The Idea of the Classic in
Eighteenth-Century England
English 560, Spring 2001
Office: (973) 353-5279x516; 516 Hill Hall.
Hours: Monday, 2:30-4:00, and by appointment (appointments
are best).
Home: (609) 882-4642 (before 10 p.m.!).
E-mail: jlynch@andromeda.rutgers.edu (the best way to
reach me).
Listserv: lynch560 @ andromeda.rutgers.edu (for the whole
class).
Course Requirements
English 560 involves the following responsibilities on your part:
- Written Assignments: There will be two argumentative
and analytical papers, the first of eight to ten pages, the
second either a new paper of eight to ten pages, or
an expansion of your first paper to fifteen to twenty
pages.
- Annotated Bibliographies: Each student will prepare an
annotated bibliography on one day's reading or another apropos
critical or historical topic.
- In-Class Reports: You'll be expected to give a brief
presentation on the reading the same day you present your
annotated bibliography. Details are below.
Readings
Virtually all the readings will be available on-line on the World
Wide Web; copies of most pieces will also be available on reserve
in Dana Library. For easily available works too long to print or
read on-screen (Paradise Lost, Tom Jones, &c.),
you're encouraged to find your own edition. A few pieces will be
available as photocopies from Print Media Services at 160
University Ave.
Reports and Annotated Bibliographies
Each student will be particularly responsible for the readings on
one day of the semester, producing and distributing (on paper or
by E-mail) a short annotated bibliography of relevant criticism
and then beginning class with an oral report of between ten and
fifteen minutes. The report should begin with a very brief
discussion of the annotated bibliography the student has
prepared, giving a quick overview of the major scholarship on the
topic. Thereafter, the topic is anything relevant to the day's
reading material. A good report will raise as many fruitful
questions as possible and get discussion rolling. Anything
that will help -- handouts, short readings for the rest of the
class -- is welcome and encouraged.
Schedule of Class Meetings
- 18 Jan.:
- Introduction (class business, &c.).
- 25 Jan.:
- Aristotle, Poetics;
Horace, The
Art of Poetry.
- 1 Feb.:
- John Milton, Paradise
Lost, front matter and books I-III; Richard Bentley's
edition of Paradise
Lost, Preface and Book I; Samuel Johnson, selections from
The
Life of Milton.
- 8 Feb.:
- Milton, Paradise
Lost, books IV and IX; John Dryden, selections from The
State of Innocence; Joseph Addison, selections from The
Spectator; William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and
Hell, plates 4, 5, and 6; Percy
Bysshe Shelley, selections from A
Defence of Poetry.
- 15 Feb.:
- Dryden, The
Æneis of Virgil, books I and IV; Alexander Pope, The
Iliad of Homer, book I; Walter Jackson Bate, selections
from The Burden of the Past and the English Poet
(photocopy).
- 22 Feb.:
- Jonathan Swift, The
Battle of the Books; Alexander Pope, An
Essay on Criticism.
- 1 March:
- Alexander Pope, The
Rape of the Lock.
- 8 March:
- John Dryden, selections from An
Essay of Dramatick Poesie; John Dryden and William
Davenant, The
Tempest; or, The Enchanted Island. First Paper
Due.
- 15 March:
- No Class: Spring Break.
- 22 March:
- Alexander Pope, Preface
to The Works of Shakespear; Nahum Tate, King
Lear; Samuel Johnson, notes
on King Lear.
- 29 March:
- Samuel Johnson, "Drury-Lane
Prologue" and selections from the Preface
to Shakespeare; Elizabeth Montagu, Introduction
to An Essay on the Writings and Genius of Shakespear;
selections from Michael Dobson, The Making of the National
Poet (photocopy).
- 5 April:
- Henry Fielding, Tom
Jones, books 1-5.
- 12 April:
- Fielding, Tom
Jones, books 6-10.
- 19 April:
- No Class: I'll be galivanting in New
Orleans.
- 26 April:
- Fielding, Tom
Jones, books 11-18. Second Paper Due.