L202 16272 LITERARY INTERPRETATION
Jerry Findley

11:15am-12:30pm TR (25 students) 3 cr. A&H, IW.

PREREQUISITE: Completion of the English Composition requirement.

This course provides students with the skills and vocabulary to analyze, discuss, and write about literary texts. We will read works representative of all major genres focusing on the basics of most literary discussion: theme, metaphor (language), plot, character, setting, and conventions. Works will include poetry by Shakespeare and Wordsworth; plays by Shakespeare, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Shaw Major Barbara, and Ionesco, The Lesson; narrative prose by Katherine Anne Porter; and a work of non-fiction, possibly Shaw’s preface to Major Barbara, possibly Machiavelli’s The Prince. We will begin by reading and explicating selections from Shakespeare’s Sonnets then turn to dramatic and prose narratives.

Requirement: three explications; three or four short essays; many quizzes and in-class exercises to assure that students attend class with their reading well prepared.