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After the break we'll begin studying poetry. In preparation, I'd like you to read/do the following from your anthology:
(1) Poets on poetry (953-6) AND Billy Collins, "Introduction to Poetry" (2) "Talking with Kat Ryan" (626-7) (3) Your editors' brief introduction to poetry (628-9) (4) Everything on pages 630-6: "To the Muse;" "Poetry or Verse;" "Reading a Poem;" "Paraphrase": Yeats' "The Lake Isle of Innisfree" and subsequent analysis, "Theme and Subject," "Limits of Paraphrase;" "Lyric Poetry": "What is a lyric poem?," Robert Hayden's "Those Winter Sundays," Adrienne Rich's "Aunt Jennifer's Tigers." Take notes on the terms in bold. Pay particular attention to the difference between subject and theme. (5) Turn to page 644. READ "CHECKLIST: Writing a Paraphrase" and DO the exercise under "Complete Writing Assignment on Paraphrasing." This should be handwritten, and you are to use TWO poems from the further reading section (1016-1103). (6) Watch the videos below. (7) Reread poets on poetry (953-6) AND reread Billy Collins, "Introduction to Poetry"; Which of the memorable definitions of poetry on pages 954-5 works best for you?
Mixing Latinate and Anglo-Saxon words is a delightful sensation, like mixing smooth and crunchy.
Words have always fascinated Pinsky, though it was his failure as a saxophone player that finally pushed him into poetry. Question: When did poetry first spark your interest?
Charles Bernstein What Makes a Poem a Poem? 60-Second Lecture, University of Pennsylvania April 21, 2004
Wednesday, January 6 (1) - Billy Collins, "Introduction to Poetry"; Paraphrase; Advice for reading poetry; Subject v Theme. Tonight, read about a poem's tone (645-8), including Roethke, "My Papa's Waltz," Cullen's "For a Lady I Know," and Bradstreet's "The Author to Her Book." Then, work carefully through Whitman's "To a Locomotive in Winter" and Dickinson's "I like to see it lap the Miles" (648-9). Respond in your notes to questions 1, 3, and 6 (649).
Thursday, January 7 (2) - Establishing a vocabulary; Listening to tone; Whitman, "To a Locomotive in Winter" and Dickinson, "I like to see it lap the Miles." Tonight, read all of the instruction and the poems found on pages 674-84 AND 698-701. No need to complete any of the exercises. Tomorrow, we'll apply the concepts to a poem by e.e. cummings and one by Billy Collins.
Friday, January 8 (3) - Diction; The Value of a Dictionary; Word Choice and Word Order; Denotation and Connotation; e.e. cummings, "anyone lived in a pretty how town" and Collins, "The Names". Over the weekend, read "Dramatic Poetry" and Browning's "My Last Duchess" (639-41).
Gerard Manley Hopkins
Monday, January 11 (4) - Dramatic Monologue; "This poem dramatizes the conflict between..."; Browning, "My Last Duchess". Tonight, read Tennyson's "Ulysses" (1090-1).
Tuesday, January 12 (5) - Tennyson, "Ulysses"; Tomorrow you'll have a vocabulary quiz on units 11-12. Also, read "Sentence Combining," pages 22-23 in your Killgallon text. Come to class having completed the following exercises: Practice 2, Number 3; Practice 4, Numbers 1-4 (pages 25, 27-29).
ESSAY DUE TUESDAY: Roethke’s “My Papa’s Waltz” is a poem worth memorizing. It’s a poem with a tone that conveys multiple emotions at once. Your next assignment is all to do with perception of tone and the components that convey such a perception. First, re-read Roethke’s “My Papa’s Waltz” and the editors’ response to the poem that follows (pages 645-6 of your anthology). The editors suggest the poem's tone is "critical but nonetheless affectionate" or "grotesquely comic" and that to read the poem as not comic is to simplify the poem (646). Are they right? In your essay, read the poem both ways, analyzing device and technique just as they do on page 646. They cite rhythm, rime, word choice, and the last line, for example, to support the affectionate part of their claim. You do the same, but in your own way and by citing other of the poem's devices and techniques, or other examples of the same ones. Then read the poem as only critical or "resentful." Finally decide which reading you think is the stronger, more interesting and sensitive reading and why. The essay will have at least five parts, then: introduction; reading 1; reading 2; your explanation of which reading is the stronger, more interesting and sensitive and why; a conclusion. If you'd rather compare and contrast the readings beneath particular devices/techniques, that's fine, too. Either way you go, make ¶s units of thinking and composition and use ¶ hooks to link the parts. And know that MLA rules about quoting poetry apply. Here's a full document about that. The usual prohibitions against Googling apply, as do the usual late policies. A sample essay on tone in “My Papa’s Waltz” is on pages 670-2, but you’ll notice its focus is different from yours. Admire the essay’s methodology and evidence, not its wooden style. Oh, and if you memorize the poem, let me know; there might be some EC involved.
Wednesday, January 13 (6) - VOCABULARY QUIZ, UNITS 11-12; Killgallon; By tomorrow, read all instruction and poems on pages 770 -7 (Stop just before "Rime."). Tomorrow, we'll be looking at how the sounds of two Gerard Manley Hopkins poems convey meaning. He's my favorite poet.
Thursday, January 14 (1) - Sound as meaning; Hopkins, "Spelt from Sibyl's Leaves" and "I wake and feel the fell of dark, not day". Tonight, read about rime (rhyme) from page 777 to the top of 787. You must read all of the poems in this section aloud. No need to complete the exercises.
Friday, January 15 (2) - Sound as meaning; Rhyme Scheme; Yeats, "Leda and the Swan" AND Hopkins, "God's Grandeur".
Tuesday, January 19 (3) - Rhythm and Meter; Tonight, work your way through this, one of my favorite passages from Spenser's Faerie Queene, a narrative poem. Or, try this one, part of a speech from Shakespeare's King Lear, which should be much more challenging. Print screen shot once completed.
Wednesday, January 20 (4) - Scansion; Review yesterday's poems; Shakespeare, Sonnet 20; Work through one more tonight. Print screen shot for EXTRA CREDIT.
Thursday, January 21 (5) - Set research essay, part 1
Friday, January 22 (6) - Vocabulary Quiz, units 13-14; Keats, "Ode on a Grecian Urn"
Monday, January 25 (1) - In-class essay preparation
Tuesday, January 26 (2) - KUBUS SHADOWING - IN-CLASS ESSAY
Wednesday, January 27 (3) - Sample essays
Thursday, January 28 (4) - Sample essays
Friday, January 29 (5) - Sample essays; Vocabulary Quiz 15-16 on Monday!
Monday, February 1 (6) - Vocabulary Quiz, units 15-16; Keats, Ode on a Grecian Urn; Tonight read all instruction and all of the poems on pages 710-4 AND Ezra Pound's advice to writers on page 724. Respond in your notes to questions 2-3 on page 714 after working closely through Bishop's "The Fish."
Tuesday, February 2 (1) - Imagery; Bishop's "The Fish"; Tonight read all instruction and all of the poems on pages 730-4 AND 739 to the very top of page 743.
Wednesday, February 3 (2) - Figurative Language
Thursday, February 4 (3) - KUBUS ON KAIROS - You will meet at our regularly scheduled time and, working in pairs, plan an AP-style poetry free-response essay on the sheet provided, defining the meaning and method of the poem you'd hypothetically write about. You'll turn this in on Tuesday. Then, read through the sample essays (given in random order). What score do you give each? We'll discuss on Tuesday.
Friday, February 5 (4) - KUBUS ON KAIROS - You will meet at our regularly scheduled time and write an in-class poetry analysis as you did last Tuesday. Come to class with your document ready to go and post to turnitin.com by the end of class.
Tuesday, February 9 (6) - Sign up for a Topic Conference; Review research essay expectations: Where should you be at this point? What should the topic conferences look like? We'll also go over "To Paint a Water Lily."
Wednesday, February 10 (1) - IN-CLASS ESSAY MAKE UP DURING LUNCH; Finish "To Paint a Water Lily." Negotiating JSTOR, Cambridge Companions, Rice's Fondren Library Catalog.
Thursday, February 11 (2) - Continue exploratory research instruction; Set Group Poetry Presentation; Use this worksheet when preparing your presentation. You'll have to copy/paste your poem into the document. I will not be collecting this, but I suggest you put it to good use.
Tuesday, February 16 (4) - Epley and Corban: Donne, "Death be not proud" (1037) --- Morille and Murray: Donne, "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" (1038-9)
Wednesday, February 17 (5) - Morris and Bain: Heaney, "Digging" (1050) --- Asensio and Clark: Wilbur, "The Writer" (1096)
Thursday, February 18 (6) - Vocabulary Quiz, units 17-18
Friday, February 19 (1) - Amend and Kennedy: Keats, "When I have fears that I may cease to be" (1060) --- Bradley and Arrieta: Keats, "To Autumn" (1060-1)
Monday, February 22 (2) - Ward and Stuchly: Owen, "Anthem for Doomed Youth" (1072-3) --- Parma and Jarlsjo: Ryan, "Blandeur" (685)
Tuesday, February 23 (3) - Palmer and McAughan: Wordsworth, "The world is too much with us" (868) --- Miranda and Gardner: Larkin, "Aubade" (900-1)
Wednesday, February 24 (4) - NO CLASS - RECONCILIATION - MEET IN LAHART CHAPEL
Thursday, February 25 (5) - Bourne and Callaghan: cummings, "somewhere i have never travelled.gladly beyond" (1035-6); Set Research Assignment, Act 2
Friday, February 26 (6) - Tanner and Cassidy: Arnold, "Dover Beach" (1019); Continue introducing Research Assignment, Act 2; Beginning Tuesday, you'll need to bring to class your copy of Othello.
Monday, February 29 (1) - McCormick and Nylund: Pope, "A little Learning is a dang'rous Thing (from An Essay on Criticism) (1077) --- Nguyen and Jones: Stevens, "The Emperor of Ice-Cream" (1089)
Study Links
"6 reading habits from Harvard"
Achebe, "The Truth of Fiction"
Questions for analyzing novels
“In reading exam papers written by misled students, of both sexes, about this or that author, I have often come across such phrases — probably recollections from more tender years of schooling — as ‘his style is simple’ or ‘his style is clear and simple’ or ‘his style is beautiful and simple’ or ‘his style is quite beautiful and simple.’ But remember that ‘simplicity’ is buncombe. No major writer is simple. The Saturday Evening Post is simple. Journalese is simple. Upton Lewis is simple. Mom is simple. Digests are simple. Damnation is simple. But Tolstoys and Melvilles are not simple..."
-Nabokov, Lectures on Russian Literature
Required Course Texts
Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing, 11th edition
Vocabulary from Latin and Greek Roots VI
Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment: Pevear & Volokhonsky Translation (Vintage Classics)
Euripides, Medea (trans. Diane Arnson Svarlien)
Killgallon, Sentence Composing for College
Wharton, The Age of Innocence (Norton Critical Edition)
Students should also expect to purchase a few paperback titles at my discretion.
What's Due?
Tuesday, January 19 - "My Papa's Waltz" Essay
Tuesday, January 26 - In-class Essay
Friday, January 29 – Have Text Approved
February 1 – February 19 – Topic Conferences
Monday, February 22 – Pilot Essay Due
Enjoying Poetry
Compilation by Maria Popova at BP
Brian Cranston reads Shelley's "Ozymandias"
Recent Essays from the Poetry Foundation
Click the image to read about Dr Johnson's Dictionary of the English Langauge
Below are 5 of my annotated pages from various texts and 1 of David Foster Wallace's copy of DeLillo's Players. The pages of the texts that you will be working with most closely should look just like these.
The College Board's official course description:
An AP English Literature and Composition course engages students in the careful reading and critical analysis of imaginative literature. Through the close reading of selected texts, students deepen their understanding of the ways writers use language to provide both meaning and pleasure for their readers. As they read, students consider a work’s structure, style and themes, as well as such smaller-scale elements as the use of figurative language, imagery, symbolism and tone.
Strake Jesuit's official course description:
In AP Lit & Comp. you will learn to read like an artist-critic, studying texts not only for their development of themes and cultural ideas but also for their technical mastery and innovations. How do writers employ language to create texts that engage their cultural moment and literary history in rich, often ambiguous ways? Why is first-person the right choice in A Farewell to Arms? Why so many disease images in Hamlet? What makes Joyce's sentences so terribly beautiful? You will read literature from a variety of genres and periods, always with an eye to unlocking its deeper mysteries. To read well you will first unlearn bad habits. No longer will quick reading, that nervous skim before class, do. No. You will learn to read slowly, to savor each sentence, each line, each paragraph or stanza for its multiple meanings, its suggestions, its silences. In time, you will learn the wisdom of Nabokov's remark that you can only re-read a book. Your writing assignments will be frequent and varied, from one-page response essays due the day of a reading, to longer, more formal essays of evaluation and analysis, to expository and creative pieces. Always, you will learn to sharpen your thinking and hone your writing, to give both an edge gained only by rethinking and rewriting. You will have conferences with me before and after essays are due. You will edit each other's essays for argument and style. And you will revise, revise, revise. This class offers an intensive reading experience and a full-on writing workshop.
Suggested Reading
Stanley Fish, How to Write a Sentence
E.M. Forster, Aspects of the Novel
David Mikics, Slow Reading in a Hurried Age
Francine Prose, Reading like a Writer
James Wood, How Fiction Works
General Literary Terms
allegory, allusion, anachronism, arete, bildungsroman, canon, characterization, chiasmus, close reading, conceit, diction, epiphany, epistolary novel, fable, fabliaux, frame narrative, genre, irony, leit-motif, metafiction, mood, motif, novel, novella, poetry, prose, satire, symbol, tone, verisimilitude, verse
Elements of Fiction
character, climax, conflict, denouement, dialogue, dynamic character, foil, narration, plot, point of view, suspense, tension, unity, unreliable narrator
Poetic Terms
alexandrine, alliteration, anapest, apostrophe, assonance, ballad, blank verse, caesura, canticle, canto, carpe diem, consonance, contrapasso, couplet, dactyll, elegy, end rhyme, english sonnet, enjambment, epic, epic simile, free verse, half rhyme, heroic couplet, imagery, in medias res, internal rhyme, lyric, metaphysical, meter, ode, pastoral, pathetic fallacy, personification, prosody, quatrain, rhyme, slant rhyme, sonnet, sprung rhythm, stanza, terza rima, verse
Drama Lingo
blank verse, catastrophe, catharsis, chorus, comedy, deus ex machina, dialogue, drama, hamartia, hubris, metadrama, miasma, mimesis, monologue, peripeteia, stasimon, strophe, tragedy, tragic flaw, tragic hero
Rhetorical Devices
a priori, anadiplosis, anaphora, antithesis, apophasis, asyndeton, hyperbole, parallelism, parataxis, pathos, polysyndeton, procatalepsis, stychomythia, synesthesia
Figures of Speech
catachresis, euphemism, idiom, metaphor, metonymy, oxymoron, paradox, personification, simile, synecdoche, synesthesia