Literature of the Enlightenment Era

For Credit: Five Years From Now

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Mon, 02 May 2011 21:44:00 +0000

The following clip, "The Five Minute University," featuring Father Guido Sarducci (comedian Don Novello), is a few decades old, but still current:

What will you remember from English 206/CWL 257 in five years' time?

There are two ways to answer this question:

1) As Father Guido Sarducci would.

2) As a hard-working and idealistic college student fresh from the course would.

You can decide how to answer (giving two answers in an option).

Deadline: Friday (5/6), 11am.

For Credit: The Final Exam

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Mon, 02 May 2011 21:30:00 +0000

The final exam was handed out in class today, you can also find it over there in the sidebar and here. In class on Wednesday, you will have the opportunity to discuss the readings for the exam, which are over there in the sidebar. Please bring a copy to class, along with any questions you have about either text.

If you have questions about the exam, it would be best to ask them in class on Wednesday or by e-mail (with the understanding that I will send the response to the class). I may not see responses to this post in a timely manner.

You CAN, however, respond to this post with your thoughts about what the exam does NOT cover. What have you learned this semester that you don't have the opportunity to display on the final? What would you have liked to have been asked, but weren't?

Deadline: Friday (5/6), 11am.

For Credit: The Big Picture Revisited (Deadline Extended)

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Sun, 01 May 2011 18:42:00 +0000

How has your understanding of the Enlightenment era changed since the beginning of the semester?

Read on before you answer!

On the first day of class people identified a number of concepts that they correctly associated with the Enlightenment:

doubt and skepticism about religion
new ideas about equality among people
distrust of monarchical and authoritarian forms of government
exploration
the development of empirical, scientific thought
emphasis on reason

At the same time that we discussed these concepts and wrote them on the board, I explained that the word "Enlightenment" in the course title didn't necessarily apply to all of the literature that we would be studying--that the narrow course title (which was laid down in stone some years back) doesn't quite correspond to the breadth of literature implied by the CWL cross-listing of the course or by its placement within the sequence of 200-level English department courses.

So, you've now read literature from that era that spans the globe, as well as the wide range of functions literature can serve, from advancing new ideas, to supplying entertainment, to repackaging old certainties in new ways, to validating the realities of readers' lives. You've done some archival research of your own, and in the company of your classmates you've explored the time period largely unconstrained by national boundaries or by preconceived ideas of what "Enlightenment" literature ought to be (after all, the word appears nowhere in the title of your Longman anthology).

What have you learned from the reading for this course? Identify ONE specific thing that you now know that you didn't on the first day of class. If a classmate has already responded with the thing you wanted to say, identify something else that you have learned.

Deadline: ~~Monday (5/2)~~ Wednesday (5/4), start of class.

Just So You Know

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Sat, 30 Apr 2011 01:29:00 +0000

I'm a week behind in the blog grading. The priority at the moment is getting your third papers graded, so I'm probably not going to get on top of it this weekend. FYI.

For Credit: The Easy Answers

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Sat, 30 Apr 2011 00:28:00 +0000

Our discussion of Candide today ended on an optimistic note: This may not be the best of all possible worlds, but by consistently questioning, thinking for oneself, and (I daresay) laughing at oneself, perhaps a better world that the current one can be gradually achieved.

Is such a hopeful, forward-looking view in fact what Voltaire seems to be suggesting through Candide?

What separates the phlegmatic cynicism of Martin or the old lady from more modern forms of anomie?

What (if any) limitations are there to the world-view presented in the conclusion to Candide?

What would you have liked to say, ask, suggest in class today if you had had the opportunity?

Deadline: Monday (5/2), start of class. Whether your post counts for Week 14 or Week 15 depends on which side of midnight Saturday it appears.

For Credit: All the Single Ladies... (BUMPED, deadline extended)

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 13:00:00 +0000

The women represented in Candide are either the victims of rampant and unremitting sexual violence...or they are prostitutes (which does not necessarily preclude being a victim of sexual violence). Or they cheerfully make love to monkeys.

What are we to make of this?

Deadline: ~~Wednesday (4/27)~~ Friday (4/29), start of class (since we didn't have much opportunity to discuss this issue on Wednesday).

For Credit: Things I Learned This Evening

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 04:18:00 +0000

1. My facetious suggestion (you know, the one that produced dead silence: that the old lady is quite deliberately presented as "half-assed") turns out to be anachronistic. Worse, it relies on a pun only available in English translation (the native-French-speaking friend I consulted tells me there's no equivalent French term that combines butts with the sense of things being poorly done or ill-considered.) In case you're curious, the term originates in American English, with a first recorded usage of 1938. It doesn't appear in British English ("half-arsed") until 1961.

2. People seem to name their cats after characters in Candide more frequently than one might expect. Or so I have gathered from searching Google Images for graphics to put on the blog.

Why doesn't the old lady have a name?

Deadline: Friday (4/29), start of class.

For Credit: Science, Progress, and Glasses that are Half-Full/Empty

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 02:12:00 +0000

Oof.

So where did today's Martin vs. Pangloss exercise leave us?

Is the difference just one between those who see the glass as half-empty and those who see it as half-full, or is there a more far-reaching distinction between the two positions?

To what extent does Voltaire think that change is possible, either for individuals or for the human race as a whole?

What would you have liked to say today but didn't have a chance to?

Deadline: Friday (4/29), start of class.

For Credit: The Winding Down of the Semester

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 02:02:00 +0000

In random bullet form, because there's not a lot of coherence here, but I don't want to make a series of microposts. The bloggy question is the last bullet point.

You people don't eat wings? The senior English majors in Later C18 Lit (427) had lots of suggestions. So did the folks in Intro to Fiction (109). I'm not sure what to make of the silence from my (ahem) Enlightenment class.
In case you were wondering, good wings are, apparently, to be found at Buffalo Wild Wings, Hooters, Farren's, Black Dog, Brothers, Applebees (half price after 9:30), and Gumby's. But the Intro to Fiction class mostly recommended BWW. Then again, according to a 2-year old Buzz review of CU wings, which someone in Later C18 Lit helpfully linked to, BWW isn't that good. So now you know. (Me, wings have always seemed like a lot of work relative to the payoff. I'll have a brisket sandwich with extra sauce and sweet potato fries at Black Dog or a cheeseburger at Farren's--and leave the wings for someone else.)
As I announced in class today, we'll finish up Candide on Friday; Monday we'll review the semester and I'll pass out the exam questions. Wednesday, we'll discuss the reading that will appear on the exam.
I misspoke in class. The exam will have three questions: one requiring you to make sense of some Enlightenment-era text you haven't seen before, one inviting you to think broadly about the semester's reading as a whole, and (this is the part I forgot) a question on Candide.
As some of you have noticed, there's an Exploration Assignment listed on the syllabus that never got assigned. It won't be. You all have had plenty to do this semester as it is. Instead I'll just give everyone the 10 points.
SO, here's the bloggy question for credit: How should the exam prompt your best thinking about Candide? Propose a good exam question. It should elicit 2 - 3 pages of double-spaced interpretive writing, be only answerable by someone who has read the text attentively and paid attention to the issues raised in class, and demonstrate the skills one has mastered over the course of the semester.

Deadline: Friday (4/29), start of class.

For Credit: God (as Promised)

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 00:11:00 +0000

Not ALL religious feeling comes under satirical attack in Candide. Jacques, the generous Anabaptist, and the El Doradans profess their faith and seem to go uncriticized for it. An oversight on Voltaire's part, or a cue to the positive views being advance in this novel?

Deadline: Wednesday (4/27), start of class.

Happy Easter!

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Sun, 24 Apr 2011 17:01:00 +0000

Wishing a festive holiday to everyone who is celebrating today.

The image is the earliest known depiction of an Easter bunny in the Americas. It is thought to be by a Pennsylvania schoolmaster (originally from Germany), Johann Conrad Gilbert. It's on display at the Winterthur Museum in Delaware, which only recently acquired it. You can read more about the picture here.

For Credit: Candide Goes to Eldorado

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Sat, 23 Apr 2011 18:27:00 +0000

As I announced in class on Friday, for Monday you should read up to the end of Chapter 19. Feel free to respond to any of the following questions, just specify which you're responding to and cite some text to support your claims.

1. Even in a novelistic world filled with brutal acts of violence, the old lady's loss of a buttock (which is mentioned several times) seems like a particularly strange data-point. What's up with that?

2. Which characters in this novel seem fully developed with rounded and psychologically complex identities? Which characters are little more than the narratives of of the misfortune they've endured?

3. It's a comic novel. What moments, episodes, events, remarks strike you as particularly funny--and why?

4. Among the many objects of satire in this novel are (a) the novel and (b) travel narratives. How and where specifically do you see those literary forms coming under attack?

5. At every point in the novel there are circumstances that could provoke Candide to reject Pangloss's teaching. What are we to make of the fact that it is only the events of Chapter 19 that finally "plunged him into a black melancholy" and led him to the conclusion that "if all is going well, it's happending in Eldorado and not in the rest of the world" (p. 486-7)?

Deadline: Monday (4/25), start of class (whether your post counts for Week 13 or Week 14 depends on whether it appears before or after midnght on 4/23).

For Credit: Third Paper (BUMPED)

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Sat, 23 Apr 2011 17:30:00 +0000

The assignment for the third paper is over there in the sidebar, in case you missed it in class. Please feel free to post here with any confusion, questions, or difficulty that you're having--or just to compare notes with your classmates.

Deadline: open, but posts only count for Week 13 up to Saturday midnight; after that it's Week 14.'

Not at all for credit; in fact, entirely irrelevant to this course, but...

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 23:33:00 +0000

a friend has moved to the area from the East Coast and is desperately in need of buffalo wings. I have strong opinions about many food-related matters, but I'm not a big fan of wings so I have not been able to guide her. Any suggestions about where to get good wings around here? (Preferably non-chain...)

For Credit: Candide!

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 23:56:00 +0000

What strikes you as baffling/confusing/strange about this novel?

What questions do you have about it?

Have you had to read it before? What did you take away from your previous study of it?

What do you look forward to discussing with regard to it?

Deadline: Friday (4/22), start of class.

For Credit: Behn-A-Go-Go

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 16:48:00 +0000

Oof! We touched on a lot of stuff today: the historiography of women writers, the slave trade, racism, the C18 abolition movement, feminist-critiques-of-Behn, intersexuality, the queer Enlightenment era, and the sexual politics of consent (sort of).

Feel free to respond to any of it in response to this post. What would you have liked to say in class but didn't get the opportunity to? What further thoughts have you had on these readings? What questions or confusion do you have?

Deadline: Friday (4/22), start of class.

For Credit: The Disappointment

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 23:28:00 +0000

Tomorrow we'll be following up our discussion of Aphra Behn's Oroonoko with a discussion of her poem, "The Disappointment," a response to Rochester's "The Imperfect Enjoyment" which we looked at briefly in class last week. You should bring both the handout with the Behn poems AND the Longman anthology to class tomorrow.

What remaining questions do you have about Oroonoko?

What differences do you see in how Behn and Rochester depict an unfulfilling sexual encounter?

What strikes you as particularly significant or noteworthy about Behn's poem?

Deadline: Wednesday (4/20), start of class.

For Credit: Oroonoko, the first American novel?

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 20:52:00 +0000

As I mentioned in class, many critics regard Oroonoko as the first American novel: the first novel to be set in the Americas, framed by issues of relevance to colonial life, with characters drawn from the colonial world. I had meant to raise the question in class, but we ran out of time, so I raise it here.

What do you think? Feel free to comment with your own thoughts, pro or con, or a thoughtful response to a classmate's reflections.

Deadline: Friday (4/22), start of class.

Chag Sameach!

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 20:40:00 +0000

A happy Passover to all who observe the holiday.

(The image depicts Portuguese Jews in the C18 celebrating a seder; it comes from multivolume French work written by Bernard Picart between 1733 and 1739, titled Ceremonies and Religious Customs of the Various Nations of the Known World.)

For Credit: What's Up with Clarinda?

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 17:01:00 +0000

If you were in class today, you got the handout with two Behn poems (by popular demand). We'll be talking about one of them, "The Disappointment" in class on Wednesday; it's a response to "The Imperfect Enjoyment" by John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester, which you can find on p. 562 of the Longman anthology. You can find "The Disappointment" (along with another, shorter poem: "To the Fair Clarinda") here, and over there in the sidebar under "Readings" if you didn't get a copy in class.

We won't be spending a lot in class on the first poem, "To the Fair Clarinda," but since it's short, have a look at it and post your thoughts here for blog credit. What's going on in this poem? Why is the poet so drawn to Clarinda?

Deadline: Wednesday (4/20), start of class.

For Credit: The Upward Path of Enlightenment

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 16:52:00 +0000

Racism and slavery are two different issues. Whether Oroonoko is a novel about slavery or not, it is an Enlightenment-era depiction of nonwhite people, and of European attitudes towards them. To what extent does this novel represent a stage in the process by which, as Chris Rock says, "White people have gotten less crazy"?

Discuss.

Deadline: Monday (4/18), start of class.

For Credit: What If Oroonoko Is Not about Slavery?

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 16:44:00 +0000

In class today we discussed some of the peculiar ruptures and discrepancies in Behn's depiction of slavery:

Oroonoko and Imoinda are represented as fundamentally different (in appearance as well as character) from the other enslaved Africans.
Little of the material deprivation, cruelty, and onerousness of slavery is depicted.
Oroonoko is hailed as a prince and revered by the very people he sold into slavery.
Imoinda has a house, a poodle, and the gallant admiration of all the white men on the plantation.

I suggested that perhaps the effort to read this as a novel about slavery is anachronistic. What if the depiction of slavery here is just the scene-setting for a different kind of story that Aphra Behn wants to tell (and perhaps a different political agenda that she wants to advance)?

Some issues to consider as we work towards other ways of understanding this novel:

Who are the villains in this story, and what makes them so bad?
What is it about Oroonoko (beyond his handsome and Europeanized physical appearance) that entitles him to some respect and reverence from everyone he meets?
What are the leadership qualities in Oroonoko that Behn seems to value?
Who are the good guys among the white men in this story--and what makes them good?

Those are some issues to be considered as we formulate an alternative interpretation about what this novella is about. Respond to this post with your answers to any of them, or your thoughts about how these various questions might come together to prompt other ways of reading this text.

Deadline: Monday (4/18), start of class.

For Credit: Behn and Oroonoko in Surinam

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 21:59:00 +0000

Feel free to respond to any of the following questions (just specify what you are answering):

1. Unlike the narrator of Fantomina, the narrator of Oroonoko puts herself in the story. What do you learn about her from her narration? What details about her life, values, or personality emerge?

2. Oroonoko becomes Caesar when he is purchased by Mr. Trefry. What (if anything) is significant about this name change?

3. The subtitle of this novel is "The Royal Slave," an oxymoron. To what ends does Behn yoke together the notions of royalty and servitude?

4. What leadership qualities does Behn ascribe to Oroonoko? How does he display his royalty?

5. What in the depiction of Surinam leads you to believe that Behn might or might not have actually been there? What details seem authentic--or not?

Deadline: Friday (4/15), start of class.

For Credit: More Fun with Swift and Montagu

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 01:14:00 +0000

Rochester as played by Depp in The Libertine

For those who missed class today, we looked at three poems in the Longman anthology:

John Wilmot, Earl of Rochester, "The Imperfect Enjoyment" (p. 562 - 563)
Jonathan Swift, "The Lady's Dressing Room" (p. 289 - 292)
Lady Mary Wortley Montagu Montagu, "The Reasons that Induced Dr. S. to Write a Poem Called The Lady's Dressing Room" (p. 292 - 294)

If you were in class, feel free to follow up on the discussion with further reflections, questions, or observations on any of these three poems--anything you would have liked to say in class but didn't have the opportunity to.

If you were not in class today, feel free to post thoughtful observations and specific queries to your classmates here about any of these three poems (and the elucidation that you might have missed out on). Those who were in class are welcome to respond.

Deadline: Wednesday (4/13), start of class.

For Credit: Oroonoko Introductory Grab-Bag

noreply@blogger.com (KW) — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 16:16:00 +0000

For Wednesday be sure to read in Oroonoko up to the point on p. 317 where the English ship arrives. You can read further, of course, but our discussion Wednesday will focus on that part of the novella
.
Here's a cluster of questions for you to consider in preparation for class. Feel free to address any one of them in your response (just make it clear which you're responding to).

1. Have you had to read this novella before? In what context? What did you take away from it?

2. At what points in the narrative does Behn reveal her political leanings? What hints do you get about her political beliefs?

3. What interesting points of comparison do you find between this text and the other novels/novellas/fictions that we've read? (i.e., Fantomina, Gulliver's Travels, The Story of the Stone)

4. What interesting points of comparison do you find between this text and the other travel narratives we've read in the past few weeks?

Deadline: Wednesday (4/13), start of class.