Prof. Fay EN201 Five British Writers MWF 11:30
Office: W-6-87; Office Hours: MW 12:30-2pm
617-287-6715 (voice mail); elizabeth.fay@umb.edu
Course description: We will explore the range of issues and influences that define for us the highlights of British literature, by reading works produced by five major voices representing five periods in literary history. We will be thinking about how to comprehend and analyze what we read both as literary art, as social text, and as personal representation. We will also be thinking about how writers think about literature: how to represent a story, a character, an accent, a scene. We will look at how things get plotted (structure), how they get represented (description), how people talk and behave (character development), and how to best represent all of this (genre). Our five authors work in major genres: narrative poetry, drama, lyric poetry, and the novel. Each of these works investigates the growth of the individual against the literary character type; each author attempts to portray an idea embodied in a “real” person drawn from life.
The course will be supplemented with occasional extra-textual materials, but principally we will operate via discussion. This is not a lecture course and will require careful reading of assigned texts, oral participation in class, and occasional written homework assignments to prepare for class discussions.
Texts: Chaucer The Canterbury Tales (Bantam)
Shakespeare Hamlet and Macbeth (NAL-Dutton)
Wordsworth Lyrical Ballads (Oxford)
Dickens Hard Times (Longman)
Woolf Mrs. Dalloway (HJB)
Course Requirements:
Quizzes: There will be occasional unannounced quizzes to test your comprehension and reading skill. The number of quizzes we have depends on class ability.
Exams: There will be one midterm exam on The Canterbury Tales and Shakespeare plays, and a take home final exam on all five authors.
Papers: There will be two analytic papers (3-4 pages each) that discuss specific aspects of the works by Chaucer, Shakespeare, Wordsworth, and Dickens. All papers must be typed and double-spaced; handwritten essays will not be accepted. Your grade will depend on your analysis of the works and the extent to which you build on class discussion to develop your own ideas of how to best understand some aspect of the text in relation to the paper assignment. Each paper needs an organizing thesis, which should be clearly stated and well-thought out. My comments will be both reflective and corrective, aimed at pushing you further.
Grading: Final grades for the course will reflect class participation, attendance and reading quizzes (totaling 20%), mid-term (20%), paper grades (40%), and take home final (20%). Attendance affects your grade after 6 absences, with 3 lates of 5 min. or more equaling one absence. Papers are due in class on the date specified; any paper handed in after class is one day late. Lateness will reduce your grade by days missed.
Special Notes: Anyone having special medical or family emergencies that will result in more than 3 absences should discuss your situation with me in advance. Anyone needing assistance for special learning requirements should notify me so that we can make the necessary arrangements. All students will be held to the University’s rules for academic honesty, including penalties for plagiarism (cheating on exams and the use of unattributed sources in papers).
Reading Assignments
Date is due date; Reading Schedule subject to change
Jan M 23 Introduction
F 27 Introduction to Chaucer and the Medieval Period, discussion of “The General
Prologue”
M 30 “The Nun’s Priest’s Tale”
Feb W 1 “The Franklin’s Tale”
F 3 “The Miller’s Tale”
M 6 “Wife of Bath’s Tale”
W 8 Wind up discussion; 1st paper assigned; discussion of paper
assignment
F 10 Introduction to Shakespeare and the Renaissance; Hamlet Act I
M 13 Hamlet Act II
W 15 Hamlet Act III
. F 17 Hamlet Act IV
M 20 Holiday—President’s Day
W 22 Hamlet Act V;1st paper due
F 24 Macbeth Act I
M 27 Macbeth Act II
Mar W 1 Macbeth Act III
F 3 Macbeth Act IV
M 6 Macbeth Act V
W 8 Wind up discussion for Chaucer and Shakespeare
F 10 Midterm Exam
3/11-19 SPRING BREAK
M 20 Introduction to Wordsworth and Romanticism; “Lines Written at a small
distance from my house” (pp. 55-7)
W 22 “Goody Blake and Harry Gill”; “We are Seven” (50-5, 63-5)
F 24 “The Thorn”; “Simon Lee” (66-76, 57-60)
M 27 “The Last of the Flock”; “Anecdote for Fathers” (76-80, 60-3)
W 29 “Idiot Boy”; “Old Man Travelling”(84-101,105-6)
F 31 “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” (7-17); 2nd Paper assigned
Apr M 3 “Rime of the Ancient Mariner” (18-32)
W 5 “Lines written a few miles above Tintern Abbey” (111-7)
F 7 Introduction to Dickens and the Victorian Period, Hard Times, vol I, ch 1-4
(pp3-23)
M 10 Hard Times, I.5-7 (23-79)
W 12 Hard Times, I.8-vol II ch 2 (79-123)
F 14 Hard Times, II.3-8 (123-74)
M 17 Holiday—Patriot’s Day
W 19 Hard Times, II. 9-III.3 (174-219)
F 21 Hard Times Appendix “Condition of England” pp. 267-88 (Intro, excerpts
from Disraeli, Engels, Carlyle, Dickens); Paper #2 due
M 24 Hard Times, III.4-end (219-264)
W 26 Hard Times Appendices “Utilitarianism” (pp. 302-11, Intro, Bentham,
Mill), and “Victorian Reactions to Hard Times” (340-50)
F 28 Introduction to Woolf and Modernism; Mrs. Dalloway (3-33)
May M 1 Mrs. Dalloway (34-65)
W 3 Mrs. Dalloway (66-95)
F 5 Mrs. Dalloway (96-119)
M 8 Mrs. Dalloway (120-71)
W 10 Mrs. Dalloway (172-end).
Final Exam (take home) will be due Wed. May 17 in my mailbox by 2pm Emailed exams will be accepted, but you must include the questions you have chosen to answer.