English 319: Satire
Thursdays 6:15-9:20; Basil 118
Dr. Melissa Bloom
mbloom@sjfc.edu
Basil 115
OFFICE HOURS: T 11:00-12:30, TH 5-6 and by appt.
PHONE: 385-7397
Satire is famously hard to define, even to categorize. It can be a genre, a particular and recognizable type
of writing, and it can be a mode, a chosen voice to use within some other genre. We will start with these
basic guidelines: that satire is always a criticism, is shaped with humor, and depends upon a shared body
of knowledge in its audience/readership. One of the questions we will ask in this course is what the
shared body of knowledge a modern satirist could rely on. We will read a variety of types of satire from
the two high points of satire in Western literature (primarily the English Augustan period) and in the last
portion of the class we’ll move to America and the 20th and 21st centuries.
Required Texts:
Satire: From Horace to Yesterday's Comic Strips by James Scott
A Modest Proposal and Other Satirical Works (Dover Thrift Editions) by Jonathan Swift
Alexander Pope: The Major Works (Oxford World's Classics) by Alexander Pope
Jonathan Wild (Oxford World's Classics) by Henry Fielding
Requirements
 75% Three papers
 10% attendance, participation
 10% Reading notebook
 5% contemporary satire selection and “presentation”
Papers: One of the three will be an imitation. One of the three will be an analysis. The last paper will be
your choice (analysis or imitation). Each paper will have a specific assignment, provided on Blackboard
at least two weeks before the paper is due.
Paper 1 due 2/14
Paper 2 due 3/18 (note, this is a Tuesday)
Paper 3 due 4/24 (final class)
Papers must follow MLA format. They must be in Times New Roman 12 point font. Please do not use
title pages. Instead, use the following heading on the top left corner of the first page of an assignment:
Your name
Professor Bloom
English 319
Date
Beneath this heading you should include a descriptive title that is centered on its line.
Satire / 1
Assignments should be deposited in Digital Drop Box at the beginning of the class that they are due. Five
points will be deducted for each day that a paper is late. Papers will not be accepted one week past the
due date.
Presentation: Over the course of the semester, we’ll slowly be codifying a definition of satire, identifying
different kinds of satire, and becoming articulate about what is and isn’t satire, what satire does, and how
it needs to be understood. To this end, at the end of the semester, you will come up with one
reading/viewing assignment for the class. The last two classes will be run by the students, who will
“teach,” in an informal way, the later 20th, early 21st century satire of their choice. This can be poetry,
fiction, essay, video, cartoon, song, or movie.
Reading notebook: I hesitate to call this a reading journal, because I mean something far less official
than that. Whether you keep this on your thumb drive, pda, in a mini notepad, or in a real notebook (say,
upside down at the end of the notebook you use for this class) is up to you, but I want you to keep a
record of thoughts, responses (emotional and intellectual), questions, and random unrelated ideas as you
read these satires. I will ask to see your journal periodically (so don’t be too personal in it) but I won’t be
reading it – just flipping through it.
Preparation And Participation: This is a small seminar. If you are not prepared, it will show, and it
will reduce the quality of discussion. In part, this is the purpose of the reading journal. Moreover, since
we meet only once a week, I would like each of us to participate in Blackboard discussions between
meetings, so that we don’t need to warm up each Thursday.
Attendance: Because this seminar is all about discussion, attendance is mandatory. Students may miss 1
class without penalty. The next 2 absences will lower your class grade. Any student missing more than 3
classes will fail the course. There is no difference between excused and unexcused absences, except in
the case of an emergency, so choose your absences with care. If you miss class, you are responsible for
finding out what you have missed. Arriving late to class is very disruptive and will also hurt your grade.
Blackboard: I will be posting assignments and sending announcements on blackboard. I will ask you to
submit all your papers via digital drop-box, though if you prefer, I will grade yours on a hard copy. We
will also use Blackboard for mid-week discussions, and for one “online” class (whose nature will be
revealed in the coming weeks).
Plagiarism will not be tolerated. Plagiarism is the act of taking someone else’s ideas, words, or writing,
and attempting to pass them off as your own. Copying another student’s paper or searching the Internet
for papers is overtly intentional plagiarism. Plagiarism also includes failing to cite quotations and
borrowed ideas, failing to enclose borrowed language in quotation marks, and failing to put summaries
and paraphrases in your own words. It includes “using” an idea you found on the web. Penalties include
a failing grade for an assignment or for the course.
In compliance with St. John Fisher College policy and applicable laws, appropriate academic
accommodations are available if you are a student with a disability. Requests for accommodations must
be supported by appropriate documentation/diagnosis and determined reasonable by St. John Fisher
College. Students with documented disabilities (physical, learning or psychological) who may need
academic accommodations are advised to make an appointment with the Coordinator of Services for
Students with Disabilities in the Office of Academic Affairs, Kearney 202. Late notification will delay
requested accommodations.
Satire / 2
SCHEDULE OF READINGS AND ASSIGNMENTS
1/17
Introduction – Satire
1/24
Horace and Juvenal
1/31
Pope Epistles and satires (imitations of Horace)
2/7
Pope “Rape of the Lock” and “Epistle to a Lady”; Responses (and Saki [S86] and Parker);
“Dunciad”
2/14
Rochester “Satyr against King Charles” “Satyr against Mankind,” Swift (poetry)
Essay 1 due
2/21
Swift Gulliver (book 4), Modest Proposal, “Abolishing Christianity”, Defoe “Shortest Way with
Dissenters” DeQuincy “Murder considered as a fine art” (Menken S110)
2/28
SPRING BREAK
3/6
Swift Battle of the Books, Tale of a Tub, Butler Hudibras
3/13
Gay Beggar’s Opera, Rehearsal at Goatham and Fielding Tom Thumb, The Modern Husband
(drama)
Essay 2 due Tuesday 3/18
3/20
EASTER BREAK
3/27
Fielding Jonathan Wild
online class
4/3
Hogarth (visual satire)
4/10
Mark Twain [S103], other 19th C prose
4/17
20th C satire of your selection
4/24
Conclusions & Review
Essay 3 due
No final exam.
Satire / 3