2:30P-3:45P TR (30) 3 cr

OPEN TO MAJORS ONLY.  DECLARED MINORS OBTAIN AUTHORIZATION FROM
BH402.

The challenge in a course like this is to develop a sense of the
richness, variety and range of literature produced in a 200 year
span, and at the same time to explore some areas with enough
depth to achieve a deeper, more complex historical and cultural
understanding.  A rather daunting task!  For sanity's sake, we
won't attempt to "cover" 200 year's worth of print.  Rather, we
will be considering three groups of texts that help define
central historical/cultural issues of the period having to do
with the role of religion, the shifting understanding of nature,
and the changing understanding of personal identity.  In addition
to the literary works, we will be reading some secondary
materials that provide critical vocabularies for thinking about
these issues.  Some texts we will all read; with other texts,
there will be choice so that individual students or groups of
students may pursue particular questions in greater detail.  This
is a course that requires that class members be active inquirers,
willing to read and research on their own and come prepared to
engage fully in class conversation.  Course requirements:
in-class writing; 2 workshopped papers; 2 shorter response
papers; midterm and final exam; reader's theatre; participation.=20
Texts: Blackwell's ANTHOLOGY OF BRITISH LITERATURE 1640-1789;
Hacker, A WRITER'S REFERENCE; Supplementary Reading Packet.