B. Detailed Description of Content of Course I. Close reading of major works by Blake, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron, Shelley, and Keats. C. Detailed Description of Conduct of Course I. Students read major works by major Romantic poets and fiction writers, and critical articles on these works. Instructor leads discussion of assigned reading, with priority given to student questions and concerns. Students write usually in journals or learning logs, responses to assigned reading, noting questions, problems, favorite passages, etc. These are often the basis for class discussion.
Students present oral reports on material drawn from their ancillary reading.
V. Students may be required to submit a major researched paper. This writing builds on skills previously practiced in English at the 100 and 200 level. Thus one goal of the course is to make students knowledgeable about the essential qualities of this major period in English literary history, which is traditionally dated 1798 to 1850. A second goal of the course, therefore, is to acquaint students more deeply with major authors whose work they may have briefly surveyed in a 200-level English course. And a third goal is to help students relate that work to the concerns of their own time.