Professor Sally Greene
Bryan 212,
ph. 924-7105
E-mail: sg5p@virginia.edu
Office hours: 2:00-3:30
MW
W 17 Introduction
F 19 Pater, "Preface to The Renaissance" (e-mail access), "Conclusion to The Renaissance" (Norton ed. of Dorian Gray)
M 22 Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray
W 24 Dorian Gray cont'd; "The Critic as Artist" and "The Decay of Lying" (Norton ed.)
F 26 Discussions
M 29 Synge, The Playboy of the Western World
W 31 Yeats, intro. to Rosenthal edition; "Cathleen ni Houlihan"
February
F 2 Discussions
M 5 Yeats, "The Dreaming of the Bones," "The Symbolism of Poetry," in Essays and Introductions
W 7 Yeats, selected poetry (from Rosenthal ed.)
F 9 Discussions
M 12 Yeats, poetry cont'd; "Modern Poetry: A Broadcast," in Essays and Introductions
W 14 Eliot, "Tradition and the Individual Talent"
F 16 Discussions
M 19 Eliot, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" (The Waste Land and Other Poems)
W 21 Eliot, The Waste Land (film, Clemons 201)
F 23 Discussions
M 26 The Waste Land cont'd
W 28 The Waste Land cont'd; mid-term review
March
F 1 Discussions; groups prepare mid-term questions
M 4 Ford, The Good Soldier
W 6 The Good Soldier cont'd
F 8 Midterm exam
Spring Break
M 18 In War Poetry, read "War and British Culture 1914-82." Then read (in this order) Brooke's The Soldier; Hardy's "Drummer Hodge," "Channel Firing," "In Time of 'The Breaking of Nations"; Owen's "Anthem for Doomed Youth" and "Dulce et Decorum Est." (For another way into Owen and more World War I poetry, start browsing here.) Read also these three poems by Owen that are in War Poetry: "Apologia Pro Poemate Meo," "Insensibility," and "Strange Meeting."
W 20 Rosenberg, "Break of Day in the Trenches," and in War Poetry "Girl to Soldier on Leave." Also in War Poetry read the essay "Gender."
F 22 Discussions
M 25 Brittain, Testament of Youth (through ch. 3)
W 27 Testament of Youth cont'd (through p. 244 only)
F 29 Discussions
April
M 1 Woolf, Jacob's Room
W 3 Jacob's Room cont'd; Woolf, "Character in Fiction"
F 5 Discussions
M 8 Woolf, "A Letter to a Young Poet"; Auden, selected poetry (Selected Poems)
W 10 Auden cont'd
F 12 Discussions
M 15 Yeats, "Purgatory" (Rosenthal ed.)
W 17 Spender, preface and selected poems from The Still Centre, "The Past Values," "Thoughts During an Air Raid," "The Bombed Happiness"; excerpt from Citizens in War--and After (War Poetry)
F 19 Discussions
M 22 Bowen, intro. and selected stories from Ivy Gripped the Steps: "Sunday Afternoon," "Songs my Father Sang Me,
W 24 Bowen cont'd: "The Demon Lover," "Mysterious Kôr"
F 26 Discussions
M 29 Jones, "Art in Relation to War"; Woolf, "Thoughts on Peace in an Air Raid"
Final exam: May 10
Course focus: Literature, what's the use of it? Should it be ethical, or (merely) aesthetical? We will investigate this question as we study British literature from the 1890s to the 1940s. We'll see how the question of aesthetics is complicated by social and political events--the Irish nationalist movement, the women's rights movement, and most significantly two world wars. Conversations will take place in class and via e-mail groups. Two papers, a mid-term, and a final are required; you must complete all four of these projects.
Organization: Although much of our class time will be spent considering the question of ethics vs. aesthetics, the literature we will study raises many other issues. To provide avenues into some of these additional issues, we'll compose ourselves into four virtual (e-mail) discussion groups. Each of you will join one of the following groups: science, religion, gender, or a fourth called loosely "literary trends." This fourth group will be interested in tracing the ways in which the ideas of the Romantic period work themselves out in this literature, and perhaps the ways in which the literature of our period prepares the way for (or already participates in) the postmodernist moment.
Your participation in the virtual discussion group is an important part of your overall class participation grade. Your group work will be judged not on the quantity of words you write alone, but on the thoughtfulness and helpfulness of your comments and your questions. You are of course free to discuss the literature in all kinds of different ways within your group, but you are primarily responsible for coming up with ideas about how your topic is dealt with.
On Friday of each week (with exceptions noted on the syllabus), each of the four groups will hold 20- to 30-minute discussions and then will give a brief report to the whole class. And you should make a digest version of the reports available on e-mail for the other three groups. Within your groups, you should create a plan for equitably sharing the work.
The work you put into these groups will not be wasted; I will be counting on your discussions to help me construct questions for the mid-term and final exam.