Course Description: Poetry 1

UNIVERSITY OF BABYLON
COLLEGE OF EDUCATION FOR HUMANITIES
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH



COURSE TITLE: 16th and 17th Century Poetry (POETRY 2)
INSTRUCTOR: Lec. Hadeel A. Muhammad, Ph.D.
CLASS: 2nd
ACADEMIC YEAR: 2012-2013
HOURS: as scheduled by department


OBJECTIVES:
The Elizabethan Age is considered the Golden Age of English Literature. The English nation has displayed a unique openness to other nations and cultures: the effect of that open-mindedness has created a literary treasure which is worth contemplating.
Jacobean and Caroline poetry, which includes the Cavalier poets and the Metaphysical poets represent the seventeenth century with all its conflicts and struggle.
The Cavalier poets are not as accomplished in style and themes as the Elizabethans; however, they are marked as a school because of their lifestyle and religion. The Metaphysical poets, on the other hand, show a continuity of some aspects of the Elizabethan poetry, like the use of wit.
Students are expected to get acquainted with the main features of these ages and to analyse some well-known poems. Therefore, they are to participate in class, whether via reading or answering questions.
To help the students fully understand the poetry of these ages and the poets’ career, selected well-known poems will be investigated and analysed. The students are required to participate in all class discussions, which will be best and most fruitfully achieved by their prior study of the poems.

TEXT BOOKS:
A pamphlet of the syllabus poems will be handed to students. Students will be notified if additional poems are needed.

SYLLABUS POEMS:

Thomas Wyatt: “Who so List to Hunt” AND “The Lover Rejoiceth the Enjoying of his Love”
Henry Howard, the Earl of Surrey: “Spring” AND “How No Age is Content”
Philip Sidney: “Come Sleep, O Sleep! The Certain Knot of Peace” AND “Leave me, O Love”
Edmund Spenser: “Like as a Ship” AND from The Fairie Queene
Marlowe: “The Passionate Shepherd to his Love”
William Shakespeare: Sonnets (18, 55 and 1116) AND “Under the Greenwood Tree”
John Donne: from Holy Sonnets (“Death be not Proud” and “This is my play’s last scene”)
George Herbert: “The Collar” AND “Grief”
Ben Jonson: “A Fit of Rhyme against Rhyme”
Robert Herrick: “To Daffodils” AND “Farewell Frost, or Welcome Spring”
Richard Lovelace: “To Althea: From Prison”
Andrew Marvell: “A Dialogue between the Reserved Soul and Created Pleasure”
John Milton: “On His Blindness” AND Paradise Lost (Book I: lines 1-156)
John Dryden: from Absalom and Achitophel (the portrait of Zimri)
Alexander Pope: Essay on Criticism (1-67, 215-252: “The Critic’s Task”)
Samuel Johnson: “The Vanity of Human Wishes”



REFERENCES: (available at Dept Library)
Edmundson and Wells, Shakespeare s Sonnets
H. J. C. Grierson, Metaphysical Lyrics and Poems of the Seventeenth Century
M. Schoenkeldt, A Companion to Shakespeare s Sonnets
R. Bradford, The Complete Critical Guide to John Milton
Boris Ford, The Pelican Guide to English Literature, vol. 2

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DAILY PREPARATION AND ASSIGNMENTS:

Before attending class, students should read the poems assigned, check the meaning of all ambiguous words and attempt to understand the meaning of the text.
Assignments will be distributed among students frequently. Some assignments will require group work, others can be done individually. Two of the assignments are already set as follows:
1. A paper on a poem (which is related to the Ages studied but not included in syllabus) to be presented orally in class and in written form to instructor. (before mid-term holiday)
2. Reciting a poem: Each student is required to recite a poem in front of class paying attention to the intonation and stress rules to be studied this year (in Phonetics and Phonology). (anytime before final exams).
3. A group presentation on a chosen theme related to Poetry. (two weeks after a specific theme is set for each group)

EXAMS:
Students are to sit three exams as follows:
1st exam : in the third week of December, 2012
2nd exam : in the second week of March, 2013
3rd exam : in the third week of April, 2013
Quizzes are to be expected anytime.

ATTENDANCE:
Students would be listed absent if they attended classes late or did not conform to University uniform codes.
If ever it is seen that students have pre-determined to be collectively absent, the students’ examination code is put into effect and students will lose marks for that.

MARKS:
The marks are divided 50/50 between the course activities and the final exam. The course marks will be calculated as follows:
33 marks : exams (10 each exam + 3 for quizzes)
12 marks : assignments (4 each)
5 marks : student’s effort throughout year

NOTE:
The course will have to deal with several religions and cultures. Any religious or political extremist discussions will not be tolerated in class. As students of literature, you are expected to keep an open mind to comprehend all that is course-related.