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Course Description

As we read literature produced by five British writers across a span of six centuries, we will explore the idea of the ‘life’ of a text. 

Literature is famed for its ability to transcend history, to be immortal.  Geoffrey Chaucer’s poetry has been read for seven centuries, far longer than the writer or any of his readers could hope to live. 

Yet literature is also peculiarly vulnerable to the force of history, which can entirely reshape the way in which we experience a text, even the form a text takes.  No one who lived during William Shakespeare’s time needed footnotes to explain any of the jokes in his plays—indeed, in Shakespeare’s lifetime there were no readers of his plays at all, only viewers, since not a single one was not published until after his death. 

Literature thus both reflects and resists its historical context and its writers’ intentions.  We can see this interaction when we juxtapose John Keats’ private letters about poetic imagination with his poetry, for example, or if we compare readers’ responses to Jane Eyre in the years following the revelation of Charlotte Brontë’s authorship to how the novel was received when it was first published under the masculine-sounding name of Currer Ellis, because Bronte feared prejudice against ‘authoresses’.  

Ultimately, literature plays an important role in how we think about history, about our relationship to the past, and about how we see time passing.  Martin Amis’ Time’s Arrow provides one twentieth-century writer’s approach to this theme, as the text attempts to narrate an entire lifetime lived backwards.

Syllabus

Student Profiles

Class Portfolio

11/14  The reading schedule for Jane Eyre has shifted slightly, so that more is done over the weekend.  We will read to chapter 31 instead of to chapter 34--the reading for 11/21 will shift accordingly to chapter 32-38.

10/9 The readings missing from the editions sold at the UMB Bookstore are now available on-line on our Media page.

9/19  Change in reading assignment:  for this Thursday, 9/21, read Rubin extract (on our Media page) and read the Franklin's Tale--you are no longer required to read the Merchant's tale.

9/12 Update!  Thanks to the suggestions of Tikeon and Juliana, a detailed on-line choronology of Chaucer's life has been added to our Resources page.  Your student profiles have now been added to our website--if you enter the Writing Room link, you can create an introduction for yourself and post your picture! Optional readings from Saussure and Augustine are available in our Media Room page.

9/7  We do not yet have student profiles allowing you to post, due to a delay in Wiser --  for this week, write down your responses to the three questions found on our Assignments page and bring your response to class with you on Tues September 12.  I hope by next week you will be able to post responses to Canterbury Tales questions, and then post questions for our last three texts.