British Literature before 1800.

Catalog description

Spanning the 8th through the 18th centuries, this course takes us on a tour of “England” and the British Isles that makes stops in Pagan heaven, Christian Hell, earthly paradise, and the lascivious limbo of the Libertine. Along the way, we’ll read, among many other texts, Beowulf, “The Wife of Bath’s Tale,” Astrophil and Stella, Dr. Faustus, The Ducess of Malfi, Paradise Lost, and A Modest Proposal, all of which epitomize the tensions between nation and narration, gender and genre, religious piety and raucous debauchery that invigorate the literature of this extraordinary period. In particular, we will be focusing on “outliers” – those who exist outside the perceptual schemes of the culture they inhabit – specifically, the Irish, Scots, Welsh and, above all, women. In addition to challenging you not only to interpret but enjoy a variety of literary modes, including epic and lyric poetry, chivalric romance, prose satire, revenge tragedy, allegory and much more, this course will encourage you to explore these texts as historical – and ongoing – bids for authority in a culture disposed to validate the Literature of the “center” over the “literature” of the margins. ( DVSY , GE2A , GEDI , GELN , GEND )