English Department Sophomore Seminars (English 97) - 2008-2009
This one-term course, required of all sophomore concentrators, introduces students to various topics, terms, problems, and methods of literary study. Seminar members study selected texts in English and American literature, along with readings in literary theory and criticism. Topics include the functions and purposes of literary study, genre, the relationship of literature to historical events and influences, research methods and bibliography, and various critical approaches (e.g., formalism, structuralism, deconstruction, psychological and psychoanalytic criticism, Marxism, feminism, and new historicism). Both close reading and general concepts are stressed. The ideal enrollment is 8 students per seminar.
IF YOU PLAN TO TAKE A FALL SEMINAR, you must attend the organizational meeting on Tuesday, September 16 at 4:00 PM in the Kresge Room, Barker Center, to sign up. If you cannot come, please notify Jeff Berg (jmberg@fas) in advance. Fall seminars will start meeting the week of Monday, September22.

IF YOU PLAN TO TAKE A SPRING SEMINAR, you must attend the organizational meeting on Thursday, January 29 at 4:00 PM OR Friday, January 30 at 12:00 PM in the Thompson Room, Barker Center, to sign up. If you cannot come, please notify Jeff Berg (jmberg@fas.harvard.edu) in advance. Spring seminars will start meeting the week of Monday, February 2.

Please complete a seminar preference form. 

 
Sophomore Seminars - Fall 2008
Steve Burt
Adolescence
Wed 3-5

Syllabus
Contemporary America (like several other English-speaking countries) imagines a stage of life called adolescence, in which young women and young men rebel against adults, rely on their peers, and decide who they are and what they want to become. What did its closest analogues look like 50, or 400 years ago? How have literary authors explored this stage-from youthful or grownup perspectives-in novels, film, plays, comics, poems? We'll explore those questions - and others of your own choice - throughout the class.
 

Dan Donoghue
Medieval and Contemporary
Wed 1-3

Syllabus
Working with the genres of lyric and prose fiction, this seminar introduces students to the methodologies of literary studies.  We will pair medieval with contemporary (or near contemporary) texts, such as Seamus Heaney’s recent translation of Beowulf alongside his most recent collection of poems, in order to trace literary conventions that seem to have a enduring presence.

The first few weeks of the course will develop techniques of close reading, using poetry and some short fiction from different periods.  Specific assignments will acquaint students with poetic form, prosody, rhetorical tropes, and other formal conventions. 

The second segment organizes an array of critical essays around two primary texts in order to demonstrate, by practical application, various critical approaches. Short response papers will help develop a critical vocabulary.

The final segment applies the lessons learnd to the medieval Njal’s Saga, a Victorian novel, and a recent novel to be chosen by the students.  There will be a final critical essay.

Peter Nohrnberg
Romanticism and Modernism
Thur 2-4

 Syllabus

Daniel Shore
Poetry and Persuasion in the Renaissance
Tues 2-4

Syllabus
What is poetry for? Renaissance poets received a rhetorical education that taught them to persuade listeners through speech and writing. How does poetry differ from rhetoric? Are its aims distinct? Might poetry possess its own special means of persuasion?

In this seminar we will borrow terms and concepts from the rhetorical tradition to aid us in describing poems by Sidney, Shakespeare, Donne, Milton, Marvell, and others. How do these poets persuade, convince, seduce, convert, and transform their readers? We will compare poems with other, obviously polemical forms of writing, like Bacon’s essays, Donne’s sermons, and Milton’s prolusions.

The course begins by studying the traditional tools of rhetoric and investigating obviously polemical poetry. By the end, however, we will engage with poems that appear to have no obvious function, to be for nothing at all. What can rhetoric teach us about these poems?
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Sophomore Seminars - Spring 2009

Glenda Carpio
Criminals and Misfits

Syllabus

J. D. Connor
Thinking Again

Syllabus
Writers, even the authors of literary masterpieces, revise their work. In this seminar, we will attempt to provide some answers to the questions why? and how? We will consider various forces from within the history and theory of authorship that shape the revision process. What are the authors’ relationships with audiences and editors? How does the development of a career affect an author’s willingness to revise? How do authors draw the lines between private life and public knowledge? At the same time, we will seek to derive useful lessons in the art and craft of revision and drafting that can be applied to our own work. Readings include: poems by Dickinson, Hamlet, The Prelude, Walden, Three Lives, The Waste Land, On the Road, and stories by Raymond Carver.

Matthew Kaiser
TBA

Syllabus

Elizabeth Lyman
Going to Extremes

Syllabus
"Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess." -- Oscar Wilde
From Plato to Montaigne to Goethe, nearly every notable thinker has had something definite to say on the thorny subject of moderation and excess. Why? What makes this opposition so enduring? We'll use the theme of moderation and excess - in scholarship, love, art, and governance (self and state) -- as an organizing principle for our serious task of acquiring literary tools and developing essential skills in close reading, research, and critical writing. Projects include an ongoing senior thesis exercise. Readings include Shakespeare's Measure for Measure, Austen's Sense and Sensibility, Blake's Marriage of Heaven and Hell, selected poems, O'Neill's Long Days Journey Into Night, and Caldwell's & Thomason's recent best-seller, The Rule of Four. Campus excursions integrated with readings are designed both to increase the efficiency and sophistication with which we exploit the rich resources of Harvard's libraries and museums, and to remind us that there is no substitute for direct contact with textual objects themselves-and with the people who help us interpret them.

John Picker
TBA

Syllabus

Peter Sacks
TBA

Syllabus

Daniel Shore
TBA

Syllabus

Jason Stevens
Henry James and the Art of Criticism

Syllabus

Gordon Tesky
Writing About Poetry and Art

Syllabus

Joanne van der Woude
Literature of Mourning

Syllabus
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Last Updated: August 26, 2008