Wednesday, May 6, 2009
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Welcome to the course blog for English 427 (Later Eighteenth-Century Literature) at the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign.
Contributors
Castle of Otranto Backgrounds and Context
Third Assignment
Unit 7: The Sublime
Unit 6: Rights of Women
Unit 5: Slavery and Abolition
Unit 4: Children's Literature
Unit 3: The Theater
Unit 2: Folklore and Fakery
Unit 1: Empire and Exploration
Independent Units
Course Readings
- Butler, Arts in the Age of Revolution
- Cowper on Omai
- Boswell on Johson, Omai, and savages
- Burney on Omai
- Brooke, Preface to The Excursion
- Johnson, Rambler No. 4
- Johnson, Rambler No. 23
- Johnson, By the River at Stowe Mill
- Sterne, The Northwest Passage to the Intellectual World
- Sterne, Obadiah's Cow
- Sterne, True Shandeism
- Sterne, Uncle Toby and the Fly
- Frye, "Towards Defining an Age of Sensibility"
- The Bard. A Pindaric Ode (Thomas Gray)
- Joseph Warton's Dying Indian
- Gray's Elegy 1751
- Gray's Elegy 1768
- Gray's Elegy modern edition
- Mary Jones, Holt Waters (1750)
- Minds of Winter (Seward and Stevens)
Second Assignment (due 2/18)
First Assignment (due 2/2)
The First Map
Map of Western North American, c. 1785
8 comments:
To be honest I don't think that I will remember most of the text that I have read. Phillis Wheatley will stay in my mind because I have come across her often. The castle of Otranto will also stay in my mind because it was the only novel that we read and I had heard many things about it before I even knew we were going to read it. Unfortunately a large amount of the work will fade away into obscurity simply because there wasn't a strong connection between one work and another. I found a lot of the things we read rather bland or dated. The texts that will stand out in my mind are the ones that tried to tackle the large problems of their time. I found it fascinating to read the opinions of these individuals pertaining to causes that have long since been resolved. It gives as perspective, how far we have or have not come, and how much farther we can go. As to what I hope I will keep I am fairly certain that it will be what has effected me the most. The works that spoke to me in a way that the others did not, and these are the works that I will not go away. Charge of the light brigade for example has not left my mind in the last four years and my class spent little time talking about it. We are studying art, and with all art you like what you like, and that is what stays with you.
I agree with Bozyman. In five years I will most likely not remember much of the text. Just like with any class, I will retain things that I found to be the most engaging, particularly things from the independent unit that my group presented and the texts that I did my assignments on. I also think that I will remember a lot of the history of the later 18th century. Coming into this class I knew very little about the 18th century. It is so true that this time period just gets skipped over. I'll remember the greats (Johnson, Wheatley, etc) but I'm sorry to say that the lesser knowns will most likely fall by the wayside.
I hope that I will retain my new and improved reading skills. In the past I have always stayed away from things written in this time period because the texts were always hard for me to understand (damn those f s things). Hopefully five years from now I will still be able to pick up a work from this time period and not want to immediately put it down in fear. I think that learning how to tackle the texts that we read was probably one of the most beneficial things that I learned this semester.
I'll remember names of certain figures. Walpole, Gray, Cowper, Omai, Sterne, Johnson, Boswell. When I hear these names in conversation, or read them in a book, I'll immediately think later C18 British Lit.
I'll also remember this course for the blog. It was useful to me. It helped me organize all the texts and it recorded our entire class on the internet. No doubt I'll forget many things, but this blog is my preeminent reference point for all things late C18 Britain.
I hope I'll remember the discussions on marriage and the Hardwicke Act. I recall when the question "How important is marriage to your happiness?" was asked. Hopefully it'll be important to me in five years and I want to NOT have the C18 mindset about it.
I'd agree with the previous posts, in that I'll remember the big authors and attempting to figure out an "s" from an "f". I think I'll definitely remember the class blog. I'll also remember watching Independence Day , and watching John act out funny scenes in class.
As far as the works I hope to really remember, The Castle of Otranto will be one, and having done my big paper on "She Stoops to Conquer" will be the other one. I believe I'll continue hearing about Tristram Shandy, and have fond memories playing a white bear and an impromptu "mocktail" party at 11 am on the last day of class. I'm sure everyone can agree that between all of the works we read in all of our English classes, it is hard to designate each one, but we walk away a little bit more well-read, we sound smarter (most of the time) when we can brag about knowledge of many authors, and our ability to analyze and express our opinions, and communicate with others is miles ahead of any engineering student (no offense!) that I've met.
Also, this might be funny for some of you!
http://chambana.craigslist.org/mis/1159381034.html
I think I'll remember some of the stranger things we came across, like Holt Waters, some of the children's literature, and Boswell's cow impression, just because it's really amusing. I think I'll still be able to recall a good portion of the authors and their works, should I encounter them at some point (like the Wilberforce bible billboards).
I hope I'll still have the ability to decode absurdly convoluted sentences that sprawl on for several lines. I hope I'll be able to recall enough Ossian and Chatterton that if I'm ever broke I can claim to have found some old texts.
I agree with Steph and think the thing I'll remember will be the ever annoying, and usually unsuccessful, attempts to decipher an "s" from an "f". I somehow never got the hang of it in spite of constantly reading the primary documents. I think I'll probably remember the "survivors" as well, but that might have more to do with the fact that I've encounter some of them in other classes.
I hope I retain the ability to analyze literature from another time period that has syntax and vernacular different from what I'm used to. That was the hardest thing for me to do this semester and I think I improved my analytical skills.
I think if I ever heard or read the texts from this class again, I would remember having read them in this class. In 5 years, I won't remember all the things we read, but I'll associate English 427 with Mary Leapor, Horace Walpole, Samuel Johnson, and some of the other authors and texts we read that particularly struck me. I think I will remember the bigger themes like sensibility, the sublime, and gothic.
I hope I retain the things we talked about in the group-lead classes, like ideas of empire, slavery, theater, and women's rights. They are themes talked about in many other classes, but I hope I remember the information specific to this period of literature.
I think that I will retain some of the major issues we talked about, especially the ones from the independent unit projects. I will definitely remember Castle of Otranto since I spent three and a half years hearing about it but finally read it this semester. Trying to cast the movie in class was pretty funny and gave me the opportunity to think of who I would want most to play Conrad...
I hope I remember that eighteenth century literature says what it means. If I ever pick up a text from that period (and it won't be an original text) it will be nice to know that there aren't really any hidden meanings.
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