Course Description
English literature of the late eighteenth century, emphasizing the works of Samuel Johnson, James Boswell, and other writers of the time.
Additional Requirements for Graduate Students:
Graduate students will be responsible for a more extensive
syllabus, secondary reading, and more ambitious, sophisticated
writing. They will be expected to master the secondary work in
the field and to bring to bear in their argumentative essays
the most current critical and theoretical paradigms. The long
essays produced in this course should be of the quality
expected of conference papers and/or journal articles. The
students will achieve this level of skill through consultation
with the professor and through peer review.
Athena Title
AGE OF JOHNSON
Undergraduate Prerequisite
Two 2000-level ENGL courses 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, the course will introduce students to British writers from the latter half of the eighteenth century, including Samuel Johnson and James Boswell. Other significant writers possibly treated will be Oliver Goldsmith, Olaudah Equiano, Laurence Sterne, Frances Burney, Hannah More, Edmund Burke, Edward Gibbon, Hester Thrale, Anna Barbauld, Mary Wollstonecraft, Charlotte Smith, Tom Paine, Robert Burns, and others too numerous to mention. The course will discuss the historical, social, political, and literary milieu in which the authors worked; students will integrate this contextual knowledge into papers and oral presentations. In general, the course will advance the idea of an "Age of Johnson" and will also critique that idea by including works of Johnson's more radical contemporaries or close contemporaries. Johnson is a dominant literary voice -- not as conservative as some of his circle, but not as radical as others thinking and writing at the same time (or shortly after) and on the same subjects. Writing assignments may take a variety of forms. Instructors may assign argument/response papers in which students address one another in brief argumentative essays. Johnson's stature as one of the most significant prose stylists in the English language leads some instructors to assign imitation/stylistic analysis papers. Research papers focused on issues such as Johnson and the eighteenth-century slave trade or Johnson and marriage customs/laws or Johnson and women or Johnson and lexicography have proven successful in the past. Close readings of the works studied may also be assigned. Students may also be asked to address issues of institutional academic organization in creative projects that imagine an "Age of Equiano" or an "Age of Frances Burney" or an "Age of Edmund Burke and Thomas Paine" as opposed to an "Age of Johnson." In whatever form the instructor chooses to assign, the students will write between 20-25 typed pages during the course of the semester.
Topical Outline
The selection of writers to be read and discussed will vary from instructor to instructor and semester to semester. The major works of the period will be read and analyzed using critical skills of various kinds(e.g., historical, close reading, comparative, structural). In addition to being examined on the material, students will write critically on one or more of the works on the course syllabus. Research projects (particularly in 6400) may also be assigned. Instructors will be expected to teach a substantial number of Johnson's works and will include Boswell's biography (in excerpted, abridged, or complete form), but, besides that expectation, there is a good deal of latitude in the defining of the syllabus. The following is a version of the course taught by one English department faculty member, but the outline will vary depending on the instructor. Sample Syllabus for English 4440/6440, THE AGE OF JOHNSON The latter half of the eighteenth century has been known for generations as "The Age of Johnson" due to the compelling personality and achievement of Samuel Johnson. Johnson was the author of the English dictionary, the Rambler essays, the Lives of the Poets, Rasselas, and the editor of Shakespeare's plays. He was also the subject of the massive biography by James Boswell which has made Johnson's dominant presence in figure and in speech available to all generations since the eighteenth century. In many ways, we honor Johnson because his career set the pattern for the professional literary life. He was a poet, a novelist, a lexicographer, a critic and an editor. He did it all, and quite naturally we in the academy respect him for embodying what we see ourselves to be. But his "age" was inhabited by other, equally vibrant, and ultimately more influential forces--revolutionary forces that led to political disruption and eventually to significant and positive social change. While Johnson speaks with a moral authority for conservative values that many still honor today, his contemporaries or near contemporaries speak, no less eloquently, of radical change. In this course, we will study the latter half of the eighteenth century as dialogue between past and future, giving equal attention and respect to both views. Texts Ed. Donald Greene, Samuel Johnson James Boswell, The Life of Johnson Oliver Goldsmith, Vicar of Wakefield Olaudah Equinano, The Interesting Narrative Laurence Sterne, A Sentimental Journey Ed. Marilyn Butler, Burke, Paine, Godwin, and the Revolution Controversy Bel-Jean packet of essays by Boswell and Goldsmith Charlotte Smith, The Young Philosopher Introduction to Course Johnson's works “London” “Life of Savage” (Johnson) “Vanity of Human Wishes” Rambler essays Adventurer (all) Idler essays Rasselas Preface to the Dictionary Preface to Shakespeare Boswell's works London Journal (excerpts) Life of Johnson Oliver Goldsmith's works Essays The Vicar of Wakefield Sterne and Equiano A Sentimental Journey The Interesting Narrative The Revolution Controversy Charlotte Smith The Young Philosopher