Read Along with Berkeley English

Connect to the Berkeley English Classroom, and to Each Other

If you are like many graduates of Berkeley’s English Department, your seminars count among your most vivid memories. We’d like to share that experience with you again by inviting you to read along on our upcoming Fall 2025 series with Professor David Marno on Renaissance Literature! Every semester, we provide selected readings and discussion questions, along with an invitation to join an ongoing online discussion and a monthly Open Office Hours with the professor. Join us for three sessions this coming Fall 2025 semester, and Zoom along with Professor Marno for our monthly office hours. All sessions are from 6-7 PM PT on Zoom. If you're a Berkeley English alum and want to receive regular updates and Zoom links to join us, sign up for our mailing list! Or join our Facebook group here, where you can participate in casual group discussions and rewatch old Read Along with Berkeley English sessions!

You’ve given so much of yourselves to Berkeley; we now want to bring Berkeley back to you.

We’re excited to welcome back all alumni and friends of Berkeley English for our first fall 2025 office hour next Tuesday, October 21, at 6 pm pt. See full schedule below. This semester, we’re delighted to be following along with Professor David Marno's course "The English Renaissance."

In our first session we’ll be discussing William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. We’ll specifically be focusing on Act 2, Scene 1, but please bring all your comments, questions, and enthusiasm for Shakespeare’s wild and magical romp through the forest! Make sure to learn more about Professor Marno from his faculty bio

Join us next Tuesday, October 21, at 6 PM PT on Zoom. We hope to see you there!

Fall 2025: Read Along with Professor David Marno | The English Renaissance
 

Session 1: Tuesday, October 21, 6pm: A Midsummer Night's Dream, specifically Act 2, Scene 1. 

Session 2: Tuesday, November 18, 6pm: John Donne, Selected Poems: "The Relic," "The Canonization," "The Good-Morrow," "Nocturnal," "To the Countess of Bedford. Begun in France, but Never Perfected." From the Holy Sonnets: "At the round earth's imagined corners," "Since she whom I loved hath paid her last debt," "If faithful souls be alike glorified," "Why are we by all creatures waited on," and "If poisonous minerals."

Session 3: Tuesday, December 9, 6pm: William Shakespeare's Henry VIII, specifically the first scene. 

How to "Read Along"

How do I join?

Simply join the Facebook group. If you don't have a Facebook account, join our mailing list here and receive regular updates, reminders, and Zoom links for our sessions.

Who can participate?

The program is open to all.

Does it cost anything?

Participation is free, but we always welcome donations to the English Department Fund in any amount. Just click here.

Can I take as many seminars as I want?

Currently, we run 1 seminar per semester. 

What is the workload?

The workload will vary across courses and sessions. Some sessions may require just the reading of one or two short stories or the viewing of a film. Other sessions might ask for the reading of a complete novel. In general, the professors will aim to keep the workload to a reasonable number of pages.

How often do we meet?

Facebook discussion threads are ongoing, but we will host one live Open Office Hours event per month.

Will I meet the professor?

Yes, the professor will engage participants during the hour-long live Open Office Hours event once a month.

Give to English

Your donation allows us to keep up the programs and services that enrich our students’ experience of literature and extend it beyond the formal classroom setting. For example, money from donors like you allows us to build the collection of books in our department library, to bring poets and other writers to campus for readings, to sponsor lectures by visiting scholars, to help fund graduate-student travel to conferences, libraries, and archives. Your support also allows the English Undergraduate and Graduate Associations to maintain their activities, in which faculty and students share their interests outside of the classroom in informal conversations, and it gives us the opportunity to provide new technologies for writing, research, and collegial collaboration. If you wish to contribute for general departmental use, please give by clicking the link to the English Department Fund found below.

English Department Fund

Support Fund