Syllabus for English 395
Milton, Blake, and Frankenstein: Explorations in Literary and Digital Methods
Spring 2016

First day: introductions and course outline

• John Milton, Areopagitica
  • Dictionary of Literary Biography (Grinnell only): John Milton

Note: here and throughout this syllabus, the first (less indented) list of readings is required, while the second (more indented) list of readings is supplemental and optional. Here, for example, Areopagitica is a required reading, while the biographical piece is recommended for exploration but are not required.

First assignment (earlier in the week): go to our PWeb discussion board and post a brief self-introduction in the forum labeled for that purpose. This will help us get to know each other and also confirm that everyone can post on the blog.

Second assignment: by the usual deadline of midnight on Sunday, post your weekly response to our PWeb discussion board.

• Milton, Paradise Lost, Books 1-4

Assignment: post your weekly response by midnight on Sunday.

• Milton, Paradise Lost, Books 8-10, 12

Assignment: post your weekly response by midnight on Sunday.

• Milton, Samson Agonistes

Assignment: post your weekly response by midnight on Sunday.

• TBD: critical or theoretical readings chosen in response to the conversations we have had so far

Assignment: post your weekly response by midnight on Sunday.

• Readings on eighteenth-century aesthetics, especially sublimity

Assignment: post your weekly response by midnight on Sunday.

• TBD: reading about and working with digital methods to approach Milton's writing

Assignment: post your weekly response by midnight on Sunday.

SPRING BREAK

• William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Europe a Prophecy, and Visions of the Daughters of Albion
  • Dictionary of Literary Biography (Grinnell only): William Blake

Assignment: post your weekly response by midnight on Sunday.

• Blake, Milton a Poem

Assignment: post your weekly response by midnight on Sunday.

• Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, Frankenstein; Or, the Modern Prometheus
  • Dictionary of Literary Biography (Grinnell only): Mary Wollstonecraft (Godwin) Shelley

  • Especially as you write your response, you may find useful information in Stuart Curran's electronic edition of the novel (1818 version; the edition includes this and the 1831), especially in the annotations of highlighted words and phrases.

Assignment: post your weekly response by midnight on Sunday.

• Andrew Goldstone and Ted Underwood, "The Quiet Transformations of Literary Studies: What Thirteen Thousand Scholars Could Tell Us"
• "Blake and Digital Making: A Critical Cluster," a collection of articles from Essays in Romanticism

Assignment: post your weekly response by midnight on Sunday.

In class, we will discuss the articles for the first segment, then turn to text mining databases of criticism.

Today we will continue our discussion of text mining critical articles, adding our primary sources to the mix.

Your preparation for the day will be to continue working on your final paper research. We will spend the latter part of class preparing for the final paper proposal meetings that happen later this week.

FINAL PAPER PROPOSAL MEETINGS
WILL HAPPEN LATE THIS WEEK

Come to class today with FOUR COPIES of a) a draft of an important paragraph (perhaps the introduction or conclusion) of your final paper and b) a list of three key questions or issues you are facing in writing the paper. We will discuss these materials in small groups today.