English 20.900: Major British Writers, 1350-1660

Summer 2002
Tuesdays 5:30 P.M. - 8:40 P.M.
300 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: engl020-900-02b@lists.upenn.edu
Course home page: http://www.english.upenn.edu/~elin/eng20_su02.html

Last updated: 5/20/02

Course Description | Books and Bulkpack | Schedule | Requirements and Policies | Resources

Course Description

How do Chaucer's texts portray women? What did people do for fun in Shakespeare's day? How did Spenser and Milton think a poet should write? This course is a survey of the so-called "great" writers of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, but rather than generalizing about what makes these writers "great" (a very problematic designation), we will examine their texts in relation to the larger cultural framework in which they operated. To that end, we will look at both "literary" texts and other kinds of "non-literary" materials, such as anatomical treatises, legal documents, and engravings. Discussions will investigate such issues as the material production of texts, theatrical performance, gender and sexuality, conceptions of identity and theories of the body, religion, science, literary genres and traditions, and European imperialism and interracial encounters. In addition to written work, active class participation and at least one oral presentation will be required.

This course is an SAS Distribution III course and is required of most English majors.

Texts

Books

Books have been ordered through House of Our Own Bookstore at 3920 Spruce Street. It is important that we all use the same editions of these texts. If you already have a used copy of these particular editions, feel free to use them, but if you plan on purchasing the texts new, please do not buy them through the Penn Bookstore, which is operated by the Barnes and Noble chain.

Bulkpack

The bulkpack will be available from Wharton Reprographics in the basement of Steinberg-Deitrich Hall.

Bulkpack Contents:

Schedule

Tu 5/21 First Day of Class Topics of discussion:
  • Introduction to the course

Reading due today: None.

Individual Conferences #1
Tu 5/28 Unit 1

Literature, Orality, and Identity: Theoretical Problems and the Example of The Canterbury Tales

Topics of discussion:
  • Introduction to The Canterbury Tales
  • Introduction to Middle English
  • Voice, character, narrator, and reader response
Reading due today:
  • Canterbury Tales
    • "Chaucer's Language"
    • General Prologue
7:40-8:10 PM Middle English practice: group #1

8:10-8:40 PM Middle English practice: group #2

Tu 6/4 Unit 1 (cont'd) Topics of discussion:
  • Literary theory and The Canterbury Tales
  • Speech acts, games, and intentionality
  • Gender and authority
Reading due today:
  • Canterbury Tales
    • Miller's Prologue and Tale
    • Wife of Bath's Prologue and Tale
 
Tu 6/11 Unit 2

Drama and Performance

 Topics of discussion:
  • Mankind
  • Medieval theatre and popular traditions
  • Religion and everyday life
  • Writing skills review
Reading due today:
  • Mankind
Language Quiz

Individual Conferences #2

Tu 6/18 Unit 2 (cont'd) Topics of discussion:
  • Library Tour
  • Guest Speaker
Reading due today:
  • To be announced
 
Tu 6/25 Unit 2 (cont'd) Topics of discussion:
  • Twelfth Night
  • Role-playing, clowning, and theatrical performance
  • Gender, sexuality, crossdressing, and the body
Reading due today:
  • Twelfth Night
  • Selections from back of Smith edition
    • "Sexuality" (pp. 183-5)
    • Crooke's Microcosmographia (pp. 195-201)
    • "Eroticism, Homoeroticism, Paneroticism" (pp. 201-2)
    • "Clothing and Disguise" (pp. 237-9)
 
Tu 7/2 Unit 2 (cont'd) Topics of discussion:
  • Spanish Tragedy
  • Spectacle and spectatorship
  • Plays-within-plays and the actor-audience relationship
  • Material conditions of theatrical performance
  • Stage violence
Reading due today:
  • Spanish Tragedy, including 1602 additions
  • Knutson, excerpt from The Repertory of Shakespeare's Company
Close Reading Exercise due
Tu 7/9 Unit 3

Poetry and Genre: Romance, Lyric, and Epic

Topics of discussion:
  • The Faerie Queene
  • Allegory, representation, and politics
  • Gender: the figure of the woman warrior
  • Genre: romance and epic
Reading due today:
  • The Faerie Queene
    • "A Letter of the Authors"
    • Book I, Canto I: 1-28
    • Book III, Proem & Canto I (all)
  • "Poetic Forms and Literary Terminology" from The Norton Anthology
 
Tu 7/16 Unit 3 (cont'd) Topics of discussion:
  • Lyric and Romance
  • The position of women writers
  • Language and the poetic subject
  • Metaphor, representation, and signification
Reading due today:
  • Elizabeth I's speeches
  • Excerpt from Wroth's "Urania"
  • Donne's "The Flea," "The Canonization," & "Elegy 19: To His Mistress Going to Bed"
Annotated Bibliography and Preliminary Thesis due
Tu 7/23 Unit 3 (cont'd) Topics of discussion:
  • Introduction to Paradise Lost
  • The epic: formal structures and conventions
  • The English Civil War
Reading due today:
  • Paradise Lost, Books I-VI (Read Books II & IV in detail; read summaries of the other books)
 
Tu 7/30 Unit 3 (cont'd) Topics of discussion:
  • Paradise Lost (cont'd)
  • Labor and imperialism
  • Oral presentations
Reading due today:
  • Paradise Lost, Books VI-XII (Read Book IX & end of Book XII in detail; read summaries of the other books)
Oral presentations:
  • ____________
  • ____________
  • ____________
  • ____________
  • ____________
Tu 8/6 Last Day of Class Topics of discussion:
  • Oral presentations
  • Summary
  • Course Evaluations
Reading due today: None. Final Paper due

Oral presentations:

  • ____________
  • ____________
  • ____________
  • ____________
  • ____________
  • ____________
  • ____________
  • ____________

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.

Middle English Practice

I will divide the class into two groups, and we'll practice reading aloud from The Canterbury Tales during the class session noted above. To improve your pronunciation, you can also listen to audio files of Middle English read by various scholars at http://www.unlv.edu/faculty/rusche/mesounds.html and http://academics.vmi.edu/english/audio/audio_index.html.

Language Quiz

I will give one short language quiz where you will be asked to translate a passage from Middle English into contemporary English. It will test your basic understanding of words and sentence structures used repeatedly in The Canterbury Tales, not whether or not you can memorize obscure vocabulary words used only once or twice. If you are having trouble understanding the language of the texts we read for this course, you can always make an appointment with me outside of class to get some additional help.

Close Reading Exercise

This assignment will ask you to analyze an excerpt from a literary text using several different close reading methods. The goal is to train you in the key techniques of literary criticism: finding patterns in specific details from texts and relating those patterns to larger issues throughout the text. Different parts of this assignment will ask you to do different things. For example, one section might present an excerpt from The Canterbury Tales, then ask you to choose a word from that excerpt, look that word up in the Middle English Dictionary (MED) and the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), and then write about how that word's history, etymology, and usage affects one's understanding of the passage. Another section might ask you to trace patterns of imagery in a passage from a text and then describe how that imagery relates to other issues in the larger text. Yet another section might ask you (1) to list how each line in an excerpt positions the reader, (2) to describe what kind of response from the reader the passage implies would be desirable, and (3) to theorize what the overall effect of such positioning is with regard to the entire text. Each section will be short and packed full of your analytical insights without the extra baggage and "filler" of writing a paper. I'll give you more information about this assignment when the time comes.

More information about this assignment is now available here.

Annotated Bibliography and Preliminary Thesis

In anticipation of your final paper, I'll ask each of you to turn in 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. I'll give you more information about this assignment when the time comes.

More information about this assignment is now available here.

Oral Presentation

Towards the end of the semester, each of you will give a short presentation (10-15 minutes) on a research topic of your choice. This assignment is a chance for you to share your specialized knowledge of a particular area with the rest of the class and to learn from others. The work you do to prepare for this presentation will become part of your final paper.

More information about this assignment is now available here.

Final Paper

For your final paper, I will ask you to do a "new historicist" reading of a literary text. In other words, you will analyze a literary text in the context of historical research you do on the topic of your choice. You will be required to use both primary and secondary sources. This longer paper (2500-3000 words) will combine the close reading skills you develop in the first assignment, the research skills you develop for the second assignment, and the historical information you learn in preparing for your oral presentation. It should be the culmination of your semester's work. 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.