English

This course provides an introduction to the literary culture of the medieval period, highlighting some of the key cultural issues of this era.  Students orient themselves in this long period (roughly from 600 to 1500) by looking at a range of texts and genres - poetry, prose, drama, lyric - from the early medieval as well as the later medieval periods. In exploring the various locations of the Middle Ages, students consider borders, boundaries, and zones between different places and periods. 

According to the archaeologist and literary scholar John Hines, “the curation, interpretation, and active use of material remains … is a near-constant feature” of human societies, past and present. Such an interest in the material remnants of the past can be encountered also in medieval literary texts – which is not to say that these texts should be seen as direct reflections of contemporary practices. Rather, the depiction of material remains allows texts to explore different ways of imagining time, history, and the transmission of knowledge. Students read and discuss a number of Middle English texts, including Osbern Bokenham’s Life of St. Margaret and the anonymous St. Erkenwald, as well as a number of Latin texts (in translation), all of which discuss material remains from the past in the context of constructing ideas of time and history.

This general education course explores the interactive relationship between literature and history. The course examines nine works from Shakespeare related to British history, and organizes teaching activities around these works. The course guides students through the original works, introduces relevant history, and the interactive relationship between history and literature, and  organizes course discussions and performance activities.

Because ULYSSES rewards careful attention to detail, the main focus of this class is a slow, patient, and close reading of Joyce's novel. The course begins with A PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST AS A YOUNG MAN before moving into ULYSSES. The course ends with a few classes that present an introduction to FINNEGAN'S WAKE. The general theme of the class is the evolution of Joyce's artistic sensibility contrasted with Joyce's representation of that evolution. The course also approaches the texts from a variety of perspectives: Joyce as an “Irish writer”; Joyce as an “English writer”; Joyce as a “European writer”; the poetics of style and form; the politics of style and form; humor as style; modes of ideology (race, religion, gender, and nation); framing a literary tradition; and the production and reception of Modernism. The course also discusses the composition of ULYSSES as is indicated on the NLI ULYSSES drafts.