Course Description
Poetry and prose of the earlier eighteenth century, emphasizing Addison, Steele, Defoe, Swift, and Pope.
Additional Requirements for Graduate Students:
Graduate students will be responsible for a more extensive syllabus, for secondary reading, and for more ambitious, sophisticated writing.
Athena Title
Early 18th Century Lit
Undergraduate Prerequisite
Two 2000-level ENGL courses or (one 2000-level ENGL course and one 3000-level ENGL course) or (one 2000-level ENGL course and one 2000-level CMLT course)
Graduate Prerequisite
Permission of department
Semester Course Offered
Offered every year.
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Course Objectives
At the end of the course, students, having read a substantial body of literature, will be able to discuss the assigned works (orally and in writing) with a considerable degree of critical sophistication, to read and enjoy other works from the period, and to converse with fellow students about texts and issues related to the subject matter of the course. In particular, 1. The course will emphasize the poetry and prose of Swift, Pope, and other members of the Scriblerus Club, with special emphasis on their satire. 2. It will also cover the prose and poetry of Whig writers of the period that might include Addison, Steele, and Defoe. 3. Special attention will be paid to the intellectual, literary, artistic, and political contexts of the writing. During the course of the semester, students will write between 20-25 typed pages. The writing may take the form of essay examinations (in or out of class), short research assignments, imitations of the Tatler and Spectator (along with stylistic analysis), close readings of the works taught in the course, full-length research papers or critical reviews.
Topical Outline
Some instructors may choose to follow an author-based syllabus such as the following outline suggests: A typical general outline might be the following: Weeks 1-4 Swift Weeks 5-9 Pope Weeks 10-12 Addison and Steele Weeks 12-16 Defoe Others may select a thematic approach as is reflected in the following: Weeks 1-2 Pope's Essay on Criticism and Swift's Tale of a Tub. These two works set the stage for the crisis under which the literary world was operating in the early eighteenth century. The works are a good introduction to the place of the writer and the nature of his world. Weeks 3-5 The writers of the age grappled with the larger issue of man's place in the universe, as well. Pope's Essay on Man, Swift's Tale of a Tub, Defoe's Shortest Way with Dissenters. Through these works, emphasis will be placed on the ideological debate between Deism, Anglicanism, and Dissent as it characterized the Age. Dryden's Works--Religio Laici and the Hind and the Panther--may be invoked to provide cultural context, as may the sermons of Swift and Sacherverell. Weeks 6-8 Britain's place in the world was also changing. Swift's Gulliver's Travels, Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, Addison and Steele, selections from the Tatler and Spectator (including the story of Inkle and Yarico), Pope's Windsor Forest. Emphasis will be placed on "Britain's Place in the World" as it serves as a focal point for all these works which celebrate and/or critique the colonial enterprise. Weeks 9-11 Pope's Rape of the Lock, Eloisa to Abelard, Addison and Steele essays dealing with women, gender, and marriage, Swift's poetry to Stella, Vanessa and the satiric works on women. These works will allow a focus on the fashioning of gender in the literature and the age. Weeks 12-14 London is the focus of so much of the literature of the time. In a real way, Defoe's Journal of the Plague Year, Pope's The Dunciad, Swift's Description of the Morning and Description of a City Shower (as well as his Journal to Stella), and all of Addison and Steele's essays feature London as a central character. Moreover, the city itself is both aestheticized and featured as the focal point for larger debates about beauty, wit, and social life. Weeks 15-16 The course might end with a consideration of mask and personae. Swift's Bickerstaff Papers, Modest Proposal and Drapier's Letters, Addison and Steele's creation of the Spectator Club as well as Mr. Spectator, Pope's autobiographical Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot, Defoe's first person narratives all offer opportunity to discuss "voice," "self- presentation," "satiric personae" and other matters related to the created authorial self.