AJ04003 Introduction to Literature II

                                            Spring 2007



                              Group E (Monday, 3.00-4.30 pm, room G32)



       Instructor: Tomáš Kačer (kacer@phil.muni.cz, Office hours: Tuesday 3-4, Wednesday 3-4)



   Readings:

   - Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita

   - Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness

   - Selections from Gilbertová, Hardy, Sparling, Introduction to Literature, various short
   stories, poems and excerpts from novels.

   

   Objectives:

   - To improve critical and interpretative thinking about literature

   - To learn writing skills needed for critical writing about literature

   - To know how to find and use primary and secondary materials in literary research

   

   Assessment:

   - Research project portfolio 60 % (the portfolio includes: weekly assignments, in-class
   response papers, essay drafts and the final essay)

   - Active class participation 20 %

   - Test 20 %

   (You must pass each of the criteria)

   

   Deadlines:

   - Research project portfolio entries and written preparation for essay: Sunday preceding the
   seminar, 3 pm

   - Essay, final draft: 28 May, 3 pm

   

   Syllabus (list of primary readings and assignments):

   Week 1 – February 19

   Introduction to the course (Research, sources, work with sources, MLA style)

   

   Week 2 – February 26

   Heart of Darkness 1 (read part 1, pages 1-44*)

     o Portfolio 1: libraries and databases

   

   Week 3 – March 5

   Heart of Darkness 2 (part 2, pages 44-78*)

     o Portfolio 2: reference works in print (anthologies, guides, histories, etc.)

   

   Week 4 – March 12

   Heart of Darkness 3: revision (part 3, pages 78-111*)

     o Portfolio 3: electronic reference works (journals etc.)

   

   Week 5 – March 19

   Lolita 1 (part 1, pages 1-142**)

     o Portfolio 4: bibliography – J. Conrad’s Heart of Darkness

   

   Week 6 – March 26

   Lolita 2 (part 2, pages 143-309**)

     o Portfolio 5: bibliography – V. Nabokov’s Lolita

   

   Week 7 – April 2

   Heart of Darkness and Lolita: revision (re-read both novels)

     o Portfolio 6: annotated bibliography

   

   Week 8 – April 9

   National holiday – no class

     o Portfolio 7: Essay proposal

   

   Week 9 – April 16

   Poetry – Epic and Lyrical Poetry, the Sonnet

   Introduction to Literature, Session 3c (Summer): “In April”, “I Sing of a Maiden” (109-11).
   Session 4 (Winter): “The Lynching” by McKay, “I, Being Born a Woman and Distressed” by St.
   Vincent Millay, “Sonnets from China XII” by Auden, (32-34). Session 4b (Summer): “Sonnet 71”
   by Sidney (117-18). “Sonnet 76” by Shakespeare***.

     o Portfolio 8: home-written response paper 1

   

   Week 10 – April 23

   Drama – William Shakespeare, Macbeth***

     o Portfolio 9: Essay – first draft (2-3 pages)

   

   Week 11 – April 30

   Fiction 1 – Romanticism and the Victorian Period

   Introduction to Literature, Session 8a (Summer): Frankenstein by Shelley (154-158). Session
   10a (Summer): Middlemarch by Eliot (177-78). Session 9d (Winter): “The Black Cat” by Poe
   (59-67).

     o Portfolio 10: home-written response paper 2

   

   Week 12 – May 7

   Fiction 2 – Modernist Prose

   Great Gatsby by Fitzgerald, Chapter 1. Introduction to Literature, Session 12b-c (Summer): 
   Mrs Dalloway by Woolf, Ulysses by Joyce (197-209).

     o Portfolio 11: Essay – second draft (3-5 pages). Bring your portfolio to class.

   

   Week 13 – May 14

   Review, feedback

   Get back portfolio and essay second draft feedback

   

   

   

   

   

   -------------------------------

   * Page numbering from the Penguin Popular Classics edition, 1994. Online access:
   http://etext.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/ConDark.html, or
   http://www.africa.upenn.edu/Books/Heart_Darkness.html

   ** Page numbering from the Penguin Modern Classics edition, 2000.

   *** Online access: http://www.opensourceshakespeare.org, or  http://www.phil.muni.cz/kapradi