English 45A

Book List

Chaucer, Geoffrey: The Canterbury Tales, ed. Jill Mann; Dickson, Donald, ed.: John Donne's Poetry; Liuzza, R. M.: Beowulf: A New Verse Translation; Marlowe, Christopher: Doctor Faustus, ed. David Wootton; Milton, John: Paradise Lost, ed. William Kerrigan et al.

Description

This course will introduce you to some central works from the earlier centuries of English literary history in order to help you develop strategies within which to read early literatures. Its particular focus on Beowulf, the Canterbury Tales, Dr. Faustus, the poetry of John Donne, and Paradise Lost will allow us to engage the early literature of England from a variety of perspectives. We will explore various genres (among them, epic, romance, lyric, drama) and the expectations created by these forms. Throughout, we will be thinking about contemporary literary conventions and the cultural contexts of the works on which we focus. And we will attend closely to matters of language, observing how English changes over the centuries.