ENGL 4073

Literary Criticism

 

Fall 2000

9-9:50 MWF (Lile 200)

Descriptions:

"Through the study of a limited selection of texts and using a number of critical approaches, this course presents the format and basic elements of critical and analytical writing. Prerequisite: ENGL 2013" (General Catalog 2000-2001, 91)

This course is designed to provide at least four services for the student of letters. To begin with, we shall survey, in a regrettably condensed form, the history of literary criticism, providing as stable a foundation as possible by which to understand what may often appear to be the babble of the present age. Secondly, we shall examine, in more thorough fashion, eleven basic schools of twentieth-century literary theory and criticism, employing Charles E. Bressler's Literary Criticism: An Introduction to Theory and Practice to set each school in its historical and philosophical context. Thirdly, we shall enjoy a brief respite from such theoretical matters by reading a great nineteenth-century novel by one of the century's greatest novelists, Charles Dickens's Great Expectations. Lastly, we shall see what modern literary criticism makes of such a novel by examining Great Expectations through the lenses of five modern critical approaches: psychoanalysis, deconstruction, feminist criticism, gender criticism, and cultural criticism. Along the way, you will have the pleasure of taking daily reading quizzes, writing two scholarly papers, and performing any number of impressive feats on two examinations, the first administered at midterm, the second at the close of the course. (English Department Courses, Fall 2000)

 

Course Goals

The primary goal of this course is to introduce students of letters to the complex world of twentieth-century literary theory and criticism, enabling them to comprehend the central issues of a variety of modern approaches, to evaluate examples of those approaches, and to employ in their own analysis of literature such elements of modern theory as they have found useful.

 

Course Objectives

The student who has successfully completed the course should be able to

Requirements:

  1. Attendance: As is indicated below, I shall be giving frequent quizzes over your reading assignments and shall allow no make-ups, so class attendance clearly has a critical impact on your grade for the course. Moreover, I shall be taking attendance daily; and, once you have accrued more than six absences, you will no longer be eligible for a passing grade in the course. Lastly, any early departures, unless cleared with me before class, will be regarded as absences, thus voiding any reading quiz taken on that day. On the other hand, anyone so diligent as to have a perfect attendance record will receive a five-point bonus at the end of the term.
  2. Preparation: In addition to reading each assignment closely prior to class, you should never arrive at class without whatever text is called for in the daily schedule, for it will play an integral part in each of our sessions. You will need to follow along with me as I discuss the material. You should also make careful note of any questions you might have while reading your assignment, which I shall welcome you to share with the class at the beginning of each session. You should arrive at class each day with a basic understanding of what you have read and a retention of the major details of the material.
  3. Participation: Your participation will be judged chiefly according to the seriousness, attentiveness, and thoroughness with which you approach the class discussions. On the one hand, a conscientious participant is, for me, a courteous, mature member of an audience, one who listens attentively to lectures and discussions and does nothing to distract either me or his peers from a scholarly consideration of the material. On the other hand, he is one willing and eager to participate appropriately in class discussions--asking appropriate questions, responding thoughtfully to my own questions, interacting intelligently and courteously in discussions. In the case of a borderline grade, the student who has been such an active and conscientious participant will receive the mercy he so richly deserves--a participation bonus of up to ten points; the student who has not will receive justice--the exact score he has earned. Know that there is no vice for which I have less tolerance than apathy, an evil that has absolutely no place among scholars, most especially Christian scholars. Take passionately to heart what the French poet Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867) said about the vice, which he considered the greatest modern evil. Among all the sins of the world, Baudelaire claimed that


    4. there’s one more ugly and abortive birth.
    It makes no gestures, never beats its breast,
    Yet it would murder for a moment’s rest,
    and willingly annihilate the earth.

    It’s BOREDOM. . . . ("To the Reader," 33-37)

  4. Two Examinations (2 @ 100 pts. each: 200 pts.): You will experience the joy of two examinations during the semester, one at midterm and one at the close of the semester. On each examination, you will be performing such feats as defining the terms of modern theory, identifying theoretical approaches and their proponents, and examining examples of literature through a variety of modern lenses.
  5. Two scholarly papers (2 @ 100 pts: 200 pts.): You will close your study of Bressler’s Literary Criticism by submitting a scholarly paper in which you select a single literary text and illustrate how each of the modern schools of theory examined by Bressler might approach that work. At the close of the semester, you will submit a second paper on Great Expectations, an essay in which you bring your own methods to bear upon some aspect of the novel and interact with the scholarship you have read on the novel. (Format: MLA, double spaced, one-inch margins, 12-pt. font, ten to twelve pages in length.)
  6. Reading assignments and quizzes (39 @ 10 pts. each, lowest six dropped: 330 pts.) I have provided below a schedule of the required readings, which you are to read closely by the date each is due on the schedule. As a means of both encouragement and reward, I shall give scheduled quizzes that will test basic comprehension and retention of the assigned reading. Each quiz will be given at the beginning of the class period and cannot be made up by those who miss it by being either absent or late for class, so you will need to be both regular and punctual in your attendance. Lastly, one question from each quiz will require you to define a word from the current week’s Daily Word schedule, which you will find described below under "Extra-Credit Opportunities."

Extra-Credit Opportunities

    1. The Daily Word Game: For the last ten years or so, several faculty members from across the university have attempted to improve both their own and their students’ vocabularies through what has come to be known as The Daily Word Game. At the beginning of each semester, Dr. Johnny Wink prepares a list of words corresponding to each school day of the semester and distributes it to the faculty, inviting professors to "incorporate daily words into their classes in any way they see fit." To prevent repeating words, Dr. Wink has been moving alphabetically through the dictionary and has come, for the fall of 2000, to the letter N. I shall be using this list directly in the course by including the daily words on your regular reading quizzes; but I thought I would also encourage you to retain the daily words, absorbing them into your own vocabularies, by offering an optional Daily Word Examination at the close of the semester for up to thirty points of extra credit.
    2. The Sonnets: A few years ago, Dr. Wink and I began the project of attempting to memorize all of William Shakespeare’s one hundred and fifty-four sonnets. By the beginning of this semester, we have memorized the first fifty-four of the sonnets. I would encourage you to join Dr. Wink and me in this project and shall offer five points of extra-credit for each sonnet you can recite to me of the sonnets that Dr. Wink and I have memorized. I shall always post on my office door a copy of whatever sonnet we are currently memorizing, and you can locate sonnets earlier in the series either in the library or on the Internet. You will find one convenient web site containing all of Shakespeare’s sonnets at http://the-tech.mit.edu/Shakespeare/Poetry/sonnets.html. Whenever you would like to say a sonnet for me, drop by my office or flag me down on campus. I shall begin by first reciting the sonnet to you from memory, and then I shall have you recite the poem to me. Given the maximum number of extra-credit points specified above, I shall be able to give you credit for no more than six sonnets, but you are certainly welcome to continue with Dr. Wink and me in the project if only for the simple joy of having a head full of beautiful poetry.
    3. Extra-Curricular Events--To Be Announced: Throughout the semester, there may be cultural events of one sort or another for which I shall give five points for attendance. I shall announce these occasions as they come to my attention.

 

Required Materials:

 

First Week: First things

 

Second Week: Historical Survey of Literary Criticism

 

Third Week: Historical Survey of Literary Criticism, Concluded

 

Fourth Week: New Criticism and Reader Response

 

Fifth Week: Reader Response and Structuralism

 

Sixth Week: Deconstruction and Psychoanalytic Criticism

 

Seventh Week: Psychoanalytic Criticism and Feminism

 

Eighth Week: Marxism and New Historicism

 

Ninth Week: Fall Break

 

Tenth Week: Scholarly Paper 1 and First Examination

 

Fourteenth Week: A Critical History of Great Expectations

Final Examination

Grade Distribution

Assignment

Point Value

Quantity

Total
Examinations

100

2

200
Papers

100

2

200
Quizzes

10

39 (lowest 6 dropped)

330
Total    

730

 

Grade Scale for Course Grade

 

course

Total

A (90%)

657

B (80%)

584

C (70%)

511

D (60%)

438