Download English Lit 18 Syllabus Spring 2014

The University of Jordan/Faculty of Arts
Department of the English Language and Literature/Spring 2014
Course Title: English Literature (1660-1798)
Course Code: 2201330
Instructor’s Name Office Hours
E-mail
Inas Ababneh
12:00- 1:00
[email protected]
Sunday, Tuesday & Thursday [email protected]
Course Objectives
“English Literature 1660 – 1798” is the second in a series of four undergraduate survey courses on
English literature, opening with the Celts and the Anglo Saxons and ending up with various literary
samples from the contemporary literature. However, the seminars in this particular module are designed
to provide a survey of the restoration and eighteenth-century English literature, a period remarkable for
its boldness of aesthetic experimentation and intellectual enquiry. The eighteenth century in Britain
continued to compromise a period of unparalleled social, political, religious and economic change. The
century witnessed the beginnings of Enlightenment consciousness, the rapid expansion of the British
Empire and the birth of the modern political order in the United Kingdom of Britain. In the context of
scientific progress, the ethical imperatives of a commercial empire, and revolutionary upheaval, writers
of the period produced powerful works of literature across a range of genres and styles. They were
constantly reevaluating what should count as literature, so this module is designed to explore the way
forms for writing poetry and prose allowed authors to innovate carefully while remaining anchored in
tradition. Therefore, concepts like ‘neoclassicism’, ‘Augustanism’, ‘empiricism’, ‘sentimentalism’, the
doctrine of ‘natural goodness’ and ‘rationalism’ will be thoroughly examined. Mathew Arnold called the
eighteenth century an ‘age of prose’; alluding to the fact that great prose does dominate the age. Indeed,
the growth of new kinds of prose took the initiative away from verse (e.g. novel, literary criticism,
biography, politics, history, aesthetics, economics, letters, journal, travel writing and sermons). With the
introduction of literary periodicals, such as The Spectator, the periodical essay, short and intended for
consumption by the middle-class coffeehouse audience, became the vogue. The so-called ‘Age of
Reason’ was also the ‘Age of Satire’. In effect, satirical pieces – in verse and prose – will be critically
analyzed. Further, students will read and analyze literature in the context of the broad social, historical,
and philosophical movements of the time to gain an understanding of the cultural forces that shaped the
eighteenth-century literary production.
Learning Outcomes:
Successful completion of this course should lead to the following learning outcomes:
A-Knowledge and Understanding – students should
1. be acquainted with some of the foremost authors and works of English literature, from the
restoration to the late eighteenth century
2. trace the origin and development of the English language, and
3. broaden their knowledge of English history: the beginnings of Enlightenment consciousness, the
rapid expansion of the British Empire, and the birth of the modern political order in the United
Kingdom of Britain.
B- Intellectual Skills – with ability to
1. develop a critical and analytical insight for literature,
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2. broaden aesthetic perceptions; understand, appreciate and enjoy literature more,
3. develop a taste for literature as an important cultural presence and a shaping force,
4. accumulate historical and political knowledge about England, and nourish the insight to link
different works of literature to their socio-cultural and historical background, and
5. compare one piece of literature with another.
C- Subject Specific Skills – with ability to
1. discuss the characteristics of the literary genres and their subgenres
2. enrich their linguistic reservoir, and
3. incorporate questioning techniques that emphasize critical thinking, such as inference,
evaluation, comparison, contrast, analysis, synthesis, criticism and appreciation.
D- Transferable Skills: Students should be able to
1. adopt life-long reading habits,
2. apply critical thinking skills in real-life situations, and
3. demonstrate continuous efforts for using the different library resources.
Textbook
 Peck, John and Martin Coyle, eds. A Brief History of English Literature. Basingstoke and New
York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002.
 Lock, John. An Essay Concerning Human Understanding: Abridged and Edited with an
Introduction by. A. D. Woozley. New York: New American Library, 1974.
 Ian, McGowan, ed. Macmillan Anthologies of English Literature: The Restoration and
Eighteenth Century. Vol. III. Basingstoke and London: Macmillan, 1989.
 Walpole, Horace. The Castle of Otranto. Ed. W. S. Lewis. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2008.
References
 Blackwell, Mark. Secret Life of Things: Animals, Objects, and It-Narratives in EighteenthCentury England. Lewisburg, PA: Bucknell UP, 2007.
 Kaul, Suvir. Eighteenth-Century British Literature and Postcolonial Studies. Edinburgh:
Edinburgh UP, 2009.
 Owen, John B.. The Eighteenth Century 1714-1815. London: Nelson, 1974.
 Palmeri, Frank. Satire, History, Novel: Narrative Forms, 1665-1815. Newark, DE: U of
Delaware P, 2003.
 Punter, David. Blackwell Companions to Literature and Culture: New Companion to the Gothic.
Somerset, NJ: Wiley, 2012.
 Rivers, Isabel. Books and Their Readers in 18th Century England: New Essays. London:
Continuum International Publishing, 2003.
 Sauer, Elizabeth, Balachandra Rajan, and Anthony Pagden. Imperialisms: Historical and
Literary Investigations, 1500-1900. Gordonsville, VA: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004.
 Shambrook, James. The Eighteenth Century: An Intellectual and Cultural Context of English
Literature 1700 – 1789. 2nd ed. London: Longman, 1993.
 Spacks, Patricia Meyer. Novel Beginnings: Experiments in Eighteenth-Century English Fiction.
New Haven: Yale UP, 2006.
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

Thorpe, Peter. Eighteenth Century Poetry. Chicago: Nelson-Hall Co., 1975.
Yadav, Alok. Before the Empire of English: Literature, Provinciality, and Nationalism in
Eighteenth-Century Britain. Gordonsville, VA: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004.
 Wahrman, Dror. Making of the Modern Self Identity and Culture in Eighteenth-Century England.
New Haven: Yale UP, 2004.
 Watt, Ian. The Rise of the Novel: Studies in Defoe, Richardson, and Fielding. London: Pimlico,
2000.
 Wein, Toni. British Identities, Heroic Nationalisms, and the Gothic Novel, 1764-1824.
Gordonsville, VA: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002.
 Willey, Basil. The Eighteenth Century Background. London: Chatto and Windus, 1961.
 Zwicker, Steven N.. The Cambridge Companion to English Literature1650–1740. Cambridge:
Cambridge UP, 1998.
Evaluation:
Midterm exam:
30%
Two Quizzes (one of them is optional):
10%
Responses to Five Texts:
10%
Final:
50%
Course Plan:
Week 1 (Feb. 17-19): Introduction
from John Lock’s An Essay Concerning Human Understanding
Week 2 (Feb. 24-26): John Dryden’s “Mac Flecknoe,” Grounds of Criticism in Tragedy (pp 62-3), and
Discourse Concerning Satire (p. 64).
Week 3 (Mar. 3-5): from Samuel Pepys’s Diary (The Great Fire of London), from William Dampier’s A
New Voyage Round the World (pp 83-4), and Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe (pp 85-92)
Week 4 (Mar. 10-12): from Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels (pp 128-137) and A Modest Proposal
Week 5 (Mar. 17-19): from William Congreve’s The Way of the World (pp 156-165)
Week 6 (Mar. 24-26): from Joseph Addison and Richard Steele’s The Spectator (171-186) and
Alexander Pope’s Essay on Criticism (206-7)
Week 7 (Mar. 31- April. 2): from Alexander Pope’s The Rape of the Lock
April 2, The Midterm Exam
Week 8 (April. 7-9): Lady Montagu’s Letters [The Turkish Women], Samuel Richardson’s Pamela (pp
269-278) and Earl of Chesterfield’s Letter to His Natural Son
Week 9 (April. 14-16): From Samuel Johnson’s The Lives of the Poets [Pope and Dryden], and from
James Boswell’s The Life of Johnson
Week 10 (April. 21-23): Thomas Gray’s “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard”
April 23rd, Quiz (1)
Week 11 (April. 28-30): William Cowper’s “The Castaway” and Goldsmith’s “The Deserted Village”
Weeks 12-14 (May. 5-21): Novel: The First One Hundred Years
May 7th, Quiz (2) (Optional)
Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto
Week 15 (May. 26): Revision
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