IMPORTANT DATES & WEEKLY SCHEDULE
RECENT HANDOUTS (click item to download an .rft file)
- Précis of T. S. Eliot's "Hamlet" (11/20)
- Historical Inquiry 1 - Biography: Poe's Account of Writing "The Raven" (11/20 - instruction sheet only; essay available from office door)
IMPORTANT DATES
Formal Papers
Exams
- Mid-Term Exam: Thu, Oct 15
- Final Exam for 004: Thu, Dec 17 (10:00 - 12:00)
- Final Exam for 005: Tue, Dec 15 (10:30 - 12:30)
Other Important Dates
- Last day to drop without a grade - Sep 11
- Last day to drop or with a "W" - Oct 16
- Last day of classes - Wed., Dec 09
WEEKLY SCHEDULE
UNIT I: WHAT DOES A LITERARY WORK MEAN? THEMATIC INQUIRY
For the first week of the semester, we will consider more rigorous ways of answering a basic interpretive question in the study of literature: What does a literary work "mean"? This basic approach to the study of literature is often called "thematic criticism," or what I will be calling "thematic inquiry." Also, we will find that our inquiries into the meaning of individual literary works often involve matters outside the literary work, including literary trends and traditions.
WEEK 1 (Sep 01-03)
Session 1 (Tue, Sep 01) Introduction to Thematic Inquiry
Required reading (in class)
- C. Bukowski, "the trash men" (handout)
- S. Musgrave, "Hidden Meaning" (handout)
- The Concepts of "Theme" and "Thematics" in the Study of Literature (handout)
- R. P. Warren, "Driver, Driver" (handout)
WEEK 2 (Sep 8-10)
Session 2 (Tue, Sep 8) Thematic Concepts: Myth and Literary Allusion
Required reading:
- Thematic 7: Edgar Allan Poe, "The Purloined Letter" (assignment available online but not Poe's story)
Session 3 (Thu, Sep 10) Theme and Motif: A Reading of Poe's "The Purloined Letter"
Required reading:
- Thematic 8: L. K. Babener, "The Shadow's Shadow: The Motif of the Double in Edgar Allan Poe's 'The Purloined Letter'" (assignment availalbe online but not Babener's essay)
WEEK 3 (Sep 15-17)
Session 4 (Tue, Sep 15) Symbol and Allegory
Required reading:
- Thematic 9 & 10: Symbol and Allegory in Poe's "The Raven" and Hawthorne's "Young Goodman Brown"
- Symbol (Norton 186-88)
- "Symbol," "Symbolism," "Allegory" (Handbook to Literature)
Session 5 (Thu, Sep 17) A Thematic Theory of Literature
Required reading:
- N. Frye, "Levels of Meaning in Literature" (handout; not available online)
- Précis of N. Frye's "Levels of Meaning in Literature" (handout)
UNIT II: ANALYTIC INQUIRY: THE INTERRELATIONS OF CONTENT AND FORM
Literature is often distinguished from other kinds of discourse by the degree to which the meaning of any literary work depends on an exploitation of the resources of language. It is for this reason that critics and scholars focus their attention on various parts of a literary work: they are examining the often complex way that literary meaning is composed. In this section of the class, we shift our focus to these aspects of literature in order to see how they can affect the interpretation of literary works.
WEEK 4 (Feb 03-05)
Session 6 (Tue, Feb 03) Analysis of Poetry - Stanzas and Lines
Required reading:
- M. Oliver, "The Kitten" (handout)
- W. Wordsworth, "It is a beautious evening" (handout)
- W. H. Auden, ["O Where Are You Going"] (handout)
- G. Kinnell, "How Many Nights" (handout)
- J. Ashbery, "The Couple in the Next Room" (handout)
- A. Rich, "At a Bach Concert" (handout)
Session 7 (Thu, Feb 05) Analysis of Poetry - Meter
Required reading:
- S. T. Coleridge, "Metrical Feet" (Norton)
- J. Suckling, "Song" (Norton)
- J. Dryden, "To the Memory of Mr. Oldham" (Norton)
- M. Harper, "Dear John, Dear Coltrane" (Norton)
WEEK 5 (Feb 10-12) Analysis of Narrative - Narrator and Point of View
Session 8 (Tue, Feb 10)
Required reading:
- Analytic 6: E. A. Poe, "The Cask of Amontillado" (Norton 70-74)
- A. Bierce, "Occurence at Owl Creek Bridge," (Norton 507-13)
- Analytic 7: A. Robbe-Grillet, "The Secret Room" (handout)
Session 09 (Thu, Feb 12)
Required reading:
WEEK 6 (Feb 17-19)
Session 10 (Tue, Feb 17) Tropes and Figures of Speech
Required reading:
- E. Pound, "In a Station of the Metro" (Norton )
- W. S. Merwin, "Separation" (handout)
- Analytic 8: Tropes and Slang
- Analytic 9: Introduction to the Figura (Figures of Speech)
- E. A. Poe, "The Raven" (Norton )
- C. Brooks, "Irony as a Principle of Structure" (handout)
- Mid-Term Study Guide
Session 11 (Thu, Feb 19) An Analytic Theory of Literature
Required reading:
- C. Brooks, "Irony as a Principle of Structure" (handout)
WEEK 7 (Feb 24-26)
Session 12 (Tue, Feb 24) Mid-Term Exam
UNIT III: GENERIC INQUIRY
In the previous section on "analytic inquiry," we became acquainted with some basic concepts used by literary scholars to talk about the interrelations of content and form. A related feature of literary discourse comes about when particular ways of exploiting language become conventional. When a set of conventions shape a literary work, we have evidence of a genre. We shall begin by examining the thematic and formal conventions of the sonnet. Then we will then shift our attention to short fiction and look at several "initiation stories" and stories of the grotesque; next we examine a genre of non-fiction prose--the essay; and finally we turn our attention to tragedy.
Session 13 (Thu, Feb 26) The Grotesque
Required reading:
- "Grotesque," entry in the Handbook to Literature
- F. O'Connor, "A Good Man Is Hard to Find" (Norton)
- F. O'Conner, Excerpt from "The Grotesque in Southern Fiction" (Norton)
- E. Welty, "Why I Live at the P.O." (Norton)
WEEK 8 (Mar 03-05)
Session 14 (Tue, Mar 03)
Required reading:
- Sonnets (handout)
- Sonnets (Norton )
- R. Frost, "Design" (Norton )
Session 15 (Thu, Mar 05) Aphorisms, Apothegms, Fragments
Required reading:
- "Aphorism," "Apothegm" in Handbook to Literature
- F. Bacon, selections from "Idols of the Mind" (handout)
- F. Schlegel, selections from the Athenaeum Fragments (handout)
- F. Nietzsche, selections from Human, All Too Human (handout)
SPRING BREAK (Mar 09-14)
WEEK 9 (Mar 17-19)
Session 16 (Tue, Mar 17) Origins of the Essay
Required reading:
Session 17 (Thu, Mar 19) An Aphoristic Theory of Literature
Required reading:
- K. Burke, "Literature as Equipment for Living" (handout)
WEEK 10 (Mar 24-26)
Session 18 (Tue, Mar 24) Tragedy: Sophocles' Oedipus Tyrannos
Required reading:
Session 19 (Thu, Mar 26) Aristotle's Theory of Tragedy
Required readings
- Aristotle, from The Poetics (handout)
- Paper 3
WEEK 11 (Mar 31 - Apr 02)
Session 20 (Tue, Mar 31) Elizabethan Tragedy: Shakespeare's Hamlet
Required reading:
- W. Shakespeare, Hamlet (Norton)
Session 21 (Thu, Apr 02) Hamlet (cont.)
Required reading:
- W. Shakespeare, Hamlet
- Comparing the Conventions of Tragic Drama in Oedipous Tyrannos & Hamlet
- T. S. Eliot, "The Problem with Hamlet" (handout)
UNIT IV. HISTORICAL INQUIRY
How do critics and scholars study the historical dimension of literary works? In this section of the class, we will become acquainted with four modes of historical inquiry into literature: biography, literary history, cultural history, and sociopolitical history.
WEEK 12 (Apr 07-09)
Session 22 (Tue, Apr 07) Some Problems of Biographical Inquiry: Poe's Account of Writing "The Raven"
Required reading:
- Edgar Allan Poe, "The Raven"
- ---, "The Philosophy of Composition" (handout)
Session 23 (Thu, Apr 09) Favorite Author Reports
- Biographical reports on authors
WEEK 13 (Apr 14-16)
Session 24 (Tue, Apr 14) Favorite Author Reports
- Biographical reports on authors
Session 25 (Thu, Apr 16) Favorite Author Reports
- Biographical reports on authors
WEEK 14 (Apr 21-23)
Session 26 (Tue, Apr 21) Sociopolitical History: From Biographical to Political History
Required reading:
- J. Conrad, Heart of Darkness (Norton Critical Edition)
- "Writing the Story" (Norton Critical Edition, 195-217); this section of the Norton edition contains (1) short excerpts from biographical discussions on Conrad and (2) a selection from Conrad's correspondence.
- "Conrad on Life and Art" (Norton Critical Edition, 218-35); as the title indicates, this section contains excerpts from Conrad's own discussions on the relationship of art and life, taken from prefaces that Conrad wrote for his novels and from his correspondence.
Session 26 (Thu, Apr 23) The Question of Racism in Heart of Darkness
Required reading:
- C. Achebe, "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness" (Norton Critical Edition 336-49)
- E. Said, "Two Visions in Heart of Darkness" (Norton Critical Edition 422-29)
- J. H. Miller, "Should We Read 'Heart of Darkness'" (Norton Critical Edition 463-74)
WEEK 15 (Apr 28)
Session 27 (Tue, Apr 28) Review Session for Final Exam (last day of class)
- Final Paper due
- Final Exam - Study Guide
