EL306 English Romantics Spring 2018
THE ENGLISH ROMANTICS This course covers selected works of British Romantics William Blake, William Wordsworth, Samuel T. Coleridge, John Keats, Percy B. Shelley, Lord Byron, Anna Laetitia Barbauld, and Felicia Dorothea Hemans. The textbook is available at Günel Copy.
Course Requirements: Attendance and participation: 5 points for regularly attending classes and 5 points for participating in class discussions. 10% of the final grade
Writing and quizzes: Reading quizzes, poetry analysis exercises, and response papers. 20% of the final grade
Midterm exam: 2-hour midterm exam consisting of short answer and long essay questions. 30% of the final grade
Final exam: This is a cumulative, open-book final exam. There will be short answer questions and a long essay question. 40% of the final grade
Optional Presentations: Students can sign up for the optional presentations and get 5 extra points. These are 10-minute presentations on supplementary topics such as French, German, Russian and Ottoman Romanticisms, romanticism in classical music and art, Gothic architecture, Abolition movement, Byron’s life etc.
Reading Schedule
ROMANTICS AND THE MIND Week 1 Blake and the Augustans 7 Feb Wed “Lo behold the bat” “All Religions Are One” and “There is no Natural Religion” 9 Feb Fri “Auguries of Innocence”, selections from Songs of Innocence and of Experience
Week 2 “Proverbs of Hell” 14 Feb Marriage of Heaven and Hell 16 Feb Marriage of Heaven and Hell In-class analysis exercise
Week 3 Child vision and adult mind 21 Feb Welch “Blake, Rousseau, Children’s Reading Pleasure” Response paper: O’Sullivan article OR Blake and Jim Morrison 23 Feb Blake selections from Songs of Innocence and Experience Wordsworth “We are Seven” Coleridge “Frost at Midnight”
Week 4 Growing Pains 28 Feb Wordsworth “Immortality Ode” 2 Mar Wordsworth “Immortality Ode” In-class analysis exercise Week 5 Nature and Everyday Life 7 Mar “Romantics and Psychology” reading quiz 9 Mar Wordsworth “Preface to Lyrical Ballads” “Lines Written in Early Spring” “Daffodils” Barbauld “Washing Day” Coleridge “The Aeolian Harp”
Optional reading: Wordsworth “An Old Man Traveling” “Solitary Reaper” “The Complaint of a Forsaken Indian Woman” Barbauld “To a Little Invisible Being Who Is Soon Expected to Become Visible”
Week 6 Dreams, Darkness, and Chaos 14 Mar Byron “Darkness” Keats “Why did I laugh tonight?” “La Belle Dame sans Merci” Coleridge “Kubla Kahn” 16 Mar Hemans “Casabianca” Shelley “Stanzas Written in Dejection” Wordsworth “The Mad Mother” Favorite lines of the week
Week 7 Imagination, Suffering, and Redemption 21 Mar Coleridge Rime of the Ancient Mariner 23 Mar Rime of the Ancient Mariner In-class writing
REVOLUTIONS, POLITICS, HEROISM Week 8 The French Revolution 28 Mar lecture on the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars 30 Mar Byron “Prometheus” Wordsworth “The Convict”
Week 9 Political Poetry 4 Apr Barbauld “The Rights of Woman” Shelley “England in 1819” “A Song: Men of England” 6 Apr Wordsworth “1 September 1802” “To Toussaint L’Ouverture” Cowper “Sweat Meat Has Sour Sauce” Favorite lines of the week
Week 10 Cynical Heroes 11 Apr Heroism article reading quiz 13 Apr Byron “Written upon swimming from Sestos to Abydos” “Messalonghi” Hemans “England’s Dead”
Week 11 18-20 Apr SPRING BREAK
THE FIRST ROCK STARS: ART AND THE ARTIST Week 12 25 Apr Lord Byron’s life 27 Apr Byron Don Juan Canto I
Week 13 2 May Byron Don Juan Canto I 4 May Byron Don Juan Canto I Keats “When I have fears that I may cease to be” In-class writing
Week 14 9-11 May Keats “Ode on Melancholy” “The Eve of St. Agnes”