A survey of the poetry, prose and drama of Tudor England, including selected works of More, Sydney, Spenser, Marlowe and Shakespeare. A study of The Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde as expressions of Chaucer's art. Emphasis is placed on the narrative and dramatic features of the poetry as vehicles for the presentation of medieval attitudes and themes. A study of the major history plays, including consideration of Renaissance political theory, and of the forms and conventions of Shakespearean comedy. A study of approximately twelve tragedies, with emphasis on Shakespeare's development as a verse dramatist.
Special attention is given to the nature of tragedy.
A study of the selected works from the Arthurian literary tradition. A study of Shakespeare's tragicomedies, focusing on the romances, with attention given to similar plays by other dramatists of the period. An examination of the masterpieces of poetry and the comic novel which reflected the arrival of Humanism in France and created a modern, literary French language. An examination of mature Humanism as reflected in Montaigne's creation of the personal essay with its questioning of reason, its invention of the concept of culture and its description of a wisdom based in nature, with an easy acceptance of death as a part of life. A study of the history of the German language form its origins to the present.