'English Literature 1 Fall 2012 -- Mr. Furr
Homework Page
Back to Home Page for this course. To schedule of readings.
I will post all writing assignments on this page.. You should create a 'bookmark' of
your own to this page, so you can go to it without having to first go to the Home Page for
the course.
NOTE: BE SURE TO USE THE PROPER SUBJECT LINE ON ALL HW
ASSIGNMENTS! SEE BOTTOM OF HOME PAGE FOR EXAMPLE!
Be sure to "send a
copy to yourself" of ALL your homework assignments!
HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENTS
- For Monday, September 10: You have a lot, to get us started.
- send me two emails, from different email accounts, on two different
servers
- One of these MUST be the MSU 'mail' account. It is "free" (you've already paid
for it, in your tuition), but you MUST use it for this course.
- See the full instructions on the Internet page.
- See the list of free web-based email providers at the bottom of our Home
Page.
- Make sure that the Subject line of the email messages conforms to the model at the
bottom of our Home Page.
- Read our text, pp. 1-12, "The Medieval Period", up to the end of 7
"England Before the Norman Conquest." Do this
assigment.
Assignments on Old English Poetry and Beowulf
- For Monday, September 10. Do this assignment on
"The Wanderer" and "The Seafarer," pp. 52-55. Take your time -- this
involves some reading!
- For Thursday, September 13 . Note: by today, make
sure you have read 1/2 of Beowulf, pp. 65 - 85, to the end of § 23.
- For Monday, September 17. By this assignment you
should have finished reading Beowulf. We'll finish discussing it in the
first half of Thursday's class.
Assignments on Middle English Literature
Middle English Lyrics
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Read Constantine Cavafy's wonderful poem "Ithaca" (1911).
There are many translations. I like this one. But there's also this one, and this
one,
See these images of the "Wheel of
Forture".
- For Monday, September 24
- For Thursday, September 27. This assignment
involves listening to a 45-minute long lecture by a famous medievalist. It is a REALLY
GOOD lecture, and you will learn a lot by listening to it.
If you don't have the free RealPlayer (most computers come with it already installed) you
can download it FREE from here or see the
"Streaming Audio Instructions" box in the table on our course's Home Page.
Geoffrey Chaucer
- For Monday, October 1: on the General Prolog to The
Canterbury Tales. NOTE: No written assignment for today because the one for Thursday
is somewhat longer than usual. So, just read the General Prolog carefully and
bring your text to class with you.
- For Thursday, October 4, on The Wyf of
Bath's Tale.
- For Monday, October 8, on The Pardoner's Prolog and Tale. Read
this page
on the Tale ( from the Harvard "Canterbury
Tales" site.). NOTE: If you want extra credit, or an extra
challenge, read Robert Miller's fine article
from Speculum, also mentioned on the Harvard page. No written assignment, but
read carefully!
Everyman
Thomas Malory, Morte DArthur
For Monday, October 15. Just read the selections on the
Schedule page, and bring the text to class. No written assignment - but you will benefit
from reading a bit about Thomas
Malory, including the unresolved mystery of his identity, and his work Morte d'Arthur (links are
to Wikipedia articles).
Assignments on Renaissance Literature -- the Sixteenth Century
Thomas More, Utopia
For Thursday, October 18. Read the selections on the
Schedule page, and bring the text to class. No written assignment, but read, and bring to
class with you, this text on "Apostolic communism
in the Book of Acts." . We'll also go back to read Cavafy's "Ithaca" --
see assignment for September 22, above.
Wyatt, Surrey, English and Petrarchan Sonnets
Spenser, Epithalamion
NOTE: No classes Monday, October 29 or Thursday, November 1: MSU
is closed due to Hurricane Sandy.
Please read this file.
It is the text of the email I sent to all students, in all my classes, on Friday, November
2, at 2:01 p.m.
Spenser, The Faerie Queene
[NOTE: Go here for a brief summary of the whole Faerie
Queene. It's very helpful! ]
- For Monday, November 5: No written assignment. Make sure you have read
the material listed for today on our schedule page:
"Introductory pages on Edmund Spenser and his epic The Faerie Queene, pp. 555-558
(old edition: pp. 573-576) and the "Bower
of Bliss", and the "Garden of Adonis"
- For Thursday, November 8, on the "Bower of
Bliss", the "Garden of Adonis", and the
"Mutabilitie Cantos" of Spenser's magnificent epic The Faerie Queene.
- For Monday, November 12: This is our "catch-up" day, and we will
probably finish up Spenser. An excellent day for the Mid-Term as well -- if enough
students have recovered from Hurricane Sandy. We will see -- stay tuned!
Marlowe, The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus
- For Thursday, November 15:
- Read Acts I and II only. No writing assignment for today.
Please read these brief pages for background on the Faust legend and on Marlowe's
famous play. "You'll be glad you did!"
- Read the introductory material on Marlowe, pp. 743-744 (old edition pp. 736-737), and on
Dr. Faustus, pp. 757-758 (old edition pp. 750-751.)
NOTE: Some people believe that not
Shakespeare but Christopher Marlowe actually wrote Shakespeare's plays! This is a
really interesting question, which you can, if you wish, begin to explore on this page.
Fascinating stuff! This is not "required" for the course -- but who would be
so dull of mind as to miss it? Surely not you?? (I didn't think so!)
- For Monday, November 19. Finish reading Marlowe, Doctor Faustus.
No writing assignment for today.
- Time permitting, e will also begin our review of British History. Please carefully read the Wikipedia page on The Tudor Dynasty.
Print it out and bring it to class with you. This will give you some idea of the
very tense political situation that existed during the time Wyatt, Surrey, Spenser,
Marlowe, and Shakespeare were writing.
- Pay special attention to "The
Age of Intrigues and Plots: Elizabeth I."
- To really get an idea of the kind of social and political unrest that characterized this
whole period, from the 1530s to the end of Elizabeth I's reign (and really long after that
too), read a few of these pages on some of the significant rebellions and wars:
NOTE on Explicitly Bawdy Language
Explicit sexual and bawdy, or ribald, language and its use in literature was common
until about the second half of the 18th century. Since the Romantic and especially the
Victorian periods ribald language has been considered "obscene." Earlier works
of literature were either censored altogether or "expurgated" (= censored), with
ribald passages removed. The most famous example of this is the "Bowdlerization" of
Shakespeare's works by Thomas
Bowdler, beginning in 1818.
Not everybody supported the "purification" of literature through censorship
of the bawdy. In 1871 Mark Twain wrote "1601", the full title of which is "
Date, 1601. Conversation, As It Was by the Social Fireside in the Time of the
Tudors." You can read the
Wikipedia article about "1601"; the publication history followed by the text;
and a
facsimile of an early edition.
It's important to understand that modern and contemporary squeamishness about the
discussion of sex, sexuality, bodily functions, and the like is a mark of Romantic and
post-Romantic style and sensibility, and not an "eternal" marker of "good
taste" or quality in literature, art, and culture generally. |
Shakespeare, The Sonnets
- For Monday, November 26. Do the HW on the
Sonnets. We'll discuss them and then take up King Lear, which we also have
for the following class.
Thursday, November 24:
Thanksgiving Day.
NO CLASS.
Spend this long weekend reading the readings for the rest of the course. Be sure
to read Shakespeare, "King Lear".
Also, remember to do the assignment for Monday! |
Shakespeare, King Lear
- For Thursday, November 29. We will do all of King Lear today! It's
a lot, so Groups 1 and 3 do this assignment; Groups 2
and 4 do this one.
John Donne, Robert Herrick, Andrew Marvell
- For Monday, December 3. No writing assignment. Read
through all this great poetry (see Schedule for what to read).
I'll read over a bit more. Be prepared to read some of it aloud in class.
John Milton
- For Thursday, December 6. This is the assignment on the
shorter poems.
- Take a look at this annotated
online edition of "Lycidas", at the Dartmouth College "Milton Reading
Room." It shows how heavily allusive -- full of allusions to Classical authors
and to the Bible -- Milton's poem is. This is a dimension of the poem that his audience
would have fully appreciated, since they would have been well read in the Classics and the
Bible. Today almost all of us have to learn about it from scholars, as here. We miss this
dimension of Milton's incredible accomplishment, in which almost every line is an allusion
to some other work.
- For Monday, December 10. This is the assignment on
"Paradise Lost", Book I.
- Thursday, December 13 is our last day of class (see the MSU Academic Calendar). We'll
discuss end-of-semester matters. Please attend! There'll be some
important things to talk about, and to do.
http://chss.montclair.edu/english/furr/el1/el1hw12.html | Email Me! | created 2 Sept 12