Engl
2110 American Lit 1, O'Donnell, ETSU, Spring 2022
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last
update: April 10, 2022
Class meets on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays from 10:25 to
11:20am in Burleson 303.
For the first nine weeks of the semester, the text
is volume B of the Norton Anthology of American Lit, 9th edition.
After that, we'll use volume A.
Wednesday:
"My Kinsman, Major Molineaux" (1831), a short story by Nathaniel
Hawthorne.
Friday January 21:
Class cancelled.
Monday: In volume B of the Norton anthology, read
"The Author's Account of Himself," from The
Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, by Washington Irving (p27-28). Also read
"Rip Van Winkle," by Irving. And read Cooper, excerpt from Chapter
III of Volume II of The Pioneers [The Slaughter of the
Pigeons].
Wednesday: Read
"The Black Cat" by Poe.
Friday: Read
"Ligeia" by Poe.
Reading response due:
Describe Poe's first-person narrators. What do the narrators of "The Black
Cat" and "Ligeia" have in common with the narrator of the poem
"Annabel Lee"?
Monday: Read
Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life...[1845]; the headnotes,
preface and chapters 1-9 (p1159-1197).
Wednesday: Read
Douglass chapters 10-11 (p1197-1224), and the appendix (p1224-1228).
Friday: Read
"Hearing Frederick Douglass: His Speech on John Brown." By Neely
Tucker. Library of Congress Blog, June 15, 2020. https://blogs.loc.gov/loc/2020/06/hearing-frederick-douglass-his-speech-on-john-brown/
Friday's class
meeting is on zoom: 491 423 6356.
Monday: Read
headnotes for Harriet Beecher Stowe (p792-794), and read these 4 chapters from
Stowe's 1852 novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin: Chapters I, III, VII, and IX
(p794-826).
Also read
"Did a book start the Civil War? 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' is a testament to the
power of culture." By David Reynolds. New York Daily News,
Monday, April 11, 2011. www.nydailynews.com/opinion/book-start-civil-war-uncle-tom-cabin-testament-power-culture-article-1.112605
Wednesday: Read
Stowe's Chapters XII, XIII, and XIV (p826-852).
Friday: Read, from
Volume II of Stowe's novel, Chapters XXXIV and XL (p879-892).
Reading response due:
Compare Douglass's nonfiction account of American slavery in the decades before
the Civil War with H. B. Stowe's fictional account of the same general subject
matter. How are these accounts similar? How are they different? How is the point
of view different?
Monday: Read
"The American Scholar" (p210-223) by Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Wednesday: Read
"Brahma" (p306) by Emerson, and "The Portent" (p1569) by
Melville.
Friday: Read
"Fourth of July" (p762-764) by Margaret Fuller.
Monday: Read
chapter 2, "Where I Lived and What I Lived For" (p1012-10-22) in Walden;
or, Life in the Woods by Henry David Thoreau.
Wednesday: Read,
from Thoreau's Walden, at least one chapter of your choosing, from
chapters 3 to 17. (Those chapters appear in the anthology in pages 1022 to
1144.) Be prepared to present the chapter you choose, in class. Be prepared to
discuss why you chose that chapter, explain what the chapter is about, and
select a good passage from the chapter, that you will read aloud in class.
Friday:
Reading response due:
Gloss the chapter of Walden that you chose to read. That is, summarize the scene and the action,
give a good quote or two from the chapter, and comment on what you got out of
it.
Monday: Read the
first 6 chapters of N. Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter.
That's pages 451 to 480 in the 9th edition of the Norton Anthology.
Note that I do not
require you to read the long "Custom House" introduction to the
novel, though it's pretty fascinating and I encourage you to read it, if you
have the time.
Wednesday: Read
chapters 7 thru 15 (p480-525) in The Scarlet Letter.
Friday March 4:
Class cancelled.
Monday: Read
chapters 16 thru 24 (p525-569) in The Scarlet Letter.
Wednesday:
In-class review for exam 1.
Friday: Exam 1.
Spring Break --
March 14-18
Monday:
In volume A of the Norton anthology, read the following by Anne Bradstreet --
"To the Memory..." p224; "To Her Father..." p226;
"Before the Birth..." p236; "To My Dear..."
p237. Also read the 6 poems, and the letter which appear on pages
241-249.
Wednesday:
Read the following poems by Phillis Wheatley -- "On Being
Brought..." p789; "To the Right Honourable William..." p789;
"To His Excellency General Washington" p796.
Friday: Read from the Autobiography of Thomas
Jefferson, p704-710 (wherein he discusses the drafting of the
Declaration). Read excerpts from "Notes on the State of
Virginia," p711-721.
Monday: Read "President Tom’s Cabin:
Jefferson, Hemings, and a disclaimed lineage," by Jill Lepore, The
New Yorker, September 22, 2008: www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/02/22/president-toms-cabin (click
here for a
cached version).
Also
read "The Monster of Monticello" [on Jefferson's views of race].
By Paul Finkelman. New York Times, November 30, 2012. www.nytimes.com/2012/12/01/opinion/the-real-thomas-jefferson.html
Reading response due: What do you
think of Lepore's and/ or Finkelman's take on Thomas Jefferson?
Wednesday:
Read Ben Franklin, excerpts from Part Two of his autobiography, pages 514-530
in volume A of the Norton Anthology. Als read Franklin's "The Way to
Wealth."
Friday
April 1: Class cancelled.
Monday: Read "The Creed: What Poor Richard cost
Benjamin Franklin," by Jill Lepore, The New Yorker, Jan
28, 2008: www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/01/28/the-creed (click
here for a
cached version).
Wednesday: Read Thomas Paine, "The Crisis, No.
1," p689-695; and Chapter 1 from "The Age of Reason,"
p695-697.
Friday: Read Crevecoeur, from Letters from an
American Farmer, excerpts from "Letter III: What is an
American?" p636-645.
Monday: Read Lincoln's Gettysburg address and 2nd
inaugural address, in volume B of the Norton anthology.
Wednesday: Class cancelled. At home, read "When Lilacs Last in the
Dooryard Bloom'd" by Whitman, pages 1382-1388 in volume B of the Norton
anthology.
Friday
April 15: Good Friday holiday.
Monday:
Read these poems by Walt Whitman: "Whoever You Are Holding Me Now in
Hand" p1362-1363; "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry" p1364-1368; the
first 7 numbered sections of "Song of Myself."
On
Monday, class will meet at the University Woods Gazebo, which is at the top of parking
lot #13 (see this map
of campus).
Directions:
1. Immediately south of the Sherrod
library and Governors Hall is the intersection of J. L. Seehorn, Jr. Rd. and
Southwest Ave.
2. From that intersection, walk south,
beneath the concrete railroad bypass.
3. On the other side of the bypass is the
entrance to lot #13. At the top of that lot, at the edge of University Woods,
is the University Woods Gazebo.
Wednesday:
Read all the poems by Emily Dickinson on pages 1658-1673 of volume B of the
Norton anthology.
Friday:
Skim the Dickinson poems on p1674-1692 of volume B of the Norton anthology.
Pick 3 poems to read out loud, on your own time. Then come to class prepared to
present and discuss the 3 poems that you have selected.
Reading response due: Write a
couple of paragraphs about one of the Dickinson poems that you chose to read
for today. Consider: Why did you choose to read the poem? What is the poem
about? What effect does the poem have on you? What do you think were
Dickinson's intentions, in writing the poem?
Monday: More Whitman and Dickinson.
Wednesday:
Review for exam 2.
Friday
April 29: Class cancelled.
Final exam (exam 2): Weds May 4, 8-10am.