ENGL 292 - Topics in British Literature

FDR: HL, GE3
Credits: 3
When Offered: Fall

Prerequisite: Completion of the FW or GE1 composition requirement.Studies in British literature, supported by attention to historical contexts. Versions of this course may survey several periods or concentrate on a group of works from a short span of time. Students develop their analytical writing skills in a series of short papers. May be repeated for degree credit with permission and if the topics are different.

Topic for Fall, 2009:

ENGL 292: Topics in British Literature: Modern British Poetry (3).This course concentrates on poetry from 1870 through 1950, asking how British poets have pushed the limits of traditional verse. British poets are known for being less innovative than their American and Continental peers. We sample poems by Walt Whitman and William Carlos Williams before asking: what did “experimentation” mean to Gerard Manley Hopkins and Thomas Hardy? And how did Yeats experiment with history in his poems, as opposed to Ezra Pound? We also see how female poets, such as Edith Sitwell and Stevie Smith, developed highly original voices, and we end by sampling the works of more recent poets, including an influx of immigrant writers. Brodie