Email: fmoramar@mail.sdsu.edu.

Description:

This course means to provide you with an introduction to literature. We will read, discuss, and write about different genres of literature: short stories, novels, plays, and poems. In addition, we will be pursuing a special theme in our readings: how issues from "Beauty and the Beast" reappear in various literary works.

There is one thing that is considerably different about these sections of English 220, compared to others offered this term. As an experiment, these sections of English 220 will make use of "new technologies"--for example: much of the class will be on the Internet and students will be working with material there; in the classroom, we will sometimes make use of presentation and interactive software; outside the class, students will work in a university computer lab with CD-ROMs. Our intention is not to make "technology" the subject of this class and at the expense of literature; instead, we wish to find out whether, if students use new "tools," they can learn and appreciate literature in a better manner than what is conventionally done in classes of "Intro to Lit."

This means that students enrolled in these particular classes should have a basic familiarity with computers; if you've never laid your hands on one of these machines or if you hate learning how to make computers do sophisticated things, then it might be better if you transfer to another section of Engl. 220. Moreover, a student in these particular sections of Intro. to Lit. needs to be flexible; this class is "experimental" and we may run into "glitches" along the way which will require, say, a schedule change or other unexpected modifications. Having cautioned you, we should also add that many students may find this class an especially interesting and exciting one.

Work & Grades:

Throughout the term, there will be numerous, unannounced, short reading quizzes. If you miss a quiz, there is no way to make it up (no exceptions). We will, however, drop your two lowest quiz grades--so, save these for those unexpected occasions when you might get sick or otherwise miss class. Your quiz scores will be averaged to arrive at your Quiz Grade.

You will have three grades for the term: 1) a mid-term, take-home essay exam; 2) a final, in-class exam; and 3) your Quiz Grade. These grades will be averaged to arrive at your grade for the term; plus or minus grades will be given.

Students will also be expected to make "journal entries" in the class forum or discussion area on the Internet. There you will respond to the works we are taking in the class, to reading questions posted by the professors, and to comments made by your classmates. These entries can have a positive or negative effect on your grade, moving it up and down one grade level--for example: frequent and worthwhile entries, can change your semester grade from (say) a "B" to a "B+"; average entries will result in a "B" remaining a "B"; unsatisfactory participation or uninspired entries may result in a "B" sliding to a "B-". During the term, we will be letting you know how we believe you are doing in this category.

Of course, regular class attendance and participation in discussion is expected. Like the journal entries, these too may have a positive or negative effect on your grade. So, come to class regularly and come prepared to take an active role in class discussions.

Texts (in the order in which they will be taken) and Equipment:

• Griswold & Moramarco, Reader for Engl. 220 (available at Cal Copies).
• Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (Penguin).
• Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse Five (Dell).
• Beatrix Potter, The Tale of Peter Rabbit, (Dover)
• Tennessee Williams, A Streetcar Named Desire (New American Library).
• William Shakespeare, Othello (Penguin).
• Hunter, The Norton Introduction to Poetry Sixth Edition, (Norton).
• Earphones. When we work with multimedia material in the computer lab, you will need to have and bring earphones that you can plug into a computer (this is university policy and good hygiene). This inexpensive item is available in the university bookstore and can be purchased elsewhere. You may find it most useful to purchase earphones that have their own slide "volume" control.
• OPTIONAL: Students who wish to, may purchase in the bookstore their own copies of CD-ROMS that we will be working with: The Essential Frankenstein and Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five (both from Byron Preiss).
• OPTIONAL: Communication Packet. If instead of using university computers, you would sometimes like to do some of your classwork from a computer (and modem) at home (and if you are not already connected to the university computer system), you will need to purchase a Communications Packet at the bookstore. Details about this will be given to you at our Feb. 6 class meeting.

Schedule:

WEEK 1

• Introduction to the course (FM &JG)
• Responding to Literary Works
• Some Critical Approaches to Literature
• The distinctive nature of this course (intro to the electronic media)
• Read Kate Chopin's "Story of an Hour" (online or in course reader) (FM & JG)

WEEK 2

• GTA Introduction to the Internet and our web-site.
• Accessing literary sites on the World Wide Web.
• Interstudent and student faculty communications. (GTA's)
  
• Joyce Carol Oates, "Where are you Going and Where Have You Been." In course reader; see links to web-sites. (FM)

WEEK 3

• Introduction to Course Theme: Beauty and the Beast(JG)
• Discussion of Beauty and the Beast, continues.
• Multimedia presentation on Beauty and the Beast in the 20th Century. (JG)

WEEK 4

• How to Use the CD-Roms in this course; introduction and instruction (see assignments below)
• Nathaniel Hawthorne, "Young Goodman Brown."
• William Faulkner, "A Rose for Emily."
• Stories in course reader.(JG)

WEEK 5

• Introduction to the Novel: Mary Shelley, "Frankenstein."
• Have read CD-ROM: The "Introduction" and Volume 1.
• These sections of the CD-ROM roughly correspond with pages 61-135 of the novel. Be prepared for quiz.(JG)
• Have read CD-ROM: Volume 2
• These sections of the CD-ROM roughly correspond with pages 136-194 of the novel. (JG)

WEEK 6

• Have read CD-ROM: Volume 3
• These sections of the CD-ROM roughly correspond with pages 195-265 of the novel. (JG)
• Have read CD-ROM: Afterword, Appendix, Galleries
• Have read paperback: Introduction, 7-42
• Have explored web links(JG)

WEEK 7

The Contemporary Novel:

• The Contemporary Novel: Kurt Vonnegut, "Slaughterhouse Five," Chapter 1 (CD-Rom and/or paperback, plus links to Vonnegut web sites. (FM)
• "Slaughterhouse Five," Chapters 2-5. (FM)

WEEK 8

• "Slaughterhouse Five," concluded. (FM)
• Students will be given question for mit-term, take-home exam on fiction (FM & JG) -- Due March 28.
• In class evaluation by Jane de Roche.
  

WEEK 9

• Beatrix Potter, "Peter Rabbit."
• A multimedia examination of the picture book. (JG)
• Take Home Exam Due.
• Discussion of exams.
• Discussion of course thus far.

April 1-6

• Spring Break.
  

WEEK 10

• Introduction to Drama: Tennessee Williams, "A Streetcar Named Desire." (JG)
• "A Streetcar Named Desire," continued. (JG)

WEEK 11

• "Othello." (FM)
• "Othello." concluded. (FM)

WEEK 12

Introduction to Poetry: Poetry on web site in hypertext format and in Norton.

• Norton, Chapter 1: Poetry; Reading, Responding, Writing, & Understanding the Text, Pages 1-54. Focus on the following poems:
  • Browning, "How Do I Love Thee,"
  • Wayman, "Wayman in Love,"
  • Olds, "The Glass,"
  • Li-Young-Li, "Persimmons,"
  • Piercy, "Barbie Doll,"
  • Knight, "Hard Rock etc,"
  • Hayden, "Those Winter Sundays,"
  • Eberhart, "The Groundhog,"
  • Blake, "The Tyger"

• Norton, Chapter 4; Focus on:
  • Dickinson, "After Great Pain,"
  • Roethke, "My Papa's Waltz,"
  • Olds, "Sex Without Love,"
  • Williams, "The Red Wheelbarrow,"
  • cummings, [in Just-],
  • Dickinson, "I Dwell in Possibility,"
  • Shakespeare, "That Time of Year,"
  • Rich, "Two Songs,"
  • Jarrell, "Death of the Ball Turret Gunner,"
  • Carolyn Forche, "Taking off My Clothes,"
  • Blake, "The Sick Rose,"
  • Williams, "Poem."

WEEK 13

Poetic Structure: Internal and External

• Norton, pp. 204-265
  • Robinson, "Mr. Flood's Party,"
  • Olds, "The Victims,"
  • Shapiro, "Auto Wreck,"
  • Williams, "The Dance,"
  • Wordsworth, "The World is Too Much With Us,"
  • Shelley, "Ozymandias,"
  • Shakespeare, "My Mistress's Eyes,"
  • Thomas, "Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night,"
  • Moore, "Poetry," MacLeish, "Ars Poetica,"
  • cummings, [Buffalo Bill's]

• Norton, pp. 287-320
  • "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer"
  • "When I Have Fears"
  • "Ode on a Grecian Urn"
  • "Ode on Melancholy"
  • "La Melle Dans Sans Merci," pp. 447-449 (FM)
  
  

A Selection of Major Poems

• Coleridge, "Kubla Kahn," p. 476;
• Dickinson, pp.482-485;
• Donne, "A Valediction Forbidding Mourning," p. 487;
• Hughes, "Theme for English B," p. 499;
• Frost, pp. 495-96;
• Whitman, pp. 539-546;
• Yeats, "Leda & the Swan," p. 553-54. (FM) T.S. Eliot
  • T.S. Eliot, "The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock." Norton, p. 491-494; Links to Web and Norton Beta CD-ROM (FM)
  
  

• Study questions for final.
• In Class evaluation. (JD)