English 166

Special Topics: Theory of the Poet

Book List

Scudder, Bernard (trans.): Egil's Saga; Wordsworth, William: The Prelude: 1799, 1805, 1850

Other Readings and Media

A course reader

Description

The figure of The Poet occupies a significant place in cultural imagination, even when The Poet is thought to occupy a marginal position or engage in useless activity. Bard, rebel, cultural diplomat, priest, historian, recluse—who or what is The Poet? This course will be co-taught by Professor Emily V. Thornbury, whose expertise is in poetry before 1066, and Professor Lyn Hejinian, whose expertise is in poetry after 1966. Readings on The Poet—essays, critical studies, myths, sagas and, naturally, poems—will be drawn from within and between the instructors’ respective historical and cultural terrains.

Instructors and students will engage in the adventures of a concept and of some of the personages who have adventured with it, creatively, and sometimes passionately, or prophetically, or mournfully, or even dishonestly.

Readings will be diverse and, for the most part, they will be made available by the instructors in photocopy or on a course website. But students will be also asked to read the 1805 version of William Wordsworth’s The Prelude and Egil’s Saga (in the recent Penguin translation).

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