In this course students will be introduced to important examples of English prose and poetry of the seventeenth century. The emphasis in the course will be on John Milton's epic poem Paradise Lost. Students will write two papers for the course, and will submit format both papers as webpages that will form part of a course website. The first paper will be on a seventeenth-century English work other than Paradise Lost, and the second will be on some topic relevant to Paradise Lost.
In addition to the two papers, students will be required to submit summaries of at least 10 of the 12 books of Paradise Lost. Each summary will be due at the beginning of the class in which we will discuss the book it summarizes.
Students will be provided html (i.e. hyper text mark-up language) templates into which they will be responsible for placing their two essays, and they will be encouraged to play with these templates in order to produce a better looking and / or more functional webpage. Reformatting the essays into an electronic environment is an important part of the course, and the way grades are generated reflects this emphasis. Because class time will be devoted to introducing students to the creation of electronic texts, and because templates will be provided, no prior knowledge of html or of digital composition is required.
Your first paper is due no later than Friday, February 17. A description of what is expected for this paper can be found on the Required Assignments page.
For your second paper you must write on Paradise Lost. Details can be found on the Required Assignments page.
There is no set number of these quizzes, and they will not be announced prior to class. If, at the end of the term, you have missed or failed more than 33% of them, you will receive a failing grade on this part of the course. (Be warned: I tend to hold reading quizzes on days when it looks like attendance is poor.)
I know that some people have a harder time than others speaking up in class, but we depend on each other for our collective understanding of the literature we read. Therefore it is important that everyone participate in classroom discussion. To this end I will call upon you individually throughout the semester, and expect you to have done the reading and have thought about it such that you can participate intelligently in the discussion. To encourage you along these lines, I grade you on your participation in class.
January:
Early seventeenth-century prose and poetry, concluding with Milton's "Areopagitica."
February:
The first five books of Paradise Lost.
March:
Books 6 - 12 of Paradise Lost.
April:
Andrew Marvell.
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This page composed by R. Cunningham December 2005. |