English 101.601: Shakespeare

Fall 2003
Tuesdays 5:30 P.M. - 8:30 P.M.
200 Bennett Hall

Instructor: Erika Lin
Email: elin@english.upenn.edu
Office: Bennett Hall, Room 215
Office Hours: by appointment
Mailbox: English Department, Main Office, 119 Bennett Hall
Course listserv: engl101-601-03c@lists.upenn.edu
Course home page: http://www.english.upenn.edu/~elin/eng101_f03.html

Last updated: 11/4/03

Course Description | Texts | Schedule | Requirements and Policies | Resources

Course Description

This course will examine Shakespeare's plays in relation to the culture of early modern England. Discussions will investigate such issues as gender and sexuality, printing house practices, popular traditions, and religious and legal institutions. Particular emphasis will be placed on how the plays were originally staged and on their relationship to other kinds of spectacle such as public executions and royal pageantry. We will also interrogate the meaning and nature of performance itself from both a historical and a theoretical perspective. In addition to written work, active class participation and at least one oral presentation will be required. Students may also be expected to perform scenes in class.

Texts

Books

The required book for this class has been ordered through House of Our Own Bookstore at 3920 Spruce Street. It is important that we all read the same version of the texts. If you already have a used copy of this particular edition, feel free to use it, but if you plan on purchasing the text new, please do not buy it through the Penn Bookstore, which is operated by the Barnes and Noble chain.

Handouts

Schedule

Tu 9/9 First Day of Class Topics of discussion:
  • Introduction to the course

Reading due today: None.

Individual Conferences #1
Tu 9/16 Prologue: Theoretical Problems Topics of discussion:
  • Text and Performance (in-class handout to be distributed)
  • Shakespeare as Cultural Icon
Reading due today:
  • Orgel, "What is a Text?"
  • Dessen, "The Logic of 'this'"
  • Knutson, excerpt from The Repertory of Shakespeare's Company
Individual Conferences #1 (cont'd)
Tu 9/23 Class cancelled (instructor was ill)      
Tu 9/30 The Plays: Issues in Performance and Culture Topics of discussion:
  • Performative Identity and Stock Characters
  • Doubling, Identity, and Disguise
  • Costumes and Props
Reading due today:
  • Comedy of Errors
  • Streitberger, "Personnel and Professionalization"
 
Tu 10/7 Topics of discussion:
  • The Legacy of Medieval Drama
  • Soliloquies
  • The Vice figure
  • The Physical Stage and "Locus and Platea"
  • Politics and Pageantry
Reading due today:
  • Richard III
Oral Presentation on Orrell, "The Theaters": ___Justin___

Oral Presentation on Bergeron, excerpt from English Civic Pageantry: ___Renee___

Tu 10/14 Fall Break (No Class)     Individual Conferences #2
Tu 10/21 Topics of discussion:
  • In-class scene performances
Reading due today: None.  
Tu 10/28 Topics of discussion:
  • The Clown
  • Perception and Modes of Performance
Reading due today:
  • All's Well That Ends Well
  • McLeod, "'The very names of the Persons'"
Oral Presentation on Wiles, "The Clown in Playhouse Terminology": ___Parth___

Oral Presentation on Wiles, "Kemp's Jigs": ___Madhu___

STC/Close Reading Exercise due

Tu 11/4 Topics of discussion:
  • Costumes and clothing
  • Gender, sexuality, crossdressing, and the body
Reading due today:
  • Twelfth Night
  • Smith, "Sexuality"
  • Excerpt from Crooke's Microcosmographia
  • Smith, "Eroticism, Homoeroticism, Paneroticism"
  • Smith, "Clothing and Disguise"
Oral Presentation on MacIntyre and Epp, "'Cloathes worth all the rest'": ___Steven___

Oral Presentations on Orgel, excerpt from Impersonations: ___Mary___

Tu 11/11 Topics of discussion:
  • Seasonal festivities and popular culture
Reading due today:
  • Pericles

Oral Presentations on Laroque, "Cycle of Calendary Festivals": ___Aryn___

Oral Presentations on Laroque, "Cycle of Non-Calendary Festivals": ___Angela___

Paper Proposals, Annotated Bibliographies, and Preliminary Thesis Statements due Friday, 11/14 by email to course listserv

Tu 11/18 Topics of discussion:
  • Paper Proposal Workshop
Reading due today:
  • Other People's Proposals, Annotated Bibliographies, and Preliminary Thesis Statements
 
Tu 11/25 Topics of discussion:
  • Violence, onstage and off
Reading due today:
  • Titus Andronicus
  • Excerpts from Meredith and Tailby on "Machinery" & "Special Effects"
Oral Presentation on Sharpe, excerpt from Judicial Punishment in England: ___Carl___
Tu 12/2 Last Day of Class Topics of discussion:
  • Shakespeare and Cultural Capital
  • Multiple Texts and Performance Practices
  • Summary of the Course
  • Course Evaluations
Reading due today:
  • King Lear
  • de Grazia and Stallybrass, "The Materiality of the Shakespearean Text"
Oral Presentations on Gurr, excerpt from Playgoing in Shakespeare's London: ___Rachel___
Tu 12/9     Final Paper due

Requirements

Reading Preparation and Reading Quizzes

Before you come to class each day, you should have read all the assigned texts at least once and taken notes on them so that you are prepared to discuss them in class. I will give a short quiz at the beginning of each period to make sure you are keeping up with the reading. If you have read the texts, you shouldn't have any trouble answering the questions on the quizzes.

Class Participation and Preparation

In this class I hope that you will learn as much from one another as you will from me. To that end, active class participation is a must. How can you participate? By asking questions, by sharing your thoughts, by listening carefully to others in the class, and by responding thoughtfully to the ideas they present. I want this place to be a safe space where you can try out new ideas and where we can all experiment and take risks in our thinking. If you find it difficult to speak up in large groups, you might try jotting down your questions and ideas as your read and then referring to them in class. (Note that your class participation and preparation grade will be based on the quality, not just the quantity, of your contribution to the classroom, so jotting down notes and questions ahead of time is a good technique for everybody, not just those who are more shy.) You can also use the course listserv to continue class discussions and to raise issues that we didn't get a chance to address in class.

Oral Presentation

During the course of the semester, each of you will give a short presentation (10 minutes or so) summarizing an article that relates to the day's class discussion. The goal of these presentations is to give you the benefit of outside secondary sources without the burden of reading all of the articles yourself.

Scene Performances

One of the best ways to learn about Shakespeare is to actually perform scenes from his plays. To that end, I will split the class into groups of 3-5 people and ask you to prepare a scene for presentation in class. Acting talent is not required, but an ability to articulate your interpretations of the text is.

STC/Close Reading

This assignment will ask you to analyze an excerpt from a play in conjunction with an excerpt from a non-literary document from the same time period. You will be using close reading methods in order to produce a historically-informed argument. This paper will be 5-7 pages long. I'll give you more information about this assignment when the time comes.

More information about this assignment is now available here.

Paper Proposal, Annotated Bibliography, and Preliminary Thesis Statement

In anticipation of your final paper, I'll ask each of you to turn in a 1-2 page proposal and a preliminary thesis statement along with an annotated bibliography of the sources that are most likely to be useful for your final paper. An annotated bibliography is a list of texts related to your subject matter in which each entry is followed by a short description summarizing that entry. The goal of this assignment is to get you thinking about your final paper and doing research for it in advance of the actual deadline. It will also allow me to advise you on any potential problems in your topic or approach before you hand in your final paper. In addition, a special in-class workshop will allow each of you to receive feedback from your classmates about your proposed paper. I'll give you more information about this assignment when the time comes.

More information about this assignment is now available here.

Final Paper

Your final paper will be a research paper of 2500-3000 words (approximately 8-10) pages in which you will analyze a play in the context of your research. Your research may focus on a particular performance issue (e.g. cosmetics, beards, wigs, etc.), a particular cultural issue (e.g. religious iconography, royal portraiture, etc.), or performance or cultural history relating to Shakespeare (e.g. editing practices in the late 18th c., American performances of Othello in the mid-19th c., etc.). I'll give you more information about this assignment when the time comes.

More information about this assignment is now available here.

Individual Conferences

I'll be scheduling two individual meetings with each of you this semester outside of regular class times. Each meeting will last approximately 15 minutes and will give us a chance to talk one-on-one about your assignments, any questions you have, etc. I encourage you to jot down questions or issues you would like to discuss prior to each conference and bring your list with you, so that I can make sure to address whatever is most important to you. I also encourage you to meet with me outside of these times--just make an appointment with me by email or in class.

Policies

Grading

Any penalty for attendance problems will be deducted from this total.

Attendance

Attendance is very, very, very, very important! This is a discussion-based class, so without you there is no class. You may miss one class meeting without penalty, but you must attend all other class meetings unless you have obtained my permission in advance or can document a medical or family crisis after the event. Attendance is also required at each of the individual conferences scheduled with me outside of regular class times. Students with 1 unexcused absence will be graded a third of a grade lower for the course (for example, a B+ gets lowered to a B); students with 2 unexcused absences will be graded two-thirds of a grade lower for the course (a B+ becomes a B-); students with 3 unexcused absences will be graded a full grade lower for the course (a B+ becomes a C+); students with more than 3 unexcused absences will fail the course. Frequent tardiness will also affect your grade, so be here and be on time.

Late Assignments

All assignments must be turned in on time. If you have a medical or other emergency, talk to me as soon as possible about it, and we can discuss alternative arrangements. Otherwise, though, no extensions will be granted!

Collaborative Writing/Plagiarism

I encourage you to work with one another to become better writers and better thinkers by sharing your ideas and giving feedback on each other's work. However, the work you submit to this class is expected to be your own. When you want to refer to someone else's ideas (even the ideas of someone else in this class), you must properly acknowledge your sources. Sometimes this involves providing appropriate citations in the body of your writing and additional bibliographic information at the end. Other times it involves using footnotes correctly. If you have questions about how to cite a source properly, consult a style manual or ask me. If you submit work that has been copied without attribution from some published or unpublished source, or that has been prepared by someone other than you, or that in any other way misrepresents somebody else's work as your own, you will face severe discipline by the University! Work that is your own work but has been submitted to more than one class for credit is also considered plagiarism unless you have obtained the permission of all course instructors involved prior to handing in the work. For more detailed information, see the College of Arts and Sciences' pages on academic integrity at http://www.college.upenn.edu/rules/academic_integrity.html.

Resources

Short Title Catalogue (STC) Texts (http://www.library.upenn.edu/vanpelt/guides/stc.html): A. W. Pollard and G.R. Redgrave's Short Title Catalogue lists the titles of more than 37,000 English books published between 1475 and 1640. Penn's Van Pelt Library has photocopies of the microfilms of most of these books in a room on the 3rd floor. The room has a handy card catalogue, which contains a chronological listing as well as author, subject, and title indexes. These items are shelved in the numerical order in which they are listed in Pollard and Redgrave's book, which can be found at the Van Pelt Reference desk. The second edition also has a chronological listing. The library also has microfilm copies of the books in the STC, with more books than are on the shelves in the STC room. These microfilms are, unfortunately, not presented in STC number order. Instead, the library listing should tell you the reel number, and the position of the book on the reel (e.,g, 4 or 5). See the reference desk for help. For books published from 1640- 1700, you would need to look at Donald Wing's Short Title Catalogue.

Early English Books Online (EEBO) (http://wwwlib.umi.com/eebo/): essentially a computerized version of the STC room with scans of UMI's microfilms of facsimiles of early modern texts. This database is not searchable, but it does include lots of useful historical texts not otherwise digitally available. Requires you to download the DjVu plugin.

The Oxford English Dictionary Online (OED) (http://dictionary.oed.com/) : the standard dictionary for literary scholarship which also gives examples about how a word's usage has changed over time. Use this for your papers.

Middle English Dictionary (MED) (http://www.hti.umich.edu/dict/med/) : An online dictionary of Middle English--currently not quite finished, so entries towards the end of the alphabet may not be available yet.

Chadwyck-Healey Literature Online (LION) (http://lion.chadwyck.com/): a searchable, full-text database of over 250,000 works in English and American Literature, including nearly all early modern English drama, all Renaissance editions of Shakepeare and later adaptations, much early modern poetry, and some early modern prose fiction.

The Furness Shakespeare Library: English Renaissance in Context (http://www.library.upenn.edu/etext/collections/furness/): facsimiles of original playtexts and other stuff from the Renaissance through the nineteenth century plus a bunch of tutorials to learn how to use these materials. You'll need a reasonably fast internet connection to use this site since there are a lot of images to download. To view the tutorials, you'll also need Flash Player, which you can download from the site. If your computer is old or slow, you might want to use the computer on the sixth floor of Van Pelt Library.

The Writing Center (http://www.sas.upenn.edu/writing/services/center.html): all kinds of writing help and advice provided by grad students from various departments, located on the 4th floor of Bennett Hall. Make an appointment by calling 898-8525.

Peer Writing Advisors (http://www.sas.upenn.edu/writing/services/advisors.html) : peer advising online at http://www.english.upenn.edu/~writhelp/ or in-person at the dorms and at Writers House.

Jack Lynch's Grammar and Style Guide (http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Writing/): fast, online advice about style (grammar and mechanics) from former Penn English grad student Jack Lynch.

Writing Program Home Page (http://www.sas.upenn.edu/writing/): general guide to writing resources at Penn.

Tutoring and Learning Resources: Help with all kinds of study skills from time management to reading a lot very quickly. Call 57-EXCEL (573- 9235) for an appointment, email them at tutoring@pobox.upenn.edu, or drop by their office at Suite 110, Harnwell College House/High Rise East (3820 Locust Walk).

Counseling and Psychological Services: Confidential and free individual counseling, support, workshops (on such topics as stress management, eating issues, test anxiety, and relationship issues), and walk-in crisis counseling--all to help you develop greater understanding about yourself and others and to enhance your personal well-being and academic performance. Call 898 - 7021 or stop by their office 133 South 36th Street (near Sansom), 2nd Floor Mellon Building, between 9 AM and 5 PM, Monday - Friday.