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ENGL 2308-001H: DOING THINGS WITH POEMS
Mr. Lewis
Spring, 2006
3 MW, 101 D
Syllabus
Required Text:
Paul Keegan, ed., The New Penguin Book of English Verse.
We will supplement Keegan in two ways: first, I’ll provide a number of
poems in the form of handouts. Second, your final project will be to
create an extension of Keegan consisting of ten poems copied out
(not downloaded!) by you and accompanied by an explanation of
why these ten poems form a coherent extension of Keegan’s
anthology. Handouts for these poems will be made available
through the Blackboard system; it is your responsibility to
download and print them out in a timely fashion.
How to Prepare for Class:
Poems are to be read before class on the dates indicated. Careful reading is the
most important form of preparation you can undertake before class. Here are
some guidelines:
1. You are responsible for knowing the meaning(s) of all words in the
assigned poems; if you do not know these meanings, look them up in the
Oxford English Dictionary, available in many places including the Fondren
Library reference room, the English Department Common Room (Dallas
Hall Room 08), and online to SMU faculty, students, students, and staff
through PONI.
2. You should make every effort to identify persons, places, etc. mentioned in
the assigned poems. This will require a different kind of research. Learn
the use of biographical and geographical dictionaries, of dictionaries of
foreign phrases, of quotations, and of concordances to the Bible and other
works of literature. You will notice that apart from the earliest poems in
our anthology, footnotes are rare. We’ll be discussing the matter of
footnotes in class, so think about how this absence of footnotes affects
your reading habits!
3. You can’t expect to understand a poem without understanding the basic
elements—words and names—from which it is built up. That’s the reason
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for points 1 and 2 above. But knowledge of words and names is not
sufficient for understanding. You must also know how these words and
names are put together or combined in the poem. In most poems, the unit
of meaning is the sentence. A poem will consist of one or more sentences,
simple or complex, and it is essential that you bring to your task the basic
ability to recognize sentences and their parts. Otherwise you will certainly
misunderstand what you read. Please note: the modern convention of
writing out and printing poems exhibits verse structure by separating
lines. These separate lines are not units of meaning; for the most part they
won’t make sense by themselves unless they end with a strong mark of
punctuation. The best way to get a “feel” for the sentences making up a
poem is to read the poem aloud several times, taking care not to pause at
the end of a verse line unless there is a strong punctuation mark there.
You will automatically make adjustments, trying slight variations of stress
and pause, as you reread and reread, and usually when you do so the
result is that the meaning of the poem becomes suddenly clear. This
experience of sudden clarity tells you when you have read the poem
“enough times.”
4. Performance of poems on your own as described in 3 above will become
easier with practice, and much practice will take place in class. You will be
called upon to read assigned poems aloud, so be sure that you can
pronounce all the words in them with confidence. Many of the poems we
will be reading are a few centuries old, and the pronunciation of earlier
English is somewhat different from today’s; for these poems you will be
not be expected to get the earier pronunciation right, but you should be
able to read these older poems aloud using modern pronunciation. Since
the OED gives a UK standard pronunciation, you should look up the
pronunciation of unfamiliar words in an American dictionary, for
example a Merriam-Webster dictionary or the American Heritage
Dicitonary. Above all, be confident when you read aloud—don’t stumble
over words!
5. One last observation: the assignments for this course are very short, often
only a page or two per class, occasionally as many as twenty or so. There’s
no reason to suppose, therefore, that the careful, intensive mode of
preparation outlined above imposes a burden on you. Prepare carefully
and fully, and you will do well in this course.
Essays, Grading, and Examinations. 15% of your grade in this course will be
based on your completion of the homework, in-class written exercises, and
similar activities. 5% will be based on your performance on the midterm
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examination. 10% will be based on your performance on the final examination.
The midterm will test your command of the vocabulary with which we talk
about poetry; the final will test your skills of analysis and interpretation. The
remainder of your grade, 70%, will be based on the four out-of-class essays. Two
of these will be explications, one will involve a tracing of some or all of the
publication history of a poem, and the final essay will be the preface to your
anthology of poems. These essays should follow the norms of standard written
American English. The essays will be penalized for late submissions, with the
penalty incresing according to the number of essays handed in late. No essay will
be accepted after the last meeting of the class. You are put on notice that the
Dedman College Dean’s Office has begun a crackdown on seriously late essay
submissions and will no longer authorize grade changes for students who hand
in work during examination week, etc. To preserve your academic good
standing, do not presume, nor ask, for special consideration in this matter. Do
not ask to take the midterm or the final at other times than those set for this
course. Only in the event of an emergency will a make-up examination be
scheduled; for the midterm one will be sheduled for the weekend after we return
from spring break; for the final one will be scheduled for the summer (probably
June).
An Extract from the Statement on Academic Integrity in the Undergraduate
Catalogue:
“Academic dishonesty is defined broadly as a student’s
misrepresentation of his or her academic work or of the circumstances
under which that work is done. This includes plagiarism in all papers,
projects, take-home exams, or any other assignment in which the
student submits another’s work as being his or her own. It also
includes cheating on examinations, unauthorized access to test
materials, and/or assisting another student in gaining any unfair
academic advantage. Failure to prevent or report academic dishonesty
by another may be considered participation in a dishonest act.”
Pursuant to the above statement, The SMU Honor Code is in effect for this
course. All out-of-class papers should bear on the last sheet verso the Honor
Pledge: “On my honor, I have neither given nor received unauthorized aid on
this work” with your legal signature beneath it. Exam bluebooks have the Honor
Pledge on their front cover; all you need to do is sign the pledge.
Excused Absences for University Extracurricular Activities. Students
participating in an officially sanctioned, scheduled University extracurricular
activity will be given the opportunity to make up class assignments or other
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graded assignments missed as a result of their participation. It is the
responsibility of the student to make arrangements with me prior to any missed
scheduled examination or other missed assignment for making up the work.
Disability Accommodations. If you need academic accommodations for a
disability, you must first contact Ms. Rebecca Marin, Coordinator, Services for
Students with Disabilities (214-768-4557) to verify the disability and to establish
eligibility for accommodations. Then you should schedule an appointment with
me to make appropriate arrangements.
Statement on the Observance of Certain Holy Days. Religiously observant
students wishing to be absent on holidays that require missing class should
notify me in writing at the beginning of the semester and consult with me about
acceptable ways of making up any work missed for this reason well in advance
of the absence itself.
Schedule of Meetings and Assignments:
Note: This syllabus is reasonably complete through the Spring Break, but it’s a
bit sketchy after that. A revised syllabus for the second part of the course will be
issued later. Please pay attention in class and in the Blackboard Announcements
for any changes that happen along the way!
Date
Preparation for Class
(Reading and Exercises)
Wednesday, January 18.
Austin Dobson born,
1840. Rubén Dario
born, 1867. Jorge
Guillén born, 1893.
Read the “Preface” to
Keegan, xxxix-xliv.
Prepare poems by
Dobson, Dario, Guillén
(open attachment to
email and print).
Monday, January 23.
Louis Zukowsky born,
1904. Derek Walcott
born, 1930.
NB: Today’s class will
meet in the English
Department Common
Room, Dallas Hall 08.
Class Themes, Activities,
and Assignments Due (if
any)
Feeling and
“Understanding” Poems.
Poem for Performance:
Wayman, “Did I Miss
Anything?” (on sheet).
Canons and Canonformation. What’s
involved in “preparing”
a poem for class?
Feeling, Ambivalence,
and Tone. Poem for
Performance: Lawrence,
“Mosquito,” K 881-883.
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Wednesday, January 25.
*Robert Burns born,
1759.
Monday, January 30.
*Walter Savage Landor
born, 1775.
Prepare Johnson, K 519f.;
Auden, “In Memory of
W. B. Yeats,” III, K 930f.
Prepare Levertov, “To
the Snake” (on sheet) and
Burns, K 523-525. Prepare
epitaphs by Carew, K
271f.; Shirley, Cleveland,
and Fanshawe, K 291f.
and Wordsworth’s
poems on Burns (on
sheet).
Prepare Prior, “A True
Maid,” K 427; Carey, K
435f.; Evans, K 436. OED
practice for Lovelace and
Cowper snail poems, K
(on handout).
OED practice.
Occasion, Form, and
Meaning. Poem for
Performance: Lawrence,
“Snake” (on sheet).
Irony and Reversal.
Poem for Performance:
Lawrence, “The Blue
Jay,” K 883-884.
Discussion of Lovelace
and Cowper, snail
poems.
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Wednesday, February 1.
Langston Hughes
born, 1902.
Monday, February 6.
*Christopher Marlowe
born, 1564. Rubén
Dario dies, 1916 Jorge
Guillén dies, 1984.
Wednesday, February 8.
*Samuel Butler born,
1612. Elizabeth
Bishop born, 1911.
Monday, February 13
Wednesday, February 15
Line and Sentence:
Uncoiling the Snake.
Poem for Performance:
Collins, “Introduction to
Poetry” (on sheet) First
Explication Assigned!
Meter and Rhythm.
Prepare Rossetti, from
Sing-Song, K 775f.; Keats Poem for Performance:
Carroll, K 773-775.
K 640-642; Tennyson, In
Introduction to the rules
Memoriam VII, K 713f.
of scansion and
Write out Tennyson, In
guidelines for
Memoriam II in normal
word-order; do the same recognizing metered and
unmetered verse.
for VII.
Metered and Unmetered
Prepare Butler, K 326328, Gray, K 484-487, and Verse. Poems for
Performance:
Pound, K 839-841. Write
out the scansion of Gray, Anonymous, “This is the
House that Jack Built”
first and second stanzas.
Additional poem: Bishop, and Christopher Smart,
“Visits to St. Elizabeth’s” from Jubilate Agno, K 488491. K 488. Practice in
(on sheet).
scanning strict iambics.
First Explication Due!
Prepare Campion, K 184, How Poems Begin and
Rossetti, K 771. Write out End. Poem for
the scansion of Campion Performance: Jack
Gilbert, “The Forgotten
(all) and the first stanza
Dialect of the Heart” (on
of Rossetti.
sheet). Further practice in
scanning strict iambics.
Introduction to loose
iambics and anapæstics;
elision.
Prepare Byron, K 604 and Second-Order Meanings
I: Metonymy and
K 679 and “The
Connotation. Poem for
Destruction of
Sennacherib” (on sheet);. Performance: Edson,
“Counting Sheep” (on
Scan the first stanza of
sheet). Practice in
“Destruction.”
scanning loose iambics
and anapæstics.
Rewrite the first seven
stanzas of Gray (1751), K
484 in normal word order.
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Second-Order Meanings
II: Metaphor and
Analogy. Poem for
performance: O’Hara,
Lines for the Fortune
Cookies” (on sheet).
Further practice in
scansion.
Allegory and
Symbolism. Poem for
performance: Berryman,
Dream Song 22: “Of 1826”
(on sheet). Further
practice in scanson.
Second Essay (including
Publication History)
Assigned!
Monday, February 20.
Dard Hunter died,
1966.
Prepare Shakespeare, K
195 (73); Cotton, K 389f.;
and Auden, 969.
Wednesday, February 22.
George Washington
born, 1732. James
Russell Lowell born,
1819. Edna St. Vincent
Millay born, 1892.
Georgios Seferis born,
1900.Edward Gorey
born, 1925. Ishmael
Reed born, 1938.
Monday, February 27.
Henry Wadsworth
Longfellow born,
1807.
Prepare Yeats, K 864f.;
Eliot, K 865f.; and Pound,
K 866f.
Prepare Longfellow, from
The Song of Hiawatha;
Southey, “The Old Man’s
Comforts and How He
Gained Them” (on sheet)
and Carroll, K 754 f. and
from “Hiawatha’s
Photographing” on sheet.
Reference, Allusion and
Parody. Poem for
performance: Wright, “In
Response To A Rumor
That The Oldest Whorehouse In Wheeling, West
Virginia, Has Been
Condemned” (on sheet).
Further practice in
scansion.
Wednesday, March 1.
*Thomas Campion died,
1620. *Basil Bunting
born, 1900. Robert
Lowell born, 1917.
Richard Wilbur born,
1921.
Prepare Wordsworth,
“Song,” K 566f. and H.
Coleridge, “He Lived
Amidst th’ Untrodden
Ways” (on sheet);
prepare Yeats, K 885;
Mona Van Duyn, “Leda”
(on sheet); and James
Harrison, . Scan the
Wordsworth and
Coleridge.
Prepare Shakespeare, K
195 (66), Herbert, K 249f.,
Resonance: Figures of
Thought (Tropes). Poem
for performance: Wright,
“Having Lost My Sons, I
Confront The Wreckage
Of The Moon: Christmas,
1960” (on sheet). Further
practice in scansion.
Second Essay Due!
Monday, March 6.
*Elizabeth Barrett
Insistence I: Figures of
Speech (Schemes).
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Browning born, 1806.
Wednesday, March 8
and Henry, K 721.
Review for Midtern
Examination.
Poem for performance:
“found poem.” Further
practice in scansion.
MIDTERM
EXAMINATION
SPRING BREAK
SPRING BREAK
Monday, March 20. Ovid
born, 43 BCE. J. C.
Friedrich Hölderlin
born, 1770. Henrik
Ibsen born, 1828.
Wednesday, March 22
Prepare Keats, K 624-634
and Swinburne, K 781783.
Insistence II: Rhyme,
alliteration, assonance,
consonance.
Review Dobson,
“Rondeau” and “The
Wanderer” (on sheet)
and prepare Thomas,
“Do Not Go Gentle Into
that Good Night,” K. 968.
Read Herbert, “The
Collar,” K 246f. Read
through the poems
published in the 1890’s, K
804-824; choose two that
seem to you worthy of
discussion and prepare
them. How would you
characterize the poetry of
this period: what are its
preoccupations, what
techniques are in favor?
Stanza Types and Fixed
Forms.
Monday, March 27
Wednesday, March 29
Read through the poems
published from 1900 to
1915, K 824-842, noting
any titles, subtitles, etc.;
choose two poems that
seem to you worthy of
discussion and prepare
them. What poems
continue the poetry of
the 1890s? What poems
represent a departure
from the previous
SPRING BREAK
Meanings from
Contexts: Titles,
Subtitles, Dedications,
and Epigraphs. Heaney,
“Death of a Naturalist”
(on sheet). Poems at the
Turn of the Nineteenth
Century I. Starting
today, we undertake a
historical survey of
English verse (in
Keegan’s sense), working
backwards through his
anthology.
Poems at the Turn of the
Nineteenth Century II.
Third Essay (Second
Explication) Assigned!
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decade? How would you
characterize the new
directions in English
poetry?
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Monday, April 3. *George
Herbert born, 1593.
Wednesday, April 5.
*Algernon Charles
Swinburne born, 1837.
Bette Davis born, 1908.
Monday, April 10
Wednesday, April 12
Monday, April 17. Basil
Read through the poems
published from 17911799, K 528-566; choose
two that seem to you
worthy of discussion and
prepare them. Again,
characterize the poetry of
this decade.
Read through the poems
published from 1800 to
1810, K 566-603; choose
two that seem to you
worthy of discussion and
prepare them. Again,
what poems herald a
change, and how would
you characterize the new
directions in English
poetry?
Read through the poems
published in the 1690s, K
389-406; choose two that
seem to you worthy of
discussion and prepare
them. From now through
your preparation for
Wednesday, April 19
continue to log the
changing characteristics
of the poems in Keegan
so as to strengthen your
sense of period styles in
English poetry.
Read through the poems
published from 1701 to
1717, K 407-427; choose
two that seem to you
worthy of discussion and
prepare them.
Read through the poems
Poems at the Turn of the
Eighteenth Century I
Poems at the Turn of the
Eighteenth Century II.
Third Essay Due!
Poems at the Turn of the
Seventeenth Century I
Poems at the Turn of the
Seventeenth Century II.
We will brainstorm on
the anthologies you will
create for the fourth
essay; get clear in your
mind what you want to
do for this assignment.
Poems at the Turn of the
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*Bunting died, 1985.
published in the 1590s, K
109-179; choose two that
seem to you worthy of
discussion and prepare
them.
Wednesday, April 19.
Read through the poems
Etheridge Knight born, published from 1601 to
1933.
1620, K 179-234; choose
two that seem to you
worthy of discussion and
prepare them.
Monday, April 24. Robert
Penn Warren born,
1905.
Wednesday, April 26
Monday, May 1
Wednesday, May 3:
READING DAY—NO
CLASS!
Tuesday, May 9 from
11:30 am to 2:30 pm:
FINAL EXAMINATION
IN ROOM 101 D!
Mona Van Duyn born,
1921. Charles Simic born,
1938.
Sixteenth Century I.
Prospectus for
Anthology Due!
Poems at the Turn of the
Sixteenth Century II
Extending the System:
the role of Loose
Iambics and (Recently)
Imported Forms.
Free Verse. Anthology
(Fourth Essay) Due!
From Surrealism to
Postmodernism.