2007 BM1 Introduction to Literature, Part 2

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The second part of our Basismodule focuses on techniques of textual analysis in the context of discussing literature. We are offering seven parallel courses (supported by tutorials). Please make sure that you are registered in Stud.IP both for the main page of the module and for your individual course. All parallel courses have a common structure, but each course may differ in emphasis. You will find information relating to all the courses on this page, and the pages for the individual courses for information on your course:

  • Tutorials:

The texts for our courses will come from a common pool, though each course may have a different choice. You should make sure to read at least those texts that are dealt with in your course.

The "analytical tools" will be presented by the lectures (on a handout) in each meeting. The additional reading from which these 'tools' are taken is not obligatory, and it can be done either before or after.

Both the texts and the other materials will be made accessible to you electronically (cf. the links below) and as a master copy at Wersig. In addition you will need to purchase the Shakespeare play read in your course in an Arden Edition (ca. 14 EUR at the CvO bookshop).

Course work: You will be asked to hand in three assignments (in week 4, 7 and 10 respectively) and produce a Research Paper Outline (due August 15 2007). The assignments are limited to a max. of 2-3 pages of text, formatted according to the style sheet, and will require you to analyse poetry, drama and fiction respectively. For the Research Paper Outline you will need to find your own topic to work on and document the preliminary work (this includes finding an appropriate title, writing a paragraph that describes your problem and your goal, and presenting a tentative table of contents and a short bibliography).

Tutorials will help you to practise your analysis skills and support you in doing your assignments and Research Paper Outline.

Session 1: A Poem

Texts

Blake, Jerusalem (1804)

Skills and Activities

Group work with presentations:

  1. What is poetic about this poem?
  2. What are the Themes of the poem?
  3. What historical contexts?
  4. What is its cultural significance (then and later/now)?

Seminar discussion: What discourses did you employ? What traditions do they belong to? How does this relate back to the lecture of the Winter Term? Survey of the coming Term.

Session 2: Poetry and Poetics

Analytical Tools

Texts

Skills and Activities

Structural approach to poetry: Communicative situation, themes, metrics and language. Acquire a basic checklist of what to look (first) for in a poem. Recapitulate the basics of metrics and rhyme patterns. Recognise the features of a particular genre and genre conventions: the Sonnet

Session 3: Poetry and Poetics: Speaking about Beautiful/Artful Language

Analytical Tools

Texts

  • George Herbert. "The Deniall" The Temple. Sacred Poems and Private Ejaculations. University of Cambridge, T. Buck and R. Daniel, 1633.
  • Emily Dickinson

Skills and Activities

Figurative language, interplay. Spot metaphors, similes, etc. the metric pattern and valorise the points where it is broken. Reinforce basic checklist of previous week. Analyse particular features of poetic language (figures of speech, metrical effects). [assignment 1 given]

Session 4: Rhetoric

Analytical Tools


Plett 3-22, 102-105 Excerpt from Plett

Texts

One of the three Shakespeare plays

Skills and Activities

A speech from the Shakespeare play of the next four sessions [assignment 1 due]

Session 5: Dramatic Structures, Dramatic Communication

Analytical Tools

Pfister 49 - 57, 86 - 94, 126 - 147 Excerpt from Pfister

Handout: Analysing Dramatic Communication

Texts

One of the three Shakespeare plays

Skills and Activities

Exposition

Session 6: Drama: Characters and Genre Aspects

Analytical Tools

Pfister 183 - 195 Excerpt from Pfister

Texts

One of the three Shakespeare plays

Skills and Activities

Distinguish modes of characterisation [assignment 2 given]

Session 7: Drama and Fiction

Analytical Tools

Texts

  • Nathaniel Hawthorne. "Young Goodman Brown [1835]." The Heath Anthology of American Literature. Vol. B. Fifth Edition. Ed. Paul Lauter. Boston, New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2006. 2258-2267.
  • Coover, Magic Poker

Skills and Activities

An understanding of genres in the context of traditional poetics, and of the transition from poetic genres to literary genres. [assignment 2 due]

Session 8: Fiction 1

Analytical Tools

Rimmon-Kenan 72-86

Excerpt from Rimmon-Kenan

Handout: Focalisation and Narration

Texts

Skills and Activities

Narration, Focalisation. [assignment 2 returned]

Session 9: Fiction 2

Analytical Tools


Rimmon-Kenan 59-71

Handout: Characterisation

Texts

Skills and Activities

Plot and Characters. [assignment 3 given]

Session 10: Film

Analytical Tools

  • Handout: Film Analysis
  • David Bordwell et al.; Korte, Einführung in die Systematische Filmanalyse (2000)

Texts

Pulp Fiction

Skills and Activities

Spectacle, Narratives and Fiction. Film Analysis. [assignment 3 due]

Session 11: Beyond the Canon 1

Analytical Tools

Texts

John Mandeville, Voyages [c. 1360] (1705)

Skills and Activities

Literary Analysis and non-literary materials, [assignment 3 returned]

Session 12: Beyond the Canon 2

Analytical Tools


Texts

Orientalist GEO, Time Life, Palestine, India etc.

Skills and Activities

Literary Analysis and non-literary materials

Session 13: Term Paper Projects

Skills and Activities

Brief Report on 'Work in Progress': Your Term Paper Projects