English 6105-01: Seventeenth-Century Literature
Spring 2012 Dr. Meg Pearson
PAFF 309 678-839-4892
Mondays, 5:30-8 pm megp@westga.edu (NOT mpearson!)
Office hours: M 2-5 pm; TR 2-4 pm Office: TLC 2240
Course description
The seventeenth century has no one issue, theme or ideology. Indeed, it is a time of intense disagreement on nearly every aspect of society and culture. This century in Britain featured the Gunpowder Plot, numerous Irish and Scottish rebellions, witch trials, civil war, foreign conspiracies, regicide, and unceasing religious dissent. From this roiling stew of upheaval emerges some of the darkest but also the most stirring poetry and prose in the English language. The course will focus on three major chronological periods: the Stuart Dynasty, the English Civil War/Interregnum, and the Restoration. Within these time frames, which divide the century roughly as 1603-1642; 1642-1660; and 1660-1700, we will focus on several major authors, such as the Johns (Donne, Milton, and Wilmot, Earl of Rochester), as well as the major themes in poetry, prose, and drama.
Texts
You're welcome to buy whatever edition of these plays and poems you can, although the anthology is a requirement. Just make sure your edition is critical: it needs to have an introduction and footnotes. Just ask me if you're not sure.
Milton, John. Paradise Lost. Ed. John Leonard. New York: Penguin Classics, 2000.
Rudrum, Alan, Joseph Black, Holly Faith Nelson, eds. Broadview Anthology of Seventeenth-Century Verse and Prose. Ontario, Canada: Broadview Press, 2004.
Gamini Salgado, ed. Three Revenge Tragedies: The Revenger's Tragedy; The White Devil; The Changeling. NY: Penguin Classics.
CourseDen Page: a number of our readings both primary and secondary will be available here. All your written work will be submitted here.
Course Policies
Perfect attendance and active participation are expected in a graduate seminar. If for some reason you must miss class, make sure you contact me and stay on top of any work you miss. If you miss more than one class, you should not expect a good grade.
No lateness,
no electronics. I dislike laptops & tablets in the classroom, but you are
welcome to make a pitch. Please bring hard copies of readings to class or ample
notes.
Formatting and
Submitting Papers:
All take-home papers will be turned in using our CourseDen page. However, they should still have all the appropriate formatting required by MLA standards. All papers should be typed in a simple font in 10-12 point typeface. Always leave one-inch margins on each side. Papers are always to be double-spaced. Always cite your sources. And finally, always make a back-up copy of every paper you write. Look into Dropbox or Google Docs or something similar if you can’t keep a hard copy safe.
You will sometimes need to email me your papers, such as when you want me to look over a draft. Please send papers to megp@westga.edu or, if that’s not working, to mfpearson@gmail.com. When I receive your email with an attachment, I will email you back right away to say “Got it.” If you submit something to me, not to CourseDen, and I do not email you back within 24 hours, I have not received your paper. Resend it.
CourseDen will let you know when you’ve submitted, and you can double check it yourself. If you have having troubles with CourseDen, please get in touch with the University ITS people. I cannot help you, sadly.
The departmental grading rubric for all upper-division written work may be found here. Assume that I expect A-level upper-division work from a graduate class. If you have trouble with your writing, you will need to do twice as much work to get up to snuff. See me, see the Writing Center, etc., for help. I have lots of writing tips and terms and links on my website, too: http://www.westga.edu/~megp.
Academic
Honesty:
Plagiarism or cheating, whether it is using the words and/or ideas of another
without properly giving credit to the source(s), submitting someone
else’s work as your own, submitting your own work completed for another class
without my permission, collaborating on individual exercises, or otherwise
violating the university's code of academic integrity will not be tolerated,
and infractions will be severely punished. Familiarize yourself with the
proper rules for citation for the English department (MLA) and the university’s
policy on academic dishonesty: http://www.westga.edu/~engdept/Plagiarism/pladef.html.
If you cheat in my class, you will receive an automatic F for the class. Do not test this.
Requirements
Response papers: You will submit three response essays in the course of the semester; these must be submitted one at a time, but they may be submitted via CourseDen at any point until April 9th. (Look in Readings/Assignments folder.) They should be around 750 words in length (about 2-3 pp.). These short essays should present an original, focused, thesis-driven analytical reading of some aspect of that week’s text in the context of critical ideas relevant to the class and our conversations. These are not journals; these are not about your feelings. (30%)
Discussion of Secondary Sources: Each of you will be responsible for presenting one day's secondary work and aiding discussion. Each student will sign up for a date, and present and analyze the article’s argument and context in a brief (10 minute) presentation that class. Think of this as a way to start your research for the final paper, as well. Please note that almost all our articles are available through UWG's Galileo network. Those that are not will be available on the CourseDen page. You will sign up via Sign Up Genius. Look for an email to your campus account. (10%)
Oral presentation: You’ll be responsible for one 15-minute (~ 8-page) thesis-driven, analytical oral presentation incorporating critical sources. This is essentially a conference paper, a formal presentation. (In other words, you’ll mostly be reading.) You should talk to me beforehand about your topic and progress. (You will turn in a hard copy, with a works cited page in MLA style, immediately after your presentation.) You may certainly bring visual technology into your presentation, but don't let cutesy screen sweeps in PowerPoint overpower your thinking. Presentations will begin Monday, January 30th. You will sign up via Sign Up Genius. Look for an email to your campus account. (20%)
Research Paper: A 15-17 page critical essay on a topic you will devise. You’ll submit a 2-page prospectus beforehand. I will provide more detailed guidelines later in the semester, but the ideal scenario might feature you adapting your conference paper into a final paper. (40%)
SYLLABUS/CALENDAR: Please have texts read completely by the day under which they are listed. If only an author’s name is noted, please read everything in the text.
Monday, January 9th: Pre-assigned reading
Early: Herbert, “The Collar”
Middle: Milton, Sonnet 12
Late: Jane Barker, “To My Friends Against Poetry”
SIGN UP FOR PAPERS/PRESENTATIONS BY 23rd VIA SIGN UP GENIUS!
Monday, January 16th: MLK Holiday – NO CLASS
Monday, January 23rd: Revenge Tragedy (Three Revenge Tragedies)
Middleton, The Revenger’s Tragedy (1606)
Middleton/Rowley, The Changeling (ca. 1620s)
Neill, Michael. "Bastardy, Counterfeiting, And Misogyny In The Revenger's Tragedy." SEL: Studies In English Literature, 1500-1900 36.2 (1996): 397-416. (Available via GALILEO)
Secondary Reading:
Monday, January 30th: Religious Poetry – John Donne (Broadview Anthology)
“Apparition,” “The Flea,” “Good Morrow,” “Indifferent,” “The Sun Rising,” “The Canonization,” “Valediction: of Weeping,” “The Ecstasy,” Elegy VI, Elegy VIII, Elegy XIX, Holy Sonnets V, X, XII, XIV, and “Hymn to God My God”
Greteman, Blaine. "'All This Seed Pearl': John Donne And Bodily Presence." College Literature 37.3 (2010): 26-42. (Available via GALILEO)
Secondary Reading:
Conference Paper:
Monday, February 6th: Stuart Poetry & Prose
Prose: Francis Bacon (“Of Truth,” “Of Simulation,” “Of Marriage,””Of Studies” (1625 version)), Nicholas Breton (all), Lady Margaret Hoby (all), Owen Felltham (“Of Woman”)
Poetry: Lanyer (Salve lines 745-end; “Cooke-ham”), Jonson (“To The Reader,” “On My First Daughter,” “On my First Son,” “To Penshurst,””On The New Inn”), Wroth (all), Campion (all)
Coch, Christine. "An Arbor Of One's Own? Aemilia Lanyer And The Early Modern Garden." Renaissance And Reformation/Renaissance Et Réforme 28.2 (2004): 97-118. (Available through GALILEO)
Secondary Reading:
Conference Paper:
Monday, February 13th: English Civil War: Poetry & Prose from both sides
Monarch: James I (“Speech to the Lords and Commons), Charles I (“Seditious in Scotland”)
Cavalier (Royalist): Lovelace (“The Ant”) Herrick (“Delight in Disorder,” “Duty to Tyrants,” “Fresh Cheese and Cream,” “The Bad Season Makes the Poet Sad,” “Upon Julia’s Clothes”)
Roundhead (Parliamentarian): Marvell, “Ode Upon Cromwell,” Hutchinson, Memoirs (pp 818-28), Wm Walwyn, “The Bloody Project”
Pugh, Syrithe. "'Cleanly-Wantonnesse' And Puritan Legislation: The Politics Of Herrick's Amatory Ovidianism." Seventeenth Century 21.2 (2006): 249-269. (Available through GALILEO)
Secondary Reading:
Conference Paper:
Monday, February 20th: John Milton Political Prose & Poetry
Areopagitica, “L’Allegro,” “Il Penseroso,” “Sonnet 19”
Thickstun, Margaret. "Resisting Patience In Milton's Sonnet 19." Milton Quarterly 44.3 (2010): 168-180. (Available via GALILEO)
Secondary Reading:
Conference Paper:
Monday, February 27th: John Milton, Paradise Lost (Books I-IV)
Martin, Thomas L. "On The Margin Of God: Deconstruction And The Language Of Satan In Paradise Lost." Milton Quarterly 29.2 (1995): 41-47 (Available through GALILEO)
Secondary Reading:
Conference Paper:
Monday, March 5th: Milton, Paradise Lost (Books V-VIII)
Dobranski, Stephen B. "Clustering And Curling Locks: The Matter Of Hair In Paradise Lost." PMLA: Publications Of The Modern Language Association Of America 125.2 (2010) (Available through GALILEO)
Secondary Reading:
Conference Paper:
Monday, March 12th: Milton, Paradise Lost (Books IX-XII)
Miller, Shannon. "Serpentine Eve: Milton And The Seventeenth-Century Debate Over Women." Milton Quarterly 42.1 (2008): 44-68. (Available via GALILEO)
Lehnhof, Kent R. "Scatology and The Sacred In Milton's Paradise Lost." English Literary Renaissance 37.3 (2007): 429-449. (GALILEO)
Secondary Reading:
Secondary Reading:
Conference Paper:
Monday, March 19th: Spring Break – NO CLASS
Monday, March 26th: Restoration History
Charles II (“Declaration of Breda”), John Evelyn (“The Restoration”), Katherine Philips (“Upon the Double Murder of King Charles I,” “On the Numerous Access of the English to wait upon the King in Flanders”), Anthony à Wood (“The Restoration” pp. 1023-25), George Savile, Marquis of Halifax ( “A Character of King Charles II”)
Bond, Christopher. "The Phœnix And The Prince: The Poetry Of Thomas Ross And Literary Culture In The Court Of Charles II." Review Of English Studies 60.246 (2009): 588-604. (GALILEO)
Secondary Reading:
Conference Paper:
Monday, April 2nd: Restoration Prose/Diaries
Aphra Behn (Love Letters), Samuel Pepys’ & John Evelyn’s diaries on the Great Fire of London, Thomas Sprat
Kohlmann, Benjamin. "'Men Of Sobriety And Buisnes': Pepys, Privacy And Public Duty." Review Of English Studies 61.251 (2010): 553-571. (GALILEO)
Secondary Reading:
Conference Paper:
Conference Paper:
Monday, April 9th: Restoration Poetry
Dryden (“Juvenal’s Sixth Satire”), Anne Killigrew (“On a Picture Painted by Herself”), Marvell (“To His Coy Mistress”), Rochester (all), Aphra Behn (“On the Death of Rochester”)
Rosenfeld, Nancy. "'Into Some Dirty Hole Alone': The Earl of Rochester Perverts Milton." Atenea 26.2 (2006): 45-68. (GALILEO)
Recommended: Fisher, Nicholas. "The Contemporary Reception of Rochester's A Satyr Against Mankind." Review Of English Studies: The Leading Journal Of English Literature And The English Language 57.229 (2006): 185-220. (GALILEO)
Secondary Reading:
Conference Paper:
Monday, April 16th: Last Day of Class – All remaining conference presentations!
Monday, April 23rd: Exam Period (Final Papers Due by noon)