Spring 2007
English 309: Victorian Literature, 3 credit hours
MWF 9-10 a.m.
Belk 219
Don W. King:
http://www.montreat.edu/dking/
Office: McGowan Center 107
Office hrs. MWF 8-9; 10-11 a.m.; Tuesday 9-12 a.m.
Phone 828-669-8012, ex. 3819
dking@montreat.edu
TABLE
OF CONTENTS:
Course
Description
Course Rationale
Texts
Course Objective
Goals
Course Outline
Evaluation
Bibliography
Academic Integrity
Final Comment
COURSE
DESCRIPTION: A
study of the major Victorian writers, including Alfred Lord Tennyson, Robert
Browning, and Matthew Arnold.
COURSE
RATIONALE: The
nineteenth century was an extremely rich time for British literature. Both
poetry and prose fiction flourished. At the same time, it was
historically significant because of the amount of change that took place.
New ideas about science, religion, politics, existence, meaning, and so
on came out of this century and British writers reflect these and other ideas
openly in their poems, novels, and essays.
Accordingly, a study of Victorian Literature is important because of the major
literary developments of the period and their impact on twentieth century
literature.
TEXTS:
The following are required texts:
Victorian Poetry and Poetics,
Ed. by W. Houghton and R. Stange
Victorian People and Ideas
by Richard Altick
Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Adam Bede by George Eliot
Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy
Also,
I strongly recommend you have these texts:
A Handbook to Literature, Eds. William
Harmon and C. Hugh Holman
MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers
(5th ed), Ed. Joseph
Gibaldi.
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COURSE
OBJECTIVE:
The central objective of this course is to introduce you to the
significant poetry and prose fiction of Victorian Literature.
In addition, you will be exposed to the important philosophical, social,
and intellectual ideas of the Victorian period with an eye toward how poetry and
prose fiction reflect these ideas. By the time you complete the course, you
should be able to:
-
Identify and
discuss Victorian
social, religious, philosophical, and intellectual ideas.
-
Discuss the
relationship between the poet and his audience in the Victorian period.
-
Describe the
relationship between duty and personal freedom in Tennyson’s poetry.
-
Define the dramatic
monologue and discuss its function in Browning’s poetry.
-
Identify the
significant
themes in Arnold’s poetry.
-
Discuss the
poetic characteristics of the minor Victorian poets.
-
Define the
nature of Victorian prose fiction as characterized by Dickens, Eliot, and
Hardy.
GOALS:
- That you read and analyze the significant poetry of Tennyson, Browning,
and Arnold as well as
three Victorian novels
.
- That you understand the dramatic monologue.
- That you explore the characteristics of Victorian prose fiction.
- That you identify the critical agents of change during the Victorian
period.
- That you consider the continuing influence of Victorian literature upon
modern literature.
- That you write a critical analysis on some aspect of our study.
- That you engage in research via the Internet.
- That you utilize email to extend class discussion, to communicate with
me, and to perform assigned
small group work.
- That you turn in all important written assignments via email attachments
or on diskette.
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COURSE
OUTLINE:
Week
1 Introduction to the Victorian period
Weeks
2-4
Tennyson’s poetry
Test
1
Feb. 5
Week 5-6 Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
Weeks
7-8 Browning’s
poetry
Test
2
March 2
Week
9-10 Adam Bede by George Eliot
Weeks 11-12
Arnold’s poetry
Test
3
April 9
Week
13 Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy
Weeks
14-15 The poetry of Clough, Meredith, Swinburne, Hopkins,
Thompson, Wilde, Hardy, and Housman
Test
4
May 4
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EVALUATION:
- You will be tested in three ways. First, in order to encourage you
to keep up with the reading,
I will give brief, unannounced quizzes from time to time.
Collectively the quizzes will
count 10% of your final grade. Second, there will be four tests that constitute 40%
of your grade
in the course. Third, you will write in class essays that will
count 10% of your final grade.
- A book review of
Victorian People and Ideas
by Richard Altick will count 10%. Due by
midnight
Feb. 18, 2007, via email attachment.
- You will develop a creative project based upon your personal
reaction to anything we have
studied throughout the semester. I prefer that this project be creative
in whatever fashion you
are creative. For example, in the past students have put on skits,
built or baked various things,
written songs, done videotape or computer presentations, painted
pictures, sculpted figures,
done needlepoint, conducted interviews, written satires, and so on.
“The sky’s the limit” but
you should check out your idea with me before you begin. Group projects
are possible but need
to be approved by me. The project will count 10% of your final
grade and must be presented in
front of the class on or before the last regular class meeting.
- You will write one analytical
paper (1,250 to 1,500 words) on
some aspect of our studies.
This paper will count 10%
of your final grade; due by
midnight April 25, 2007 via
email attachment.
- The remaining 10% will come from in class essays, your class
participation, discussion, quizzes,
regular attendance, homework,
reserve and supplemental reading, group work and various short
writing
assignments.
- There are a total of 1000 pts possible in the course. Final grades
will be compiled using the following
guidelines:
1000-900 A to A-
899-800 B+ to B-
799-700 C+ to C-
699-600 D+ to D-
599-0 F
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LIBRARY: All students are encouraged to take advantage of the
services and resources available
from the library.
You can search the online catalog and the library’s databases by going
to
http://www.montreat.edu/library/. Select
“Catalog” to search the online catalog or “Electronic
Resources” to
search the databases. The catalog lists all of
the books in the Montreat College library
as well as the holdings of
five other colleges. You may check out books
from all of these libraries
via Interlibrary loan. From the
online catalog, you can also check on reserve materials by selecting
“Reserve Desk” and searching by instructor
name or course name.
The list of databases at
http://www.montreat.edu/library/completeelectronic.asp provides
links
to a variety of
databases containing journal articles, online reference sources, and
electronic books
(ebooks). These databases
are accessible both on and off campus. You can search for journals at
http://www.montreat.edu/library/electronic.asp.
Ask the library staff for a password for remote
access ifyou live off
campus.
BIBLIOGRAPHY:
In addition to the books listed
below that are on three-day reserve, the library
(or the MCLN) holds many
journals that may be of help in doing research for this course, including
Victorian Poetry, Victorian
Studies, and Nineteenth Century
Literature.
Of much
interest to you,
however, will be the multiple resources available via
electronic databases, especially JSTOR.
Altick,
Richard D. The
English Common Reader: A Social History of the
Mass
Reading
Public, 1800-1900.
Altick,
Richard D. Victorian
People and Ideas.
Bateson,
F.W., ed. Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature.
Batho,
Edith, and Bonamy Dobree, eds. The Victorians and After,
1830-1914.
Beach,
Joseph Warren. The
Concept of Nature in Nineteenth-Century
Poetry.
Buckley,
Jerome H. The Triumph of Time: A
Study of the Victorian
Concepts
of Time,
History, Progress, and Decadence.
Buckley,
Jerome H. The Victorian Temper: A Study
in Literary Culture.
Bush,
Douglas. Mythology and the Romantic Tradition in English Poetry.
Chesterton,
G.K. The Victorian Age in Literature.
Cruse,
Amy. The
Victorians and Their Reading.
De
Laura, David J., ed. Victorian
Prose: A Guide to Research.
Fairchild,
Hoxie N. Religious Trends in English Poetry.
Faverty,
Frederic E., ed. The Victorian Poets: A
Guide to Research.
Gaunt,
William. The Aesthetic Adventure.
Hilton,
Timothy. The
Pre-Raphaelites.
Holloway,
John. The Victorian Sage: Studies
in Argument.
Hough,
Graham. The
Last Romantics.
Houghton,
Walter E. The Victorian Frame of Mind, 1830-1870.
Levine,
Richard A., ed. Backgrounds
to Victorian Literature.
Massingham,
H.J., and Hugh Massingham, eds. The
Great Victorians.
Miller,
J. Hillis. The
Disappearance of God: Five
Nineteenth Century
Writers.
Preyer,
Robert O., ed. Victorian
Literature: Selected Essays.
Saintsbury,
George. The Later Nineteenth Century.
Somervell,
D.C. English Thought in the Nineteenth Century.
Sussman,
Herbert L. Victorians and the Machine: The
Literary Response
to
Technology.
Tindall,
William York. Forces in Modern British Literature.
Turner,
Paul. Victorian Poetry, Drama, and Miscellaneous Prose,
1832-1890.
Wellek,
Rene. A History of Modern Criticism , 1750-1950, vol. IV:
The
Later Nineteenth Century.
Willey,
Basil. More
Nineteenth Century Studies.
Willey,
Basil. Nineteenth
Century Studies.
Williams,
Raymond. Culture and Society, 1780-1950.
Wright,
Austin, ed. Victorian
Literature: Modern Essays in
Criticism.
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ACADEMIC INTEGRITY:
For all individual assignments students are expected to present their
own work;
documentation of research for your literary analysis must follow the specific
criteria as
outlined in the MLA
Handbook for Writer of Research Paper or
MLA-Style Citations of Electronic Sources. Cases of
academic
dishonesty, including but not
limited to cheating and plagiarism, will result in
either of failure of the assignment
or of the course.
For the college's policy on this issue, please click
academic integrity.
FINAL COMMENT: This syllabus and other
details about the course, including your grades for
the course, are available through the college's online platform,
Moodle. Please feel free to come by
my office in
McGowan
Center 107, contact me at
extension 3819, or email me at
dking@montreat.edu
if you need help with any aspect
of the course.
All students are encouraged to take advantage of the resources available in
the Writing Center, located
adjacent to the Bell Library computer lab. See
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Literature Page
Last updated
January 08, 2007