Course module - Forms of Poetry
Code : ENGL20382 Credit rating: 20 Semester : 2
Links in this page :
Aims |
Objectives |
Assessment |
Information
|
Course Content |
Course Materials |
Tutors |
Timetable |
Teaching Methods |
Keywords
Aims
- To introduce students to a range of poetic forms and genres, such as epic, ballad, ode, sonnet, dramatic monologue, elegy, satire and verse narrative;
- To make students aware of the distinctive formal features of these genres and their historical development;
- To foster and develop close reading skills;
- To develop an understanding of the relationship between thematic and formal choices;
- To encourage the use of a range of theoretical and critical approaches in the close reading of poetry.
Objectives (Learning Outcomes)
By the end of the course, students will be able to:
- Demonstrate skill in the close reading of poetry;
- Demonstrate a knowledge of some of the key poetic texts of 18th and 19th-century British literature;
- Demonstrate awareness of the distinctive formal features of a range of poetic genres;
- Demonstrate an understanding of the historical development of major poetic genres;
- Discuss the relationship between theme and form in poetry.
Assessment
One 3,000-word essay (50%); one 2-hour unseen written examination (50%)
The use of dictionaries in the examination is prohibited. This rule applies to all categories of students, including all Visiting Students.
Information
THIS COURSE IS NOT AVAILABLE AS FREE CHOICE.
Course Content
The course aims to enable students to read poetry with confidence and pleasure. Lectures will introduce students to a wide range of important poetic texts representing a broad spectrum of poetic genres from the 18th and 19th centuries. Seminars will focus on developing close reading skills and the understanding of the relation between theme and form. The course will be divided into sections dealing with the historical development of specific genres, which might include epic, ballad, elegy, ode, sonnet, dramatic monologue, verse narrative, and satire. See indicative reading list below.
Course Materials
Tutor(s)
Rawes, Dr Alan
Timetable
PROVISIONAL TIMETABLE FOR 2013-2014
Lecture: Tuesday, 10.00-12.00
Seminars: T B A
Teaching Methods
One 2-hour lecture and one 1-hour seminar per week.
Preliminary reading
Readings will vary from year to year, but the following selections are indicative of the kinds of works that may be studied:
- Epic: Milton, Paradise Lost (excerpts); Pope, The Rape of the Lock or The Dunciad; Wordsworth, The Prelude; Byron, Don Juan; Tennyson, Idylls of the King
- Ode: Milton Nativity Ode, Dryden Alexander’s Feast, Wordsworth, Intimations of Immortality, Coleridge, To France, Keats, Ode to a Grecian Urn
- Sonnet: representative sonnets by Milton, Wordsworth, Charlotte Smith, Keats, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Christina Rosetti, George Meredith
- Elegy: Milton, Lycidas; Grey, Elegy Written in a Country Church-yard; Shelley, Adonais; Tennyson, In Memoriam; Arnold, Thyrsis
- Ballad: Traditional Ballads and Songs (Percy’s Reliques : ‘Sir Patrick Spens’ and ‘Barbara Allen’); Lyrical And Other Ballads (Wordsworth, Goody Blake and Harry Gill and We are Seven); Politics and Patriotism (Shelley, The Mask of Anarchy; Campbell, Ye Mariners of England); Victorian ballads (Emily Brontë and Christina Rossetti)
- Verse Narrative/Poem of Social Critique: excerpts from Crabbe, The Borough; Clare, The Parish; Clough, The Bothie; Barret Browning, Aurora Leigh
- Dramatic Monologue: Pope, Epistle to Dr Arbuthnot, Eloisa to Abelard; Robert Browning, My Last Duchess, Fra Lippo Lippi; Arnold, Dover Beach; Tennyson, Ulysses and Tithonus; Elizabeth Barrett Browning, The Runaway Slave at Pilgrim’s Point