English 212 Syllabus
Spring 2025
English literature from 1700 to 1900.
This course begins with the first great novel of the 18th century and ends with the last great novel of the 19th century. In between, we'll read one of the first great novels of the 19th century and spend considerable time reading and discussing the poetry of the Romantic period, which ran from about 1780-1820. The 18th and 19th centuries are the time when the modern world, the world we live in, evolved. Human beings had lived in pretty much the same kinds of circumstances for ten thousand years before European, also called "Western," civilization began to develop science, technology, industrialization, and capitalism. This process started in the 17th century, more or less, and took off in the 18th and 19th centuries, and the literature of the period is a product of the changes in society that were taking place as a result. The novel in particular is a product of the commercial and industrial class called the bourgeoisie, and you will learn a lot in these novels about how the bourgeoisie began to challenge the aristocracy for power. Romantic poetry, on the other hand, was a spiritual and intellectual reaction against the scientific materialism that was getting rid of all mystery, magic, and divinity from the world, reducing everything to the action of whizzing atoms. The Romantics, especially Wordsworth, affirmed the priority of imagination and spirit over mere materiality.
There will be frequent, unannounced, reading quizzes to help you keep up with the reading, to be done on your phones or laptops and emailed to hstaten@uw.edu. (If you email me for other reasons, send your email to this same address. I will not respond to emails sent to the canvas email.) I will drop the three lowest grades on your quizzes, but there are no retakes. I drop three grades because I know people get sick, have car trouble, or whatever.
Your quizzes will count for 30 per cent of your final grade. You will also write a 5-6 page mid-term paper, which will count 30 per cent, and a 5-6 page final paper, which will count 40 per cent.
Reading schedule:
Samuel Richardson, Pamela (April 1, 3, 8, 10)
Thomas Gray, “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard” (April 15)
William Blake, "London," "The Tyger," "The Chapel of Love," "The Chimney Sweeper" (April 17, 22)
William Wordsworth, Preface to Lyrical Ballads, Lucy poems, "Tintern Abbey"
Weeks 6-7, Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
May 6: Vol. 1, Chs. 1-16
May 8: Vol. 1, Chs. 17-23, Vol. 2, Chs. 1-9
May 13: Vol. 2, Chs. 10-19, Vol. 3, Chs. 1-6
May 15: Vol. 3, Chs. 7-19
Weeks 8-10, Thomas Hardy, Jude the Obscure
May 20: through Part II, chapter 2
May 22: through Part III, ch. 6
May 27: through the end of Part IV
May 29: through Part VI, ch. 3
April 1: to the end of the book
April 3: Hopefully, no class