French 455
French Literature of the Renaissance
Fall 2015
Professor Bruce Hayes
Office hours: Tuesdays 4–5 pm, Thursdays 11–12 and by appointment
Office: 2067 Wescoe Telephone: 864-9028
E-mail: bhayes@ku.edu
Course Description
In this survey course on the literature of the Renaissance, we will be reading several works
that represent the major literary currents of sixteenth-century France. In order to appreciate
more fully these texts, we will be doing additional readings and conducting class discussions
on the history, politics, aesthetics, and philosophy of this period. This course will expose you
to a significant amount of the diverse literary production of the French Renaissance, a period
marked by great activity, experimentation, and tumultuous change. One of the primary goals
of this course is to discover ways in which these Renaissance writers are pertinent and
relevant to our world today, as many of the ideas explored in their writings have contributed
vitally to current conceptions and debates about education, politics, religion, and selfunderstanding.
This semester, as we read and discuss these texts, we will be considering questions of
sustainability, conceived largely to include topics such as equity and social justice, as well as
environmental questions. To guide our exploration, we will use a concept of great
importance to Renaissance writers and thinkers—what Horace called the aurea mediocritas, or
golden mean. We will look at how this concept can help us approach complex problems,
ranging from personal challenges and choices to ideal forms of society and government. It is
my hope that by the end of the course, you will see how many of the questions that occupy
our society today were very much at the forefront of Renaissance literature and ideas.
Required texts
PLEASE NOTE: While I am aware that all of these works are available for free on
the internet through various outlets such as Kindle and Project Gutenberg, you must
purchase the physical copies of the books listed below and bring them to class with
you. Failure to do this will result in a lower participation grade.
Rabelais, François. Gargantua (Folio, edited by Emmanuel Naya and Valérie Lagier)
Navarre, Marguerite de. Heptaméron (Flammarion)
Du Bellay, Joachim. Les Regrets (Gallimard)
Ronsard, Pierre de. Les Amours (Flammarion)
Montaigne, Michel de. Essais (Petits classiques Larousse)
Course requirements and grading
Preparation: Careful reading—including the necessary study of vocabulary—before class is
imperative. Each of you will keep a Reading Journal in which you will note unfamiliar
vocabulary with definitions in English (you should average at least two to three words per
page read, but no more than five or six; for poetry, you should look up all unfamiliar
vocabulary), summaries of the text (these do not need to be elaborate), and questions you
may have. These will be checked and graded periodically and without warning. You are
responsible for bringing your reading journal to class each day. If you forget it on a day I am
checking journals, you will receive a ‘0’ for that reading journal assignment.
Attendance: Presence and participation in class is crucial. More than two unexcused
absences will strongly affect your grade for the class. Beyond two absences (rather than
check doctor’s notes and other such practices, I will assume that all of your absences are
excused and grant you a maximum of two for the semester), you will receive a 3% reduction
for your final grade with each additional absence. Tardiness will also adversely affect your
grade for the class, as each tardy will count as half an absence. If you know in advance that
you will be absent, please let me know. If absent, it is your responsibility to find out from a
fellow student what was done in class and to be prepared to participate fully at the next class.
If you miss a quiz or in-class assignment, you will not be allowed to make it up. The only
exception to this is if you are participating in a university-approved activity or you have
medical or other documentation which makes it clear that you could not have physically
made it to class that day.
Participation: You will be expected to participate in meaningful ways each class. Your
participation grade will be assessed based on both the quality and quantity of your class
participation. If you overly dominate class discussion, speak out of turn, interrupt others,
you will be assessed accordingly. On the other hand, if you spend the semester never saying
anything unless under extreme duress, this will also have a negative effect on your
participation grade. Problems with attendance and/or tardiness will inevitably have a
negative impact on your ability to participate fully in the class. Participation in class should
always be in French. If you make lots of comments in English, you will be assessed
accordingly.
Writing: The main writing project for this course will be a well-researched five- to six-page
research paper (1,500-1,800 words, plus bibliography). To achieve this, we will break the
assignment down into multiple steps—you will first submit a 250–300 word abstract (while
this first version will not be graded, you will be penalized if you do not submit a reasonably
well-written abstract), followed by a second version of your abstract, then an annotated
bibliography (this should contain at least five to seven sources, including at least three books
and four well-selected academic articles, with research materials in both French and English),
before finally submitting the paper at the end of the term. Please note that I heavily penalize
work that does not meet the minimum requirements for the assignment.
Group Project: You will be assigned to a group and will spend the semester preparing a
presentation on a given author and exploring how that author addresses questions of
sustainability in his or her writings. You will be given class time throughout the semester to
work on the project and I will meet individually with the groups to discuss your project. Half
of your grade for this project will be assessed by me; the other half will be assessed by your
fellow group members.
Quizzes: There will be unannounced quizzes throughout the semester based on your
readings and class discussion.
Recitation: At the end of the poetry section, you will be expected to memorize and to recite
a poem in class which you will select from a list I will give the class. If you refer to a copy of
the poem while doing your recitation, you will receive a ‘0’ for the assignment. You will
prepare a 4- to 5-minute explication de texte on the poem after reciting the poem. For this part,
you should use notes. Your explication should include a formal analysis of the poem’s
versification and rhyme scheme, observations about poetic figures and devices found in the
poem, and illustrations of connections between the poem’s forme and fond.
Grading
Attendance & participation
Reading journals
In-class quizzes
Recitation and explication
15%
10%
15%
10%
Abstract (second version)
Annotated bibliography
Research paper
Group project
5%
5%
30%
10%
Grading scale:
I use the +/- system:
94-100%=A
90-93.9%=A88-89.9%=B+
84-87.9%=B
80-83.9%=B78-79.9%=C+
74-79.9%=C
70-73.9%=CEtc.
Please note that I do not round up grade percentages. (e.g. 89.8% is a B+, not an A-.) Please
also note that 94%, not 93%, is my cut-off point for an A.
Additional Information
Cell phones: This is a classroom, not your living room. Any questions? And yes, when you
have it on vibrate, we can all still hear it. Also, this classroom is a laptop-free zone, with the
exception of group project work days. I will be happy to discuss this with you if this is a
problem.
Assignments: NO LATE WORK ACCEPTED, NO EXCEPTIONS. Papers must be
submitted to me in Word format on Blackboard. (If you use a word processing program
other than Word, remember to save the file as a Word document--.doc or preferably .docx.)
When I have finished grading an assignment, I will send the class an e-mail notifying
everyone that they can retrieve it on Blackboard. Students should be sure that all work
submitted is entirely their own. This means that outside assistance is NOT allowed (that
is, tutors, friends, native speakers, electronic and/or computer-assisted translators,
translating programs, etc.). However, I will be happy to help you myself if you give me a
draft two weeks before the due date, a practice I strongly recommend.
Blackboard and e-mail: I use Blackboard to provide you with various handouts, guides,
etc. It is your responsibility to check Blackboard regularly and check e-mail at least once a
day for messages I periodically send to the class.
Disabilities: Please let me know if you are having difficulty with any aspect of the course; I
will try to help in any way I can. If you have a disability that might affect your work, tell me
as soon as possible so that we can discuss appropriate adjustments to enable you to
complete the course requirements. The staff of Services for Students with Disabilities (SSD),
135 Strong, 785-864-2620 (v/tty), coordinates accommodations and services for KU
courses. If you have a disability for which you may request accommodation in KU classes
and have not contacted them, please do as soon as possible. Please also see me privately in
regard to this course.
Plagiarism: “Plagiarism and cheating are serious academic offenses that should be brought
to the attention of the Chairperson or Language Coordinator. Whenever a student is caught
cheating (whether copying from another student's paper or plagiarizing printed or electronic
sources or other sources), the instructor will inform the Chairperson of the Department,
who—upon concurring with the instructor—will forward a “CHARGE OF ACADEMIC
MISCONDUCT FORM” to College of Liberal Arts with a recommendation for the
appropriate sanction.”
Instances of students “Googling” their research and then either copying and pasting or
slightly modifying content without citing their source(s) in the paper are on the rise. Below is
a link to one section on plagiarism and how to avoid it from the KU Writing Center home
page. I strongly encourage you to review this and other material in the section on plagiarism.
Whether intentional or not, improper citation or not crediting your sources constitutes
plagiarism, and in any instance where I find this, I will follow departmental and College
procedures.
http://www.writing.ku.edu/students/docs/integrity.shtml
ABOUT THE USE OF TRANSLATION PROGRAMS: The use of computer or online translation programs is NOT permitted in any French or Italian course and is
considered cheating. As opposed to dictionaries and grammar references, these programs are
not a learning tool because they simply provide a translation, rather than allowing you to
choose among various words/tenses/etc. to come up with the best translation on your own.
Moreover, translation programs produce bizarre and incorrect translations that are
notoriously easy to identify. Students will learn far more by doing their own work than by
risking serious academic consequences.
Final remark: Please remember that all of the content in this course (lectures, handouts,
etc.) is my intellectual property. You are not to record me nor are you to distribute
(electronically or otherwise) material from this course.
Jour
25 août
27 août
Emploi du temps
En classe
Introduction
La Renaissance et la
durabilité
1 sep
3 sep
Group work
(organizational)
8 sep
Group work (end of
class)
À préparer
« Introduction à la Renaissance » ;
Alex Steffen, « Worldchanging »
(both available on Blackboard)
Guide de lecture (Blackboard) ;
Gass article (Blackboard) ;
Gargantua: Prologue de l’auteur,
chap. 1
Gargantua : chap. 3-4, 6-7, 11, 1315
Gargantua : chap. 16-24
10 sep
Gargantua : chap. 25-33
15 sep
Gargantua : chap. 38-41, 45
17 sep
Gargantua : chap. 52-58
18 sep
À rendre avant
18h00 : brouillon,
« abstract » (résumé)
22 sep
24 sep
Individual and group
consultations
2:30–5:00 pm
Heptaméron : Prologue de la 3e
journée ; nouvelles 21, 22
Heptaméron : nouvelles 24, 26, 30
29 sep
1 oct
2 oct
6 oct
À rendre avant
18h00 : « abstract »
(résumé)
Research training
8 oct
13 oct
Heptaméron : Prologue, nouvelles
8, 19
Preparation for individual and
group consultations
FALL BREAK
Heptaméron : nouvelles 11, 33, 69
(cf. Cent Nouvelles Nouvelles #17—
Bb)
Louise Labé (Blackboard)
15 oct
Meet at Spencer
Research Library!
20 oct
Meet at Spencer
Research Library!
22 oct
27 oct
29 oct
3 nov
5 nov
6 nov
10 nov
Récitations
Group work (end of
class)
À rendre avant
18h00: « Annotated
bibliography »
(bibliographie
annotée)
Récitations
Group work (end of
class)
12 nov
“Quitting the Paint Factory”
(Blackboard) ; « Au lecteur » p.
24 ; « De l’oisiveté » (Blackboard)
« Des cannibales » pp. 108-23
17 nov
19 nov
24 nov
26 nov
30 nov
Du Bellay, Défense et Illustration de
la Langue française : I.3, 7-8, 11 ;
II.3-4 ; Conclusion de tout
l’œuvre
Du Bellay, Les Antiquités : 1, 3-6,
25, 30, 32
Du Bellay, Les Regrets : 1, 4, 7, 9,
13, 31, 130, 180
Ronsard, Les Amours : ‘vœu’ (p.
57), 1, 4, 9, 20, 23
Ronsard, Les Amours : 49, 57, 66,
71, 101, 139
Ronsard, Les Amours : ‘Ode à
Cassandre’ (p. 153), Elégie III (p.
156) ; Continuation des amours : 1 (p.
157), 65, 70 ; Nouvelle Continuation
des Amours : ‘A son livre’ (pp. 21418) ; Sur la mort de Marie 5 (p.
238) ; Second livre des sonnets pour
Hélène 24 (p. 298)
Group work (end of
class)
ACTION DE
GRÂCE
Date limite pour les
brouillons
« De l’expérience » pp. 226-46
(line 672), « Me, Myself, and I »
(Bb)
« De l’expérience » pp. 246-69
(line 1423)
1 déc
« De l’expérience » pp. 269-90
(fin)
3 déc
Group presentations
8 déc
Group presentations
10 déc
No class (professor
out of town at
conference)
STOP DAY
11 déc
11 déc
À rendre avant
18h00 : « Research
paper » (article de
recherche)