[SOLVED] Romantic Seconds

Romantic Seconds
English 166B

Lecture Viewing Period: TTh 9:30AM-10:00AM
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBrdft8TrnkRkT-reBZsbVT5qKI1UpbTY
In-Person/Zoom Discussion Period: TTh 10:00AM-10:50AM

Course Description
This course explores the aftermath of the revolutionary energies of early Romantic literature. After
the radical experiments of William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Charlotte Smith, and
William Blake (what I called the “Romantic Firsts” in English 166A), a second generation of
Romantics emerged, including, most famously, John Keats, Percy Shelley, and Lord George Gordon
Byron. These authors reckoned with both political disappointments and realized social reform. The
first half of the course will deal with four key dimensions of this afterlife: (1) the new state of
perpetual war during the Napoleonic era, (2) movement in the debate on the slave trade, (3) the
emergence of a public sphere of women writers, and (4) a mature conceptualization of the creative
pains and pleasures of the imagination. In the second half of the course, we will hear from what
Robert Southey called the Satanic School of poetry in the “audacious impiety” of second-generation
Romantics, including Keats, Shelley, and Byron.
Course Logistics
Arrive to class or sign on to Zoom after the lecture viewing period. The first 30 minutes of our
assigned time is dedicated to lecture viewing on YouTube. Do this before you come to class. Take
notes, discuss using the YouTube comments section (the videos are not public), and come to class
prepared to respond to lecture material with questions and comments.
Required Texts
Everything is available online.
Grade Breakdown
Presentation (in-class or Zoom with a 500-word write up, submitted to Canvas): 15%
Close Reading 1 (500 words minimum on the material from weeks 1-2, submitted to Canvas): 5%
Close Reading 2 (500 words minimum on the material from week 3-4, submitted to Canvas): 5%
Close Reading 3 (750 words minimum on Keats, submitted to Canvas): 15%
Close Reading 4 (750 words minimum on Shelley, submitted to Canvas): 15%
Close Reading 5 (750 words minimum on Byron, submitted to Canvas): 15%
Final Paper (1,500 words on anything from the course material, submitted to Canvas): 30%
Presentation
Each meeting, I will need 2-3 volunteers to present a self-designed response to the day’s reading and
lecture material. You can sign up at any time by just telling me in class or via email your preferred
presentation date. Get these done sooner rather than later. Each student must do a presentation
before the end of the quarter. These presentations are meant for you to engage the material in a way
that you believe will be most useful for you and your fellow classmates. In about 5-10 minutes, you
will model that engagement with the course material for your classmates in any way you see fit. Your
presentation might include any combination of the following components (but don’t feel restricted
by this list):
• A recitation and/or explication of a few lines of poetry or prose that you found difficult in
the assigned reading
• A response to something you learned from the video lecture
• A guided discussion with the rest of the class on an important theme
• A slide-driven presentation in which you put forth an interpretive argument
• An introduction to relevant outside reading and research that you did
To receive full credit on the assignment, submit a 500-word write up of your presentation
experience. The write up is due within a week after your presentation. In the write up, develop your
presentation with the feedback you get from your classmates. You will automatically receive an A
(95%) if you satisfy all the criteria above.
Close Readings
A close reading begins with a paraphrase of a short passage and complicates it. It is a coherent,
precise analysis of a passage from a literary text which acknowledges its primary obvious meaning;
its secondary, implicit meanings; and most importantly, considers how one arrives at those
meanings. A close reading tries to answer the questions: What is it like to read this passage? How do
I come to conclusions about what it means? To answer these questions, it is essential to pay
attention to the unique characteristics of the passage’s language. How is the language organized?
What imagery is used? What figures of speech? What kind of diction? A close reading links such
particulars of the reading experience to the creation of primary and secondary meanings. Finally, a
good close reading can gesture toward how that passage fits into some larger theme or issue
addressed by the whole text from which it is taken. For all close readings, choose passages NOT
extensively discussed in class to avoid repetition of lecture material. If you’ve submitted your close
readings on time and addressed the criteria above satisfactorily, you will automatically
receive an A (95%) for these assignments. This is an adjustment that I’ve made for our
continuing struggle with the pandemic. Use this loosened grading scheme as an opportunity to be
bolder and more creative in your close readings.
Final Paper
Aim for a minimum of 1,500 words and submit the paper to Canvas. The final paper is a thesisdriven, argumentative essay. Formulate your own topic around your interests in the course and use
the final paper as an opportunity to explore the questions that come up. Use the close reading skills
you’ve developed to build this larger interpretive and analytical project. In answering your analytical
question, make sure to reference at least two authors from the course material. This final paper
will be graded with more conventional rubrics.
Policies
Papers should be written in double-spaced 12-point font and should be formatted with MLA
guidelines. The OWL site produced by Purdue University provides good examples of MLA
citations. Late papers will be marked down 1/3 of a letter grade per day (including weekends).
Plagiarism, or presenting another’s words or ideas as your own, will result in disciplinary action. At
UCR, cheating and plagiarism are dealt with very seriously. Cases will be reported to the dean and
may lead to dismissal. Please cite your sources.
Technologies
The main technologies we will be using in this class are: Zoom, Canvas, and YouTube. All these free
resources are required for successful completion of this course. Zoom will be used for synchronous
meetings and live office hours, Canvas will be used for announcements and assignments, and
YouTube will be used for asynchronous lectures. All students will receive a Zoom link and a link to
a YouTube playlist. You should all be automatically added to Canvas.
Accommodations
If you have a physical, psychiatric/emotional, medical, or learning disability that may impact your
ability to complete the assigned course work, I encourage you to contact the UCR Student Disability
Resource Center (SDRC) https://sdrc.ucr.edu/ for accommodation arrangements. If you are
comfortable doing so, please let me know what you need from me as well. All information and
documentation regarding services and accommodations is confidential. The University of California,
Riverside offers several important resources to ensure your academic success, physical health, and
mental wellbeing. It is recommended that students make use of these resources as needed. If you do
have a learning-related disability, please make your instructor aware as soon as possible so that
accommodations can be made to ensure your academic success and equal participation in this
course: www.specialservices.ucr.edu & www.counseling.ucr.edu. Should you need modifications or
adjustments to your course requirements because of documented pregnancy-related or childbirthrelated issues, please contact me as soon as possible to discuss your options. Generally,
modifications will be made where medically necessary and similar in scope to accommodations
based on temporary disability. Learn more about the rights of pregnant and parenting students by
consulting the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. For any concerns regarding gender-based
discrimination, sexual harassment, sexual misconduct, stalking, or intimate partner violence, the
University offers a variety of resources, including advocates on-call 24/7, counseling services,
mutual no contact orders, scheduling adjustments, and disciplinary sanctions against the perpetrator.
Please see the Title IX website for more information. They can be reached at (951) 827-7070. You
can also file a report.
UCR Land Acknowledgement
We at UCR would like to respectfully acknowledge and recognize our responsibility to the original
and current caretakers of this land, water, and air: the Cahuilla [ka-wee-ahh], Tongva [tong-va],
Luiseño [loo-say-ngo], and Serrano [se-ran-oh] peoples and all of their ancestors and descendants,
past, present, and future. Today this meeting place is home to many Indigenous peoples from all
over the world, including UCR faculty, students, and staff, and we are grateful to have the
opportunity to live and work on these homelands.
Schedule of Reading
Week 1 (War)
Day 1: Read William Wordsworth, “Character of the Happy Warrior” and “To Toussaint
L’Ouverture” from Poems in Two Volumes (1807). Watch lecture 1: “Romanticism at War.”
Day 2: Read William Wordsworth, “Calais, August 1802” and “I griev’d for Buonaparte” from
Poems in Two Volumes (1807); Anna Letitia Barbauld, Eighteen Hundred and Eleven (1812). Watch
lecture 2: “Romanticism Against War.”
Week 2 (Slavery)
Day 1: Read Anna Letitia Barbauld, “Epistle To William Wilberforce, Esq. on the Rejection of the
Bill for Abolishing the Slave Trade” (1791); William Wilberforce, A Letter on the Abolition of the Slave
Trade (1807, The ending from “But the enormous dimensions” to “the forbearance of the
Almighty”); Maria Edgeworth “The Grateful Negro” (1804). Watch lecture 3: “The Abolitionist
Movement.”
Day 2: Read William Cowper, “The Negro’s Complaint” (1788); Mary Prince and Thomas Pringle,
The History of Mary Prince (1831, just the Mary Prince part, not the supplements or the history of AsaAsa). Watch lecture 4: “Voicing the Enslaved.” CLOSE READING 1 DUE
Week 3 (Feminism)
Day 1: Read Felicia Hemans, selections from Records of Woman (1828): “The Bride of the Greek
Isle,” “Properzia Rossi,” “The Homes of England,” and “The Graves of a Household.” Watch
lecture 5: “Domestic Feminism.”
Day 2: Read Lucy Aikin, “Introduction” and Epistles I and II from Epistles on Women (1810); Letitia
Elizabeth Landon, “Sappho’s Song” from The Improvisatrice (1824), “The Proud Ladye” from The
Troubadour (1825), and “Love’s Last Lesson” from The Golden Violet (1827). Watch lecture 6:
“Beyond the Home.”
Week 4 (Imagination)
Day 1: Read Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Chapter XIII of Biographia Literaria (1817) and “Kubla Khan”
(1816). Watch lecture 7: “The Esemplastic Power.”
Day 2: Read Thomas De Quincey, “Introduction to the Pains of Opium” (from “Now, then, I was
again happy” to “pass to a very different one—the pains of opium”) and “May 1818” and “June 1819”
from “The Pains of Opium” in Confessions of an English Opium Eater (1821). Watch lecture 8: “The
Costs of Imagination.” CLOSE READING 2 DUE
Week 5 (Keats)
Day 1: Read John Keats, “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” “Ode on Indolence,” “Ode on Melancholy.”
Watch lecture 9: “The Great Odes, Part I.”
Day 2: Read John Keats, “Ode to Psyche,” “Ode to a Nightingale,” “To Autumn.” Watch lecture
10: “The Great Odes, Part II.”
Week 6 (Keats)
Day 1: Read John Keats, the letter on “Negative Capability” and “La Belle Dame Sans Merci.”
Watch lecture 11: “Theory and Practice, Part I.”
Day 2: Read John Keats, the letters on “The Mansion of Many Apartments” and the “Vale of SoulMaking”; The Fall of Hyperion. Watch lecture 12: “Theory and Practice, Part II” CLOSE READING
3 DUE
Week 7 (Shelley)
Day 1: Read Percy Shelley, “Ode to the West Wind,” “England in 1819,” “Mont Blanc,”
“Ozymandias.” Watch lecture 13: “Shelley in Brief.”
Day 2: Read Percy Shelley, Prometheus Unbound (Acts I and II). Watch lecture 14: “Promethean
Revolution, Part I.”
Week 8 (Shelley)
Day 1: Read Percy Shelley, Prometheus Unbound (Acts III and IV). Watch lecture 15: “Promethean
Revolution, Part II.”
Day 2: Read Percy Shelley, Triumph of Life. Watch lecture 16: “The Mature Shelley.” CLOSE
READING 4 DUE
Week 9 (Byron)
Day 1: Read George Gordon Byron, “She walks in beauty,” “So, we’ll go no more a roving,”
“Darkness.” Watch lecture 17: “Byron in Brief.”
Day 2: Read George Gordon Byron, Canto IV, Stanzas CXXVIII (128)-CXLVII (147) of Childe
Harold’s Pilgrimage. Watch lecture 18: “The Byronic Hero.”
Week 10 (Byron)
Day 1: Read George Gordon Byron, Manfred. Watch lecture 19: “Heroic Transgression.”
Day 2: Read nothing. Watch lecture 20: “Conclusion.” CLOSE READING 5 DUE
FINAL PAPER DUE