The Novel to Jane Austen

English 565, Autumn 2011

Jack Lynch

Course Description

Hours: Monday and Wednesday, 1:00–2:30, and by appointment (appointments are best).

Home: (609) 882-4642 (before 10:00 p.m.!).

E-mail: jlynch@andromeda.rutgers.edu (the best way to reach me).

Course Requirements

• Written Assignments: There will be two argumentative and analytical papers, the first of around ten pages (2,500 words), the second either a new paper of around ten pages, or an expansion of your first paper to fifteen to twenty pages (3,500 to 5,000 words).
• 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 around ten minutes. The report should begin with a very brief discussion of the day's annotated bibliography, giving a quick overview of the major scholarship on the topic. Thereafter, the topic is anything relevant to the day's readings. 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.
• Readings: This is a novel course, so the reading load is unavoidably heavy. Do what you can to keep up, and talk to me if you get overwhelmed. All of these books are available from New Jersey Books:
  • Ian Watt, The Rise of the Novel, California, ISBN: 0520230698.
  • Aphra Behn, Oroonoko, Bedford, ISBN: 0312108133.
  • Daniel Defoe, Moll Flanders, Oxford, ISBN: 0192834037.
  • Samuel Richardson, Pamela, Oxford, ISBN: 0192829602.
  • Henry Fielding, Joseph Andrews and Shamela, Oxford, ISBN: 019283343X.
  • Laurence Sterne, Tristram Shandy, Oxford, ISBN: 0192834703.
  • Matthew Lewis, The Monk, Oxford, ISBN: 0192833944.
  • Frances Burney, Evelina, Oxford, ISBN: 0192840312.

  Classroom discussion is easier if everyone uses these editions, but if you own the novels in other editions, or if you can get cheap secondhand copies of other editions, you needn't buy new ones. Additional critical materials and Austen's Love and Freindship are available through the library's online reserve.

Schedule of Class Meetings

Thursday, 8 Sept.

No Class: I'll be at a conference.

Monday, 12 Sept.

Introduction: class business, &c.

19 Sept.

Aphra Behn, Oroonoko; Ian Watt, The Rise of the Novel, chapters 1 (“Realism and the Novel Form”) and 2 (“The Reading Public and the Rise of the Novel”).

26 Sept.

Daniel Defoe, Moll Flanders; Ian Watt, The Rise of the Novel, chapter 4 (“Defoe as Novelist: Moll Flanders”).

3 Oct.

Defoe, Moll Flanders; Michael McKeon, Introduction to The Origins of the English Novel, 1600–1740.

10 Oct.

Samuel Richardson, Pamela, vol. 1 (pp. 1–219); Ian Watt, The Rise of the Novel, chapter 6 (“Private Experience and the Novel”).

17 Oct.

Richardson, Pamela, vol. 2 (pp. 221–503); Nancy Armstrong, selection from “The Rise of the Novel,” chapter 3 of Desire and Domestic Fiction.

24 Oct.

Henry Fielding, Joseph Andrews; Ian Watt, The Rise of the Novel, chapter 8 (“Fielding and the Epic Theory of the Novel”); J. Paul Hunter, “The Novel and Social/Cultural History,” from The Cambridge Companion to the Eighteenth-Century Novel. First Paper Due.

31 Oct.

Laurence Sterne, Tristram Shandy, vols. 1–3; Viktor Shklovsky, “A Parodying Novel: Sterne's Tristram Shandy.”

7 Nov.

Sterne, Tristram Shandy, vols. 4–6; D. W. Jefferson, “Tristram Shandy and the Tradition of Learned Wit.”

14 Nov.

Sterne, Tristram Shandy, vols. 7–9; Jonathan Lamb, “Sterne and Irregular Oratory,” from The Cambridge Companion to the Eighteenth-Century Novel.

21 Nov.

No Class: Wednesday schedule for Thanksgiving.

28 Nov.

Matthew Lewis, The Monk; Homer Obed Brown, Preface to Institutions of the English Novel.

5 Dec.

Frances Burney, Evelina, vols. 1–2; Joanne Cutting-Gray, “Writing Innocence: Fanny Burney's Evelina.”

12 Dec.

Burney, Evelina, vol. 3; Susan Staves, “Evelina; or, Female Difficulties”; Jane Austen, Love and Freindship (copy). Final Paper Due.