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John Brett, "The Hedger"
British Poetry and the Sister Arts: 1830-1920
This course will enable students to explore some of the beautiful, profound, and dramatic poetry and art created in Great Britain during the Victorian and early modern periods, 1830-1930. Throughout the semester we will examine some of the different registers of verse—oral and written, high cultural and popular, personal and narrative—against a background of the period’s major visual forms, newspaper illustrations and Pre-Raphaelite, decorative, and early modernist art. As time permits, we will also sample oral recordings and musical settings to evoke some of the settings in which these poems were appreciated and enjoyed. Our discussions will consider the aural and linguistic qualities of these poems (metrics, rhythm, dialect), their formal organization, the experiences which prompted them, and the responses which they evoked.
Our class selections are designed to engage poetry of celebration, consolation, amusement, and reflection written by women and men, members of several classes, and defenders of different social and religious faiths. Class sessions will focus on discussion, so attendance is essential (and will affect final grades), and I will ask students to present background material to their fellow students, contribute several internet responses, and submit twelve pages of written work.
Course Information and Assignments: British Poetry and the Sister Arts: 1830-1920
MW Room E220 Adler Journalism Building 5-6:15 p. m.
Instructor: Florence Boos, florence-boos@uiowa.edu
Office: 319 EPB: office phone 335-0434
Office hours: before most classes (let me know so I’ll be sure to be in); Monday and Wednesday 6:16-7 p. m.; Tuesday and Friday afternoons by appointment
Textbooks: Broadview Anthology of Victorian Poetry, Concise Edition and handouts from Linda Hughes, The Cambridge Introduction to Victorian Poetry, and Carol Christ, "Victorian Poetry," from the Blackwell Companion to Victorian Poetry.
Exam: Monday December 13th at 5 p. m. or another time agreed on by all the class.
Course Requirements:
participation: contributions to class discussion. Please read the assignment before class and come prepared to discuss the poem’s form and content, and ask any questions you may have about unclear passages.
In addition, please come to class with a brief written answer to the following question: What is something you found valuable, important, or interesting in the reading? Why did this seem valuable to you? (i. e., a beautiful passage, relevance to present day life, psychological complexity, unconventionality, representative quality, etc.)
background contribution, reports: For each class period, a student will be asked to bring in the representation of a visual artifact (painting, photograph, etc.) or musical setting related to our class reading, preferably a 19th century illustration or setting for the work. S/he will check in with me about this choice by the preceding day, and will present this material to the class before we discuss the poem in question.
shorter essays, ICON. Six times during the semester, by the times indicated on the syllabus, please post an essay equivalent to two typed pages on our discussion space on ICON.
Of the postings, at least one should respond to a work or works of Victorian art, most likely from the Pre-Raphaelite and Morris slides which we view; at least one should provide background or commentary on a song or musical work composed between 1830 and 1920; one should use biographical or critical material from an article or book chapter which discusses the text on which you are commenting; and one or more should apply some of the observations in Linda Hughes’s The Cambridge Companion to Victorian Poetry or Carol Christ’s essay/introduction to Victorian poetry to a poem or poems which we read.
Due to the desire for assessment early in the semester I will provide grades for these. However these are intended chiefly as a way for you to work out your ideas and are thus weighted less than the longer papers.
two essays: In addition to these short essays, you will be asked to write a six page + critical/research paper, and a six page final take-home examination.
Your critical/research paper must be based on research in the biographies, book-length critical studies, and critical articles on the author or topic you have chosen (that is, you cannot merely use web-page citations unless these are also printed items). A title, bibliography and if possible, an abstract should be turned in a week before the first draft is due, as indicated in the syllabus.
If you hand a draft to me one week early, I will be glad to give initial comments and suggestions.
The final essay/take-home exam will be a comparative critical discussion of the works of two or more authors/texts you have read during the course. You will summarize this to your fellow students at the final exam, which is thus partly an oral based on your written essay.
The final will be held Monday December 13th from 5-7 p. m, unless the class votes on another time.
Grading: With some variation for special factors and marked improvement, grades will be roughly based on the following scale:
2 papers: 60%
ICON postings 10%
Course Decorum:
No cell phones!
As educated persons, I assume that you will be aware of the dangers posed by Covid-19 to young adults (and those of all ages) and that you have been vaccinated. If not, I hope that you will protect yourself and others by doing so immediately. If you need information on how to obtain a vaccine, I'll be happy to help you locate this. In addition, masks are an added protection, and you can take them off when speaking.
Course Syllabus
August 23rd M introduction--genres; recording of Victorian salon
25th W working-class poems by Ellen Johnston, W. J. Linton, Samuel Laycock, Fanny Forrester, and anonymous (handout); recordings
30th M working-class poems
September 1st W Elizabeth Barrett Browning, “The Cry of the Children”
5th M Labor Day
7th W assignment: critical articles by Carol Christ and Linda Hughes (handouts)
Pre-Raphaelite painting, slides
First posting due Friday September 9th
M 13th Alfred Tennyson, "The Lady of Shalott"
W 15th Victorian metrics-examples from our texts
M 20th Tennyson, "In Memoriam," 15 sections
W 22nd Tennyson, “In Memoriam,” 15 sections
M 27th slides of Victorian art
W 29th --------
Second posting due Friday October 1st
October 4th M Robert Browning, “Fra Lippo Lippi”
6th W Robert Browning, continued
11th M William Morris, “Concerning Geffray Teste Noire”
13th W slides of Morris decorative art
Third posting due Friday October 15th
18th M D. G. Rossetti, “The Blessed Damozel"
20th W D. G. Rossetti, “Jenny”
25th M Christina Rossetti, "Goblin Market"
27th W Algernon Swinburne, "The Lake of Gaube"
Fourth posting due October 29th
November 1st Augusta Webster, “The Castaway”
3rd W Webster, "The Castaway"
November 5th title, abstract and bibliography for first 6-page essay due
8th M Gerard Manley Hopkins, "The Windhover," "Binsey Poplars," "Pied Beauty," "That Nature is a Heraclitean Fire"
10th W Michael Field (Katharine Bradley and Edith Cooper), “A Portrait,” “Embalmment,” "Trinity," “A Palimpsest,” “Fellowship”
FIRST 6 PAGE ESSAY DUE NOVEMBER 12th
15th M Oscar Wilde, “The Ballad of Reading Gaol”
17th W Wilde, continued
Fifth posting due November 19th
Thanksgiving break
29th M Charlotte Mew, “The Trees Are Down”
December 1st W Wilfred Owen, “Strange Meeting”
Sixth posting due December 3rd
6th M Siegfried Sassoon, “The Repression of War Experience”
8th W -----
Final exam Monday December 13th
FINAL 6 PAGE ESSAY/EXAM DUE DECEMBER 17th