Survey of English Literature
from 1700 to the Present
English 211
Meegan Kennedy
This course was taught at Trinity College, Spring 2002
The survey course is a staple of the English literature curriculum in schools across the country. It is often considered more important than the survey of our own American literature. Nevertheless, each professor's survey course will differ from that of her peers. Our differences may be over the dates of the modern era; the inclusion of lesser-known writers; the emphasis on literary quality, historical importance, or social relevance as criteria for including authors; the choice between focusing on single authors as representative of literary eras or providing a broader but shallower picture of an age; the role of literary or critical theory as a tool for reading texts; the effects of race, class, gender, or other ideologies on our understanding of a text; the use or avoidance of an anthology; the imperative to cover a certain range of texts and literary eras; and the construction of a canon.
The survey also presents certain interesting problems as an example of the genre known as literary history. Critics have long debated how to balance the competing claims of literary and historical study in such a project. We need to remember that we create such things as “literary eras” as a retrospective understanding of certain authors or styles.
Our assignments span many genres, including poetry, novel, essay, drama, and film. In designing the course, I included many of the most canonical authors in the British tradition, in part because I feel that a survey course must recognize our culture's demand that readers achieve a kind of literary fluency in the canon. Indeed, you will see how canonical texts and authors become the material for revision and critique in later writers. You will find, however, that in our approach to these writers we do not always accept their status lightly.
You will find this a challenging and sometimes frustrating course due to the incredible range of texts we are asked to encompass. It requires a lot of reading and no small amount of writing, since the best way to know a text is to write about it. I expect thorough and thoughtful preparation from you, but you will enjoy the course much more as a result. I hope to make all this work a rewarding and an exciting experience for you as well.
Readings:
Because you may not know all the ins and outs of English history, you should use the resources of the Longman Anthology. I expect you to know the background material that the Longman provides on each author. The historical essays that introduce each “split” are part of the required reading for this course, and each split also contains an excellent bibliography of secondary works. I have included critical essays by some of the authors we will be reading, so you will be able to examine the changing relation of literary criticism to literature as well as see what various authors thought they were doing.
Films will be placed on reserve in the Media Center at the library. Viewing assigned films is mandatory.
Used copies of these texts would be fine but I recommend finding the same edition. The Longman also comes in a two-volume format, which is fine if you don't mind lugging around the heavy volumes. I've ordered the “split” version, which divides each volume into three parts for easier use.
Longman Anthology of British Literature, Volume 1C, The
Restoration and the Eighteenth Century
Longman Anthology of British Literature, Volume 2A, The Romantics
and Their Contemporaries
Longman Anthology of British Literature, Volume 2B, The Victorian
Age
Longman Anthology of British Literature, Volume 2C, The Twentieth
Century
Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels (Penguin)
Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility (Penguin)
Charles Dickens, Hard Times (Norton)
Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway (Harvest/HBJ)
Jamaica Kincaid, Annie John (Noonday)
L = Longman Anthology
S = supplementary packet, will be available through the English
Department
January
Tues 1/15 Introduction
Tables of Contents (Longman, Norton, Oxford)
Thurs 1/17 The Eighteenth Century (Longman Split 1C) 3T&T
Historical material on “The Restoration and 18th Century” (L1978-2002)
Periodical Papers (L2311 ff), especially Periodical Personae; Inkle and Yarico; Women and Men
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tues 1/22 3T&T
Alexander Pope, “Essay on Criticism” 1711 (L2459-78)
Perspectives: Mind and God (L2626-2657), especially Locke, Watts, Addison.
George Cheyne, from The English Malady, 1733 (S)
Thurs 1/24
John Gay, The Beggar's Opera, 1728 (L2571-2616)
William Hogarth, “Rake's Progress” (AL2617-2625)
VIEW Bertold Brecht and Kurt Weill, Threepenny Opera, 1931
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tues 1/29 3T&T
Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels, 1726: Lilliput and Laputa
Thurs 1/31 PAPER 1 DUE: Close reading (will discuss in class)
Perspectives: Landscape, Pleasure, Power (L2857-2885), especially Addison, Burke, Gray, Gilpin
Samuel Johnson, Travel Writing (L2765-2778), especially “Letter to Hester Thrale” and “Journey to the Western Isles of Scotland”
Joseph Sterne, from Sentimental Journey (S)
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
February
Tues 2/5 The Romantic Period (Longman Split 2A) 3T&T
Historical material on “The Romantics and Their Contemporaries” (L2-28)
Thomas Percy, “Reliques of Ancient English Poetry” (L 298-301)
William Wordsworth, Preface to Lyrical Ballads (L332-336), “Lines Written a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey” (L 328-332), “Resolution and Independence” (L430-433), “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” (L433)
Dorothy Wordsworth, Grasmere Journals (L462-68)
Thurs 2/7
William Wordsworth, The Prelude, Books I, IV, V, VI (L364-395)
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tues 2/12 3T&T
Mary Shelley, Frankenstein, 1818 (L810-927)
Thurs 2/14
Mary Shelley, Frankenstein, 1831 (L927-932)
Frankenstein in Context (L940-958), especially Milton, Byron, Keats, Hazlitt, Shelley, DeQuincey
VIEW Branagh, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tues 2/19 NO CLASS - Trinity Days
Thurs 2/21 3T&T
Perspectives: The Rights of Man, especially Burke, Wollstonecraft, Paine, Godwin (L46-92)
Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Women (L206-235), especially Chapters 1-3
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tues 2/26 3T&T
Jane Austen, Letter (L1028)
Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility, 1813
Thurs 2/28 PAPER 2 DUE: Comparative reading (will discuss in class)
Jane Austen, Sense and Sensibility
Tues 3/5 The Victorian Period (Longman Split 2B) (Mid-term) 3T&T
Historical material on “TheVictorian Age” (L1032-1055)
Thomas Carlyle, from Past and Present (L1082-1092)
Perspectives: The Industrial Landscape (L1093-1119), especially Kemble, Parliamentary Papers, Engels, Mayhew
Thurs 3/7
Charles Dickens, Hard Times, 1854
Backgrounds and Sources from the Norton edition of the novel, on “Education” and “Utilitarianism”
>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tues 3/12 3T&T
Charles Dickens, Hard Times
Backgrounds and Sources, from the Norton edition of the novel, on “Industrialism”
Thurs 3/1
George Eliot, “Brother Jacob” (L 1521-1528) and excerpt from Adam Bede (S)
John Ruskin, from Modern Painters (L 1553-1560)
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tues 3/19 NO CLASS, Spring Vac
Thurs 3/21 NO CLASS, Spring Vac
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tues 3/26 3T&T
Matthew Arnold, “Dover Beach” (L1634-35)
Christina Rossetti, “Goblin Market” (L1712-1724)
Algernon Swinburne, “The Leper” (L1745-1750)
Walter Pater, “Conclusion to The Renaissance” (L1763-1765)
Thurs 3/28 PAPER 3 DUE (see Paper Topics handout)
Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest (L1882-1921) and from The Decay of Lying (L 1858-1872)
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
April
Tues 4/2 The Twentieth Century (Longman Split 2C): Modernism 3T&T
Historical material on “The Twentieth Century” (L1990-2011)
Joseph Conrad, Preface to The Nigger of the “Narcissus” (L2016-2018)
Blast, “Vorticist Manifesto” (L2191-2206)
Wilfred Owen poems (L2241-2242)
Virginia Woolf, “Mr. Bennett and Mrs. Brown” (S)
Thurs 4/4
Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness
with Companion Readings (L2013-2080)
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tues 4/9 3T&T
William Butler Yeats, “The Lake Isle of Innisfree,” “The Wild Swans at Coole,” “Easter 1916,” “The Second Coming,” “Leda and the Swan” (L2305-2324)
W.H. Auden, “In Memory of W.B. Yeats” (L2658-2660)
Thurs 4/11
T.S. Eliot, “The Wasteland” (L2429-2442) and “Tradition and the Individual Talent” (L2447-2452)
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tues 4/16 3T&T
James Joyce, Ulysses, “Aeolus” (L2379-2405)
Thurs 4/18
Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway 1925
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Tues 4/23 Postcolonialism and Postmodernism (Last Class) 3T&T
Jamaica Kincaid, Annie John
VIEW film My Beautiful Laundrette
[Screenplay is in the Longman for reference: Hanif Kureishi, My Beautiful Laundrette (L2777-2822)]
May
Tues 5/7 FINAL EXAM, 3 pm
Grading Policy:
Participation:
Mandatory. Discussion is an important
part of this class and of your learning experience. Please come
to class prepared and ready to talk.
Attendance:
Mandatory. More than 10 minutes late counts
as an absence. Three or more absences may be grounds for lowering
your grade.
Writing:
Three 5-6 pp papers. If you need an extension (up to one week), you must request it in writing one week in advance. Include your name, phone number, and the new due date. Get my signature, then attach it to your paper when you hand it in. Late papers without extensions are penalized. You may rewrite any of your major papers if you hand it in within a week of having received my grade and comments. The final grade overwrites the previous grade entirely; I do not guarantee a better grade.
Weekly “Three Threads and a Thesis” (3T&T). Please post to the Discussion Board (on the course website) by classtime each Tuesday (by midnight), and bring a clean hard copy to class for me. Consider these a preface to class discussion and a chance to practice building an argument on a brief, informal level. 3T&Ts will not be accepted late except in case of illness. They will be graded for clarity; evidence of close, careful reading; and thoughtfulness, on a scale of check, plus for excellent work, minus for careless or insufficient work, or zero (not completed). You may be asked to read your threads or thesis to help situate class discussion.
Short (one-paragraph) responses to someone else's 3T&T on the discussion board. Over the course of the semester I expect you to post at least 5 responses of this sort. These will become part of your participation grade. If you are shy about talking in class, you may choose to post more online responses to share your ideas this way instead.
Final exam:
The format will be announced in the last
few weeks of class, but it is likely to include a number of
quotation ID/short answers and short essays.
Grading:
10% participation (discussion, attendance, online responses,
pop quizzes)
10% 3T&Ts
20% paper 1
20% paper 2
20% paper 3
20% final exam