ELSE(W)HERE: Journey to self and other from early modern to enlightenment
HC 222H, Honors College World Literature, Bishop and Bohls, Winter 2004, 308 Chapman, 346-0733, lmbishop@uoregon.edu
Click HERE for the final exam
MOVIE NIGHT! Wed. Feb. 4, PROSPERO'S BOOKS, 100 Willamette , 7 pm
Class hours:
CRN 22182 Tues., Thurs. 8:00 am to 9:20 am CRN 22183 Tues., Thurs. 10:00 am to 11:20 am
Office hours:
Tuesday, noon to 3:00 pm Thursday, 3:30 pm to 4:30 pm and by appointment

"Discourse: a domain or field of linguistic strategies operating within particular areas of social practice to effect knowledge and pleasure, being produced by and reproducing or reworking power relations between classes, genders and cultures." --Paul Brown, "'This Thing of Darkness I Acknowledge Mine"

"To us the distortions and errors of perception under which explorers, merchants, clerics, and scholars alike labored are obvious, often amusing, and all too often had tragic consequences; but we err if we congratulate ourselves too quickly on our cultural relativism or too naively equate more information with better judgment." Timothy Healy's foreword to Anthony Grafton's New Worlds, Ancient Texts (1992).

". . . the bricks of Chaucer's literature were intended to construct an edifice with purposes which were often very different from those which we today expect of works of art. . . the concepts of society and 'human nature' contained in works of literature, and even the very notion of literature itself, are never natural or eternal but are always specific according to time and place and thus capable of being analysed in historical terms. . . historical context provides no easy court of interpretative appeal, not least because the provision of a context in which to understand any work is itself the result of a process of interpretation. . . . literary texts are nowhere more historical in their nature than when they seek to pass themselves off as timeless and dehistoricised." S.H. Rigby, Chaucer in Context: Society, Allegory, and Gender (1996)

Requirements | Grading | Reading schedule | Reading guide: texts | Paper format instructions

This second term of the Honors College literature sequence organizes our readings around the idea of travel to explore important literary themes: language, individuation and identity, culture and cultural relativism, and the definitions of fact and fiction. These issues arise out of the concerns of traveler and narrator. For instance, a traveler's sympathy and identity relates to Socratic self-knowledge and its dark side, narcissism; the language of travel complicates ideas about real and imaginary, especially as we move into the age of enlightenment. Travelers' political and economic aims reflect and create public and private spheres, with their concomitant gendering: geography "maps" the human body. Because the West's colonial impulse grows exponentially from the sixteenth through the eighteenth centuries, the ethical dimension of travel and narrative has special meaning for this term of the HC literature sequence. The ways in which literature indexes colonial expansion -- through accommodation and critique -- will be a theme throughout our readings.

HC 222H folds writing analysis (composition) into the study of literature. To that end, please be advised of the university's Web-based composition resources. (Back to top of page)

The texts we will read this term are

The last six texts are available at the UO Bookstore. The first reading for the term, Chaucer's "Man of Law's Tale," is available on-line. Please print the text (or bring a computer to class) according to the reading schedule. To access this text on-line,

Electronic Reserves No articles are currently posted on electronic reserve; you will be notified if that situation changes. Please note that all Electronic Reserve articles are in PDF format; be sure to have Adobe Acrobat installed on the computer you are using. (Back to top of page)


Requirements:
Response papers. You'll write three short response papers this term (see reading schedule for due dates). These are formal papers in the sense that spelling, grammar, and thinking count--all papers must be neat, typed, revised, finished, and proofread. At the same time, these are papers in which to try out ideas, to experiment and challenge yourself intellectually. I will read these papers, comment on them, and grade them pass/no pass. A passing paper requires a clear and pointed thesis, cogent evidence, and NO grammatical errors. For extra credit, or to make up for a no-pass response paper, you can write your own travel narrative in the style of one of our authors, due the last day of class, Thursday, March 13. Three passing papers will count as a 4.0, two as a 3.0, one as a 1.0. See the reading schedule for response paper due dates.

Article summary and response. During the term, you will read, summarize, and comment on two critical articles. For the first article, due Thursday, January 22, choose one of the following, available in our edition of The Book of Margery Kempe: Atkinson, Staley, Gibson, or Bynum (this last the most "religious" of the four selections). For the second article, due Thursday, February 26, choose between the essays by Ian Watt and Carol Flynn in the selection of twentieth-century critical articles available in our edition of Robinson Crusoe.

These responses, like the response papers, will be graded Pass/No Pass, and you have one week in which to rewrite No Pass summaries.

Graded formal papers. Two five- to six-page papers, each of which may use observations originally explored in respo nse papers. PAPER 1, due Thursday, January 29, will treat "The Man of Law's Prologue and Tale," and/or Margery Kempe. PAPER 2, due Thursday, March 6, will treat Utopia, The Tempest, and/or Montagu's Letters. Note paper due dates: papers must be turned in on the date specified.

Final exam. Cumulative, essay, take-home exam, especially emphasizing our last two texts, due no later than Wednesday, March 19, at 5:00 p.m. (Back to top of page)


Grading: The response papers constitute 15% of your grade; the two formal papers, 30% each; the article summary and response papers 10%; and the final exam will constitute 15% of your grade. (Back to top of page)


Reading Schedule Please read the assigned pages BEFORE the class meeting

Tuesday, January 6
Class introduction: from medieval to enlightenment: the meaning of the textual "real"

Thursday, January 8
Chaucer, Man of Law's Introduction, Prologue and Tale: please read the complete Introduction, the Prologue, and the Tale, i.e. all of part 1 and to around line 500 in part 2 (Custance being set adrift); PLUS a brief excerpt from Mandeville's Travels, a travel book roughly contemporary with Chaucer's text, and a couple of saints' lives (handed out in class). For an index to medieval saints' images, click here.

Tuesday, January 13 Response paper: Chaucer
Rest of Tale (parts 2 and 3) and the Epilogue: allegory and England, history and fiction
Thursday, January 15
The Book of Margery Kempe, Introduction and pp. 3-44: defining spirituality and autobiography--putting the self into sacred space
See the spectacularly useful website on Kempe, "Mapping Margery Kempe," designed by Sarah Stanbury and Virginia Raguin, for a chapter-by-chapter synopsis, images, historical background and social contexts.
Tuesday, January 20
Margery Kempe, pp. 44-125, travels and trials: defining authenticity, performance, text
Thursday, January 22 Kempe Article due Atkinson, Staley, Gibson, or Bynum
Margery Kempe, pp. 125-84, visions and conversations: Public, private, fact, fiction--the imaginative real
Tuesday, January 27

Margery Kempe, aesthetics and performance
Thursday, January 29 FIRST FORMAL PAPER DUE
Thomas More, Utopia, Introduction and Book One: self-knowledge and imagination

Tuesday, February 3 Response paper: More
More, Utopia, Book Two
Travel, stability, instability and colonial thinking

Thursday, February 5
Shakespeare, The Tempest, Acts 1 and 2: Language and identity: Family as nexus
Tuesday, February 10
The Tempest, Acts 3 and 4: Monsters and slavery: What is "natural"?
Thursday, February 12 Response paper: Prospero's books
The Tempest
, Act 5: Magic, marriage, and subjection
Tuesday, February 17
Montagu, Letters, Introduction and letters through # 35 (last letter from Adrianople) PLUS handout on early travelers to Turkey
Thursday, February 19
Montagu, letters 36 through 58: Different ways of being
Tuesday, February 24 Response paper: Montagu
Montagu and Margery
Thursday, February 26 Defoe Article due
Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe, pp. 1-71 and primary materials (pp. 227-54)
Tuesday, March 2
Robinson Crusoe, pp. 72-131
Thursday, March 4 SECOND FORMAL PAPER DUE
Robinson Crusoe, conclusion and
Tuesday, March 9
Eliza Winkfield, The Female American, pp. 33-71 and primary materials (157-9, 172-92)
Thursday, March 11 Response paper (possibly for extra credit): a travel narrative of your devising in the style of one of our authors
The Female American, pp. 72-155
(Back to top of page)

Reading guide: texts
The following notes and questions are meant to complement your reading of the text. They touch on the central issues we'll be discussing in class. At the same time, be aware that not every question will be answered, and many issues cross over from one text to the next. You may use this guide to spark your response papers' theses.

"Man of Law's Prologue and Tale": Part romance, part saint's life, part allegory, this text invokes melodramatic horror in response to, among other things, dysfunctional families and cosmic turbulence. Notice the details we do get directly from the tale, and think about what is left out, especially in contrast to either Mandeville's account of the saints' lives you've read. What, if anything, is "real" about this tale? How does that reality square with a teller who is a lawyer? How does "journey" differ from "escape" or "exile"? What is the role of belief in this tale? Notice Custance's speeches-- how do her words square with the way she's described? Think about it culturally, individually, narratively, nationally. Choose a particular episode and analyze its meaning of "travel" in relation to belief, gender roles, rulership, or obedience.

The Book of Margery Kempe: Critics have often differentiated between Chaucer, the author of The Canterbury Tales, and Chaucer, the character in the Canterbury pilgrimage. So too for Margery Kempe. Lynn Staley, editor and translator of our edition of The Book of Margery Kempe, differentiates Kempe, the author of the book, from Margery, the character /persona Kempe creates for the book. How does this paradigm affect your understanding of the descriptions of suffering the text includes? What does it mean to suggest that suffering heightens spirituality? What are the evidentiary moves that Kempe makes in order to support Margery's claims? Does she establish a difference between a pilgrimage and a "trip"? How does writing fit into the relationship between spirit and body? Characterize Margery's "voice": be alert to what you're taking from the text, and what expectations or assumptions you're bringing to your analysis.

Utopia: Originally in Latin, Utopia was translated into English in 1556 by Ralph Robynson, who produced his translation after More's execution and during the reign of Henry VIII's Catholic daughter Mary. Raphael Hythloday addresses the complex intersection between wealth and morality by attaching ehtical meaning to mercantile practices. Among other interesting moments, Hythloday argues against the death penalty for vagrancy. The identity of More with Hythloday is as intriguing as that between the pilgrim and author Chaucers, or between Kempe and Margery. In Book One, how does the dialogue form affect the "truth-value" of Hytholoday's, or More's, opinions? In Book Two, do you detect any humor/irony/sarcasm in the description of Utopian ethics or government? How does humor contain, exploit, or invoke danger? How does danger intersect with travel? with self-knowledge?

The Tempest: The fertile intersections among family-polity-theatre that appear on the island intersect dynastic concerns (Prospero-Miranda; Alonso-Ferdinand) with mercantile reward (Stephano and Trinculo) and colonial oppression (Caliban-Sycorax) with magic (Ariel). Why does Prospero have books along with his magic staff? What does this play say about "good rulership"? Greenaway's film Prospero's Books is a creative retelling of Shakespeare's play. What does Greenaway emphasize, and how is the textual different from the visual? How "dramatic" is Greenaway's film, and how do you account for the differences between film and play? What sorts of things does Greenaway's film use that were unavailable to Shakespeare and his stagecraft? What do play and film underscore in their interpretation of "the book"?

The Turkish Embassy Letters: Lady Mary Wortley Montagu accompanied her husband, the British Ambassador, to his post in the Ottoman Empire (present-day Turkey) in 1716. Few British women had made such a journey. She wrote to various friends and acquaintances, including her sister, the Countess of Mar, and the poet Alexander Pope. After her return, she revised her letters as if for publication, but they weren't published until after her death in 1763. What types of sights or experiences seem to interest Montagu most as she crosses Europe and arrives in Turkey? Does she write differently to different correspondents? She was English, Protestant, aristocratic and female; do these aspects of her identity seem to you to mark her letters, and if so, how? Does she display the condescending attitude of many later Europeans toward non-Western or "Oriental" regions and peoples?

Robinson Crusoe: Daniel Defoe's famous novel was one of the four best-selling works of fiction in Britain's rapidly expanding print marketplace during the decades 1700-1740. Of the others, Jonathan Swift's Gulliver's Travels is also a travel fiction, indicating the intensity of readers' fascination during this period with travel, adventure, and different, exotic people and cultures. Travel writing was one of the best-selling nonfiction genres (along with religious material), and Defoe clearly drew on true stories such as that of Alexander Selkirk. But other genres or traditions, such as the "guide" and spiritual autobiography, were also influential for Defoe's writing and his contemporaries' interpretation of his book. What, exactly, does Robinson consider to be his "original sin"? Is it punished? What are his chief fears on the island, intially and later? Are they realistic? Is this a psychologically plausible account of extended solitude? How would you describe his relationship with Friday?

The Female American: This pseudonymous novel is one of the many "Robinsonades," of knockoffs of Defoe, capitalizing on his novel's immense popularity. The author also draws on the well-known story of Pocahontas for Unca Eliza's parents. What difference does it make having a woman rather than a man--and a biracial woman, half Indian, half European--as the protagonist of the castaway tale? Where does this author choose to depart from Defoe's model, and what might be the significance of the differences?

(Back to top of page)

 


Back to top of page | Back to Bishop Home Page | This page created by Louise M. Bishop and Elizabeth Bohls | Last updated 10 March 2004