due Thursday, 2/14

• OED Exercise: Select 1 poem. Identify the most important word in the poem, and consider its resonance throughout the poem. Look it up in the Oxford English Dictionary, and research its ETYMOLOGY (the roots of the word in Latin, Greek, or Germanic languages), tracing its evolution over time. List all possible angles and meanings of this word. Consider how the storyline of the word opens your reading of the poem. Write a well-focused paragraph of 250 words or so in which you justify the word’s centrality and relevance, referring specifically to your gathered research. Consider how the word would figure prominently in a close analysis of the poem: how would it be useful as evidence for an effective argument; how does the author’s usage of the word enhances your understanding of the poem as a whole? (Remember: there may be chronological limits if a definition post-dates the poem, and you can consider the word within its context of other words in the poem.)[Begin this exercise as a brainstorming session to strategize which word might be central to an essay revealing something about the poem not immediately obvious to a reader. To accomplish this task, please do the following: Read the poem carefully several times. If you have a quick memory, commit it to memory; or at least write it out a few times, so that you are familiar with every line. Underline at least 5 words as candidates for your choice—those that seem most crucial to  the poem as a whole, to how it works, in all of its complexity. Then select your 1 word.] Post on blog.

due Tuesday, 2/19

—Select ONE poem from Week 2 and perform each of the following brief exercises on it:

1. Scansion: Gloss a 5-line section of the poem. Type out lines and paraphrase in your words next to each line, then indicate any relevant scansion marks or notes. (See handout on Scansion.)
2. Diction: Identify the most important word in the poem (research etymology in OED), and discuss its significance to the poem as a whole.
3. Imagery: Select 1 image, metaphor, analogy, figure, or scheme that you find prominent; quote the line in which it occurs, or which alludes to it. Explain why you find it resonant to the overall meaning of the poem.
4. Syntax: Identify the most important line in the poem, and explain why it is so. Also: Is anything happening with the syntax of this line as it impacts your reading of the poem?
5. Title: Address the significance of the title.
6. Synesthesia: If the poem were a color, what would it be / why? If the poem were set to a musical score, for which instrument would it be written / why?
7. Content/Form Relationship: What is the central idea of this poem, and how does the form/shape/structure of the poem convey this? (Try not to be redundant here; really think about the relationship of form and content, of form and meaning.)
8. Context: Research the context in which this poem was published: time period, literary association or movement (ie. Romanticism), and any important info on the author. Take notes if anything seems integral to understanding the poem; though I urge you to know these details when writing about a text, you will not necessarily address them in a close-reading essay, unless they impact your particular reading in a specific way.
9. Question: Write down 1 question that you think would make for a unique, compelling scholarly discussion of the poem. Make sure your question anticipates a discussion not only about what the poem means, but how the poem is creating meaning (what it’s doing), as well as the relationship of content & form, and why putting a lens on this matters. (Remember the construction of a scholarly discussion as: what/how/why (so what?).)

NOTE: All responses (unless specified) should be a couple sentences; brief but detailed. Avoid generalizing, summarizing, or obviousness. Resist the urge to read secondary material; I want to see how you’re making sense of this poem on your own terms. Feel free to select the poem you intend to write on for Essay 1, as this will help you really dig into it as you begin to formulate a viable thesis. However, you do not need to be decided about which poem you’ll write on for Essay 1, and you may even change your mind after doing these exercises, which is ok.

Post by Noon Tuesday 2/19.

due Thursday, 2/21

• Write a sonnet (use the form to respond to or extend the idea of any sonnet we’ve read)
• Intro to Essay 1, TWO HARDCOPIES

due Monday, 2/25

• Essay 1, draft 1, TWO HARDCOPIES (deadline extended to Tuesday)

due Tuesday, 2/26

• Reading response to 1 poem from Week 3 readings (post on blog)—consider focusing on one aspect of bodily expression as it is represented in the theme and/or form of the poem.

due Thursday, 2/28

• Write 1 form poem (villanelle, sestina, pantoum, ghazal).

due Tuesday, 3/5

• Reading Response: Write a 1-page single-spaced explication of 1 poem from Week 4, focusing on a specific way in which the body is represented through imagery (if selected from Tuesday) or in which the voice/tone of the poem creates an idea of the body (if selected from Thursday). Post to blog by Noon 3/5. (See Tips for Explications under the 103 tab…and while you’re there, I recommend you revisit the essay guidelines.)
• Creative Exercise: Convert 1 of your form poems (either your sonnet or your alternate form) into free-verse and be prepared to discuss the the process.
• In-Class Group Presentations TBA

NOTE: Please be well-prepared to discuss all poems for this week, as you may be asked to give a presentation on any one of them either T or Th.

due Thursday, 3/7

• Memorization of 1 poem from the poetry unit.
• Return Peer Essays w/Peer Review Form
• In-Class Group Presentations TBA
• Intro to Essay 2 (see below), TWO COPIES.

ESSAY 2 — due Friday, 3/15 by 2pm in box outside my office door

4-5 pages

Your task in this assignment is to construct an argument about the body in any one of the free-verse poems on the syllabus that we have read so far, (one that we have not discussed).

How you address the topic of the body is up to you, and you should think carefully about this as you devise your own essay question. You must address the poem through a primary lens of either A) imagery or B) voice, though you will talk about all of the relevant formal and thematic elements that emerge in your reading (likely including an overlap of imagery and voice/tone).

A) IMAGERY. You may want to discuss how the idea of the body is explored or represented by the imagery in a poem and how it is significant for the poem as a whole; or you may want to use a passage from the poem to examine the ways in which imagery and body are linked; or you may want to consider how the poem embodies, as a bodily form itself, ideas of the body central to the poem’s meaning. There are many possibilities. Find the one that is doable, and that promises to be of interest and challenge. Your argument about the body should derive from careful consideration of one (or several) imagesin the poem. Imagery, as this assignment refers to it, includes “all the objects and qualities of sense perception referred to in a poem or other work of literature, whether by literal description, by allusion, or in the vehicles (the secondary references) of its similes and metaphors” (Abrams and Harpham). As you will infer, in order to accomplish this task, you will need to come up with a question about the poem you select; it is my policy not to provide you with such a question. I would suggest that you search out a problem or mystery pertaining to images in the poem as they relate to the body, and then articulate the puzzlement or curiosity that arises from this problem or mystery as a clear question. You may not solve the problem or mystery, but you may be able to enlighten your readers as to its significance. Your argument should have a prominent thesis, and should imply a compelling agenda—a reason for your reader to read your essay. Perhaps an image in your poem suggests an overall interpretation, or a way in which the poem might affect us, that we might not have comprehended, or might not have been able to articulate before reading your essay; perhaps the image conflicts with another image in the poem, or something the poems says, and your argument, with regard to the body, either resolves the contradiction in such a way as to help us make sense of the poem, or explains the significance of the contradiction in terms of the poems as a whole; perhaps you are saying something generally about how the poet uses imagery with regard to the body—what kind of metaphor or effect she uses it to achieve.  Your argument, your thesis, and your agenda are to be determined by you. Use this opportunity, as well, to review and practice the other elements of the scholarly essay.

B) VOICE. You may want to discuss how the idea of the body is explored or represented through a primary consideration of the voice or voices established by the poem. What is the tone of the poem? What attitude might you infer from this tone, and what does it tell you about how the poem is representing or articulating the body? Or how, in the poem, does the construction of voice rely on the body? Obviously, you do not have to answer all or any of these questions. You must come up with your own over-arching question, but use any or all of the question posited here onlyif they help you–only if they make sense in the context of what is at stake in your project. As you think about this assignment, remember that voice is a set of instructions implicit in the poem as to how to hear the poem. In order to perceive those instructions, we must consider poetic elements we have discussed so far (ie. diction, syntax, imagery, rhythm, form), as well as any context we may be able to document. So you will need to read with everything you have so far learned in mind. I would suggest that you search out a problem or mystery pertaining to any or all of the various poetic elements we have discussed so far, and then articulate the puzzlement or curiosity that arises from this problem or mystery as a clear question articulating exactly what the problem or mystery is and demonstrating its importance. You may not solve the problem or mystery, but you may be able to enlighten your readers as to its significance. Your argument should have a prominent thesis, and should imply a compelling motive—a reason for your reader to read your essay. Perhaps your study of voice suggests an overall interpretation, or a way in which the poem might affect us, that we might not have comprehended, or might not have been able to articulate before reading your essay; perhaps one voice conflicts with another, or with something the poems says, and your argument either resolves the contradiction in such a way as to help us make sense of the poem, or explains the significance of the contradiction in terms of the poem as a whole. Your argument, your thesis, and your motive are to be determined by you. Use this opportunity, as well, to review and practice the other elements of the scholarly essay.

due Tuesday, 3/12

1. Do a close-reading of the Duke’s opening monologue, discussing how it specifically sets up the tone and themes of the play.
2. Discuss the alternate title of the play, What You Will, as it is relevant to the play as a whole, then point to 1 scene in detail that supports your ideas.
3. Notice how Shakespeare uses different types of language (rhymed verse, blank verse, prose, etc.) to differentiate between characters (ie. serous/comical; nobility/social climbers) or to create other effects (increased solemnity or silliness; poetic effects; song). How does the type of language in 1 scene add to the meaning(s) Shakespeare is attempting to convey?
4. How does the comic relief of drag in Twelfth Night — the comical effect of mistaken identity which produces the error plot — dispel ideas of gender (or other identity categories)? Considering that (gender) identity is a social performance, discuss who has identity in the play? Discuss 1 scene closely.
5. Write down 1 critical question you have about the play, and be prepared to share it in class.