeat earlier postings, and they should reflect some engagement
with earlier postings.
4. Postings should be substantive.
Chapman University Academic Integrity Policy:
Chapman
University is a community of scholars that emphasizes the mutual responsibility
of all members to seek knowledge honestly and in good faith. Students are
responsible for doing their own work, and academic dishonesty of any kind will
be subject to sanction by the instructor and referral to the university's
Academic Integrity Committee, which may impose additional sanctions up to and including
dismissal. (See the Undergraduate Catalog for the full policy.)
Chapman Equity and
Diversity Policy:
Chapman University is
committed to ensuring equality and valuing diversity. Students and professors are reminded to show respect
at all times as outlined in Chapman’s Harassment and
Discrimination Policy. Any
violations of this policy should be discussed with the professor, the Dean of
Students and/or otherwise reported in accordance with this policy.
Chapman's Students with Disabilities Policy:
In compliance with ADA guidelines, students who have any condition, either permanent or temporary, that might affect their ability to perform in this class are encouraged to inform the instructor at the beginning of the term. The University, through the Disability Services Office, will work with the appropriate faculty member who is asked to provide the accommodations for a student in determining what accommodations are suitable based on the documentation and the individual student needs. The granting of any accommodation will not be retroactive and cannot jeopardize the academic standards or integrity of the course.
For
Wednesday, August 28:
Read the introduction to William Blake and all the selections from Songs of
Innocence & Songs of Experience (112-35). Come to class
prepared to read one of the Songs out
loud to the class and explain why you chose it.
For Wednesday, September 4: Read Blake’s
“Book of Thel” (135-14). Answer one of the Discussion questions in
Blackboard by 7 pm Tuesday, September 3.
For Monday, September 9: Read the
introduction to William Wordsworth (270-272), and read “Simon Lee,” 275, “We Are Seven,” 278, &
“Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern
Abbey,” 288.
For Wednesday, September 11: Read
Wordsworth’s “A Slumber did my Spirit Seal” (307), “Nutting” (308), and
“Ode: Intimations of Immortality” (335).
Answer one of the Discussion questions in Blackboard by 7 pm Tuesday, September
10.
For Monday, September 16: Read the introduction to Coleridge
(437-39), "Rime of
the Ancient Mariner" & "Kubla Khan"
(443-62). (Iron Maiden’s musical version.)
For Wednesday, September 18: No new reading. Respond to one of the Blackboard questions by
7pm Tuesday, September 17.
For Monday, September 23: Read Coleridge’s Christabel
(462), the introduction to Percy Bysshe Shelley (748), and Shelley’s
“Mutability” (751), “To Wordsworth” (752), and “Ozymandias”
(776).
For Wednesday, September 25: Read the introduction to John Keats (901) and
his “The Eve of St.
Agnes” (912) & “La Belle Dame Sans Merci” (923). Bring one question and one comment about the
reading to class.
For Monday, September 30: Read Keats’s “Ode to Psyche” (925),
“Ode to a Nightingale” (927), “Ode on a Grecian Urn” (930), and “Ode on
Melancholy” (931). Bring ideas for your
first essay to class.
For Wednesday, October 2: No new reading. Look over the Essay 1 Assignment Sheet posted
in the Contents section of Blackboard.
Be sure to have your essay topic cleared in class or via email by
Thursday evening.
For Monday, October 7: Read the Introduction to Alfred, Lord
Tennyson, and his “The Lady of Shalott,” “Ulysses,”
and “Tithonus.”
Bring a draft of the first essay to class for a workshop.
For Wednesday, October 9: No new reading. The electronic copy of your first essay is
due by 11:59 pm Wednesday. Bring your
hard copy to Wednesday’s class if you’re finished by then.
For Monday, October 14: Read the introduction to In Memoriam and the selected Cantos through 56: pages 1187-1207. Be prepared to read and discuss one
Canto.
For Wednesday, October 16: Read the
introduction to Browning (1275-1278), and "Porphyria's Lover" (1278),
"Soliloquy in a Spanish Cloister" (1280), "My Last Duchess"
(1282) and "The Bishop Orders his Tomb at Saint Praxed's
Church" (1286). By 7pm Tuesday (October 15), write a brief character
sketch of the speaker of one of these poems in Blackboard.
For Monday, October 21: Read the introduction to George Bernard Shaw
and his play, Mrs. Warren’s Profession
(1780-1829). Come to class with an idea
about a paper or project about the play.
For Wednesday, October 23: Post your idea
for a paper or project concerned with Mrs.
Warren’s Profession on our Blackboard Discussion Board.
For Monday, October 28: Read Oscar
Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest (1734-77, satirical farce), Robert Louis Stevenson, “The Strange Case
of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” (1677-1719, horror), Arthur Conan Doyle, “The
Speckled Band” (1831-48, detective fiction) or Rudyard Kipling, “The Man Who Would be King” (1853-77, colonial
adventure fiction).
For Wednesday, October 30: No new assignment.
For Monday, November 4: Read the introduction to William Butler Yeats
(2082-85) and “The Stolen Child” (2085), “The Lake Isle of Innisfree”
(2087), “When You are Old” (2088), “Adam’s Curse” (2090), “September, 1913”
(2092), “Easter, 1916” (2093), “The Second Coming” (2099), “Leda and the Swan”
(2102), and “Sailing to Byzantium” (2102).
Choose one poem to read and be prepared to explain why you chose
it.
For Monday, November 11: Read the introduction to Virginia Woolf
(2143-44) and the selection from A Room
of One’s Own and “Professions for Women” (2264-76). And read the introduction to James Joyce
(2276-78) and “The Dead” (2282-2311).
For Wednesday, November 13: By 7pm Tuesday, November 12th, on the
Blackboard discussion page, make one feminist observation about any of the
works or authors we've read this semester, drawing on Virginia Woolf's
observations in A Room of One's Own
and "Professions for Women."
For Monday, November 18: Read the introduction to Doris Lessing &
“To Room Nineteen” (2758-80), and the introduction to Harold Pinter & The Dumb Waiter (2815-36).
For Wednesday, November 20: By 7pm Tuesday, November 19, identify the
theme (or simply a theme) of “To Room
19” or The Dumb Waiter on our
Blackboard discussion board. Provide one
piece of supporting evidence.
For Monday, November 25: Read the introduction to Salman Rushdie and
“The Prophet’s Hair” (3000-11).
Formulate a topic and thesis for your final paper, or a description of
your final project, to discuss on Monday.
For Monday, December 2: Read the introduction to Zadie
Smith and her “The Waiter’s Wife” (3057-68). The final project/paper is due
Wednesday.
For Wednesday, December 4: On Blackboard, post one final exam
essay question.