| Syllabus:
Instructor: Term: Time: Room: Office: Office hours: |
English 750 (Classic to Romantic Seminar)
Maner Winter 2006 TTh 2:15-3:55 PM 499 Millett 441 Millett TTh, 1:00-2:00 and other times by appointment |
| Texts: | Abrams, M. H. The Mirror and the Lamp: Romantic Theory and the Critical Tradition. 1953. New York: Norton, 1958. |
| Abrams, M. H., et al., eds. The Norton Anthology of English Literature. 7th ed. 2 vols. New York: Norton, 2000. | |
| Gibaldi, Joseph. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. 6th ed. New York: MLA, 2003. |
| Date | Topic | Reading |
| Tue 1/3 |
Introduction Overview of critical theories "Generality" in neoclassical literature Characteristics of neoclassical criticism Discuss prospectus for term paper |
Handouts; Abrams 3-69. (Note: all assignments labelled "Abrams" are from The Mirror and the Lamp. Anthology assignments are labeled "Norton" and are identified by volume and page number.) |
| Thu 1/5 |
Samuel Johnson and classicism
"The Vanity of Human Wishes" "On the Death of Dr. Robert Levet" (Explore "Norton Topics Online" at <http://www.wwnorton.com/nael/welcome.htm> to get an overview of the Restoration and eighteenth century.) |
Norton 1: 2660-70, 2672-73. |
| Tue 1/10 |
Samuel Johnson and classicism "Preface to Shakespeare" From the Life of Milton: "Lycidas," "L'Allegro," "Il Penseroso" |
Norton 1: 2674-76, 2712-19, 2725-36, 2738-40, 2894-95. |
| Thu 1/12 |
The emergence of expressionist theories Alexander Pope, from Essay on Criticism (1.130-80) |
Abrams 69-155; Norton 1: 2512-13. |
| Mon 1/16 |
Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Wright State closed |
|
| Tue
1/17 |
Thomas Gray and pre-romanticism
"Ode on a Distant Prospect of Eton College" "Ode on the Death of a Favorite Cat" "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard" |
Norton 1: 2825-33. |
| Thu 1/19 |
Workshop on prospectuses and term papers | |
| Mon 1/23 |
Last day to drop without a "W" | |
| Tue 1/24 |
The psychology of literary invention
Term paper prospectus due |
Abrams 156-225. |
| Thu 1/26 |
William Collins "Ode Written the Year 1746" "Ode on the Poetical Character" "Ode to Evening" |
Norton 1: 2833-39. |
| Tue
1/31 |
Oliver Goldsmith
The Deserted Village Return graded prospectuses |
Norton 1: 2857-67. |
| Thu 2/2 |
Literature and personality | Abrams 226-62 |
| Tue
2/7 |
The Romantic Period William Blake Poetical Sketches Songs of Innocence and Experience |
Norton 2: 1-21, 35-59. |
| Thu 2/9 |
William Blake The Marriage of Heaven and Hell |
Norton 2: 72-86. |
| Tue 2/14 |
William Wordsworth "Tintern Abbey" Preface to Lyrical Ballads 10-minute oral reports based on annotated topic bibliography Hand in annotated bibliography of 10 sources on an eighteenth-century "trend" plus 1-2 pp. overview |
Norton 2: 219-21, 235-51. |
| Thu 2/16 |
William Wordsworth "Michael" |
Norton 2: 270-80. |
| Mon 2/20 |
Last day to drop a class with a "W" | |
| Tue 2/21 |
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
"Frost at Midnight" Biographia Literaria The ode and the greater Romantic lyric |
Norton 2: 416-18, 457-58, 467-86. |
| Thu 2/23 |
Literature and poetic truth | Abrams 263-97. |
| Tue 2/28 |
John Keats "Ode to a Nightingale" |
Norton 2: 823-26, 849-51. |
| Thu 3/2 |
John Keats "Ode on a Grecian Urn" Keats's letters |
Norton 2: 851-53, 887-903. |
| Tue 3/7 |
George Gordon, Lord Byron From Childe Harold's Pilgrimage From Don Juan |
Norton 2: 551-55, 563-75, 621-50. |
| Thu 3/9 |
Scientific truth, poetic truth Course evaluation Term paper due (10 pp. minimum plus bibliography) |
Abrams 297-335. |
| Thu 3/16 |
Final exam (same room, but note the different time!) 3:15-5:15 PM |
| Evaluation | ||
| Prospectus for term paper | 15% | |
| Term paper | 35% | |
| Annotated bibliography & overview | 25% | |
| Final exam | 20% | |
| Participation and attendance | 5% | |
| Participation and attendance portion of course grade: | 0-1 absence | A | |
| 2 absences | B | ||
| 3 absences | C | ||
| 4 absences | D | ||
| 5 absences | F | ||
| 6 absences will result in an F for the entire course. | |||
| Course grades are computed by multiplying weighted percentages times the numerical value of letter grades, using the following equivalents: A = 4.0, A- = 3.8, B+ = 3.2, and so on. | |||
| Assistance on Papers
I am happy to meet with you individually for assistance, but administrative work may force me to miss office hours occasionally. Making an appointment a day ahead of time is always advisable. |
| Class Policies |
| 1. Late work will be subject to the following reductions: A minor assignment (such as a bibliography or prospectus) must be turned in on time and will receive a zero if it is late. A major assignment (such as a term paper) turned in after the beginning of class but by 4:30 PM on the due date will be penalized 5 points (on a 100-point scale). For each day or portion of a day thereafter, the penalty will be 10 points per day. Work slipped under my office door during class will be considered late and will receive an F. If you must miss class but wish to turn in a printed copy for credit, you must have the date and time recorded by an English Department secretary in 470 Millett in order to demonstrate that it was turned in on time. If you must be late for class for some reason, you may meet the on-time requirement by sending the day's assignment as an e-mail attachment. |
| 2. Papers shorter than the assigned minimum length will
receive grade reductions. Please do not try to evade the length requirement
by fooling around with large fonts and margins. A page using proper
MLA format should have 1" margins on all sides, 1/3" line spacing, 27 lines
to the page (unless over-ridden by widow and orphan control), plus a page
header. Properly formatted MLA templates are available at
<http://www.wright.edu/~martin.maner/rptemp.htm>. |
| 3. I will not give a make-up final examination unless arrangements have been made before the regularly scheduled examination has been given. |
| 4. Assistance on written work should be limited to the instructor, library reference personnel, and Writing Center personnel. Automatic penalty for any form of plagiarism (defined as passing off the work of someone else as if it were your own): F for the course, written notification of the Dean of the College of Liberal Arts and the English Department Chair. Your papers for this course must be exclusively your own and exclusively for this course. You may not submit a previously submitted paper, nor a paper simultaneously submitted for another course. |
| 5. I normally do not grant "I" grades, since they usually cause more problems than they solve. If you miss an assignment, your grade will be computed on the basis of the work you completed, with the missing assignment counted as a zero. |
| 6. Please do not ask me what you missed. You are responsible for making arrangements with a classmate to supply you with information about classes you missed. If questions remain, see me. |
| 7. Mid-course changes in the syllabus (assignments, readings, grading policies) are sometimes necessary, though I will always try to provide sufficient advance notice of such changes. |
| 8. My office is 441 Millett, telephone 775-2639. You may leave messages for me with the department secretaries at 775-3136. |
| 9. Sending a fax copy to meet a deadline is acceptable. The departmental fax number is 775-2707. However, it is your responsibility to follow up the fax transmission by calling 775-3136 to confirm that the fax copy was received. You should always "chase" a fax copy with a regular printed copy as soon as possible, since fax copies are flimsy and often only semi-legible. You may also submit assignments as e-mail messages or attachments in Word format, but you are responsible for knowing how to do this. For example, if your e-mail software cannot handle attributes such as underlining, the absence of underlining will be treated as an error. (It is unreasonable to expect your instructor to format your work and then grade it on the basis of his own corrections.) |
| 10. Since the early weeks of the course are focused mainly on getting started in library research, you will have accumulated only a few percentage points of graded credit by the time the last drop date arrives. Probably the best way to estimate your likely performance in this course is to ask yourself the following questions: a) Have I spent at least 8 to 12 hours of well directed work for this course during the opening weeks? b) Have I become familiar with the essential research tools such as bibliographies, indexes, online resources, and library catalogs? c) By the time the drop date arrives, have I found and listed virtually all the available English-language sources relevant to my topics? d) Has a diagnostic quiz over English skills indicated that my grade is likely to be limited to C or lower? (Diagnostics are available on request.) |
| Resources |
| My Home Page, with Links to Syllabi: http://www.wright.edu/~martin.maner |
| Guide to Essential Tools for Research in English Literature:
http://www.wright.edu/~martin.maner/essential_tools.htm |
| Using Search Engines to Find Web Resources:
http://www.wright.edu/~martin.maner/search_engines.htm |
| Online Resources for Research Writers:
http://www.wright.edu/~martin.maner/eng344.htm |
| Links to Resources in Literature and the Humanities:
http://www.wright.edu/cola/Dept/eng/lit_links.htm |
| E-Mail Links: Martin Maner Charlotte Droll (Humanities Reference Librarian) Martin Jenkins (Humanities Reference Librarian) |