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SyllabusUniversity of Massachusetts Boston English 406: Section 1 The Victorian Age Fall 2008 Course Syllabus
Professor Louise Penner Office: W-6-88 Office Phone: 287-6724 Email: louise.penner@umb.edu Office Hours: TR 3:30-4:30pm and by appointment
Course Description: This course examines the literature, culture, and society of the Victorian age. We look at how the men and women of the period coped with vast social, political, scientific, and philosophical changes that affected their lives. We focus on their attempts to find meaning and escape in a world where faith and science appeared to be in conflict, to adjust to the changing expectations for proper male and female behavior in the aftermath of the tumultuous eighteenth century, to understand the nature of the self and its place in the new industrialized and faster-paced society, and to evaluate and reevaluate their notion of “progress” as the century and Britain’s investment in colonialism progressed. We read important canonical and non-canonical works of fiction, non-fiction prose, and poetry.
Texts: The Longman Anthology of British Literature: Vol. 2B: The Victorian Age. 3rd ed. ISBN: 0321333850 Charlotte Brontë, Villette (Broadview): ISBN 1551114615 Wilkie Collins, The Woman in White (Broadview): ISBN 1551116448 Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist (Broadview): 1551117584 Lewis Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (Broadview): 155111223X Course handouts
Course Requirements: Reading: One of this course’s most important goals is to teach and encourage students to read carefully, giving all of the readings a great deal of attention and thought. Your performance in discussions and in written work will depend on your having read the course materials with such care by underlining, highlighting, and/or taking notes on significant details in your texts. To be successful in this class, and (as important as being successful) to enjoy this class and the great works we will be studying, you will have to stay on top of the reading.
Regular attendance: Because our discussions of texts are crucial to the class, and to our understanding and enjoyment of the texts, attendance is required. Missing more than two classes may result in your failing the class. If you know you will have to miss a class, contact me ahead of time. If you have conflicts that make your attendance difficult, see me immediately.
Frequent and thoughtful class participation: Classroom discussions depend on students having carefully and thoughtfully read for class. It is through discussing a work that we learn how to do the kind of critical thinking that will open up a text and will allow us to enjoy and understand it. Participation is thus a part of your grade for this class. Please see me right away if you are someone who usually has a hard time speaking in class and I will work to incorporate your ideas into class in other ways.
**Active participation can take many forms: posing questions, bringing to our attention places in a text that you find confusing, offering answers to the questions of others, adding to or qualifying another class member’s or my comments or questions.**
Individual short presentations (no more than 10 minutes) by each student will also give each student a chance to introduce historical material about the period and its literature into our discussion and thus enhance our sense of the historical contexts of the works we read.
Short Quizzes and T & T Assignments: (Further details forthcoming)
*** The Quiz Option: Because this course involves substantial reading, and one of my main goals for the course is to have every student to read and enjoy every text, I offer a quiz option to every student in the class. There will be weekly or bi-weekly quizzes given in class. All students who take and pass every quiz will have the option to use the average of their quiz scores as their Mid-term exam grade. Any who student who qualifies to take the quiz option is also welcome to take the exam if he/she chooses. The same offer will be made for the final exam, which covers material since the midterm. Note: Students who miss excessive numbers of classes or miss any quizzes will not be able to take the quiz option. No make up quizzes will be offered.
Your contributions and questions are vital to this class!
Grading: Midterm Paper 25% Midterm Take-Home Exam*** 10% Presentation 5% Final Paper 30% Final Exam*** 10% Attendance and Participation 20% (includes T&T assignments and quizzes)
Weekly Schedule WEEK 1 T Sept 2: Course Introduction
Part One: Faith, Doubt, and the Role of Art in Society R Sept 4: “Introduction to Victorian Age,” Longman Anthology [LA 1008-1032]: Carlyle Sartor Resartus, selection [Class Handout]; Tennyson, “The Poet,” “The Poet’s Mind,” [Class Handout]
WEEK 2 T Sept 9: Tennyson, “Ulysses” [LA 1150]; Browning, “Porphyria’s Lover” [LA 1308-09] Add/Drop Ends
R Sept 11: Browning, “My Last Duchess,” [LA 1311-12];“The Bishop Orders His Tomb at St. Praxis’ Church” [LA 1315-18]; “Andrea Del Sarto” [LA 1339-45]
Part Two: Revealing Selves: Masquerade and Performance WEEK 3 T Sept 16: Brontë, Villette/ T&T 1 Due
R Sept 18 Brontë, Villette
WEEK 4 T Sept 23 Brontë, Villette/ T&T 2 Due
R Sept 25 Brontë, Villette
WEEK 5 T Sept 30 Brontë, Villette
Part Three: Victorian Work and Industry R Oct 2 Brontë, Villette
WEEK 6 T Oct 7 Browning, Aurora Leigh, Selections
R Oct 9 “The Industrial Landscape”: Introduction and The Steam Loom Weaver, Fanny Kemble, Blue Books, Engels and Mayhew: [L A: 1037-1141; 1143 1149; 1150-1162]; Dickens, Sketches by Boz, Selections [Class Handout]
WEEK 7 T Oct 14 Dickens, Oliver Twist/Midterm Paper Due
Part Four: Victorian Childhood R Oct 16 Dickens, Oliver Twist/ T&T 3 Due
WEEK 8 T Oct 21 Dickens, Oliver Twist
R Oct 23 Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland/ Midterm Take-Home exam Due for those required to take it.
WEEK 9 T Oct 28 Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland
R Oct 30 Christina Rossetti, “Goblin Market” [LA 1618-1630]
WEEK 10 Part Five: Gender, Sensation, and Melodrama T Nov 4 Dante Gabriel Rossetti, “Jenny” [Class Handout]/ T&T 4 Due
R Nov 6 Collins, The Woman in White Pass/Fail and Course Withdrawal Deadlines
WEEK 11 T Nov 11: Veteran’s Day—No Class
R Nov 13 Collins, The Woman in White/ T&T 5 Due
WEEK 12 T Nov 18 Collins, The Woman in White
R Nov 20 Collins, The Woman in White/ T&T 6 Due
WEEK 13 Part Six: Style, Decadence, and Approaches to the Modern at the Fin de Siècle T Nov 25 The Strange Case of Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde
R Nov 27 Thanksgiving Break
WEEK 14 T Dec 2 The Strange Case of Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde T&T 7 Due
R Dec 4 Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest
WEEK 15 T Dec 9 Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest T&T 8 Due
R Dec 11 Last Class Day: Wrap Up and Review
Final paper due M Dec 15th: 5:00 pm in my office box or slid under the door at my office Papers may not be turned in via email! Two hour final exam at time assigned by the Registrar for those required to take the exam
** A Note on Academic Integrity** Academic integrity is central to the mission of this institution. Without honest effort, a learning community has no substance or validity. All students are expected to maintain the highest standards of academic honesty. No excuses will be accepted for plagiarism, cheating, or any other act that suggests that you have not fulfilled your academic responsibilities in this course. A plagiarized formal assignment will lead to the student receiving an F for the assignment and the class.
For more, including sanctions for academic dishonesty, see your Student Handbook sections on academic dishonesty pp. 150-158.
**A Note on the Reading Schedule** Though the course requirements and grading criteria listed on this syllabus are fixed, other aspects of this syllabus (reading schedule, paper due dates) are subject to change.
**A Note on Late Papers** No late papers will be accepted unless arrangements have been made with me prior to the Due Date.
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