[Milton-L] Renaissance course tips

[Peter C. Herman]

Dear Prof. Durocher,

In my experience, I've had good success with the Longman anthology of 
English literature, as it contains nearly all the texts that I want 
to cover in my early modern survey courses, e.g., , More's Utopia, 
poetry by Wyatt and Surrey, Book 1 of the FQ, some Shakespeare, 
Sidney's Apology, excerpts from AS, Dekker and Middleton's The 
Roaring Girl, John Donne, and much much more. The added advantages to 
this volume are the notes and introductions by Constance Jordan, 
which are brand new, and the inclusion of historical materials (since 
I do a lot of contextualizing in my classes). As for Milton, I have 
to admit that I leave him out of the survey, since everything in 
Milton is so connected to everything else, I find excerpting Comus or 
Lycidas just doesn't work. And I will not, EVER, teach excerpts of 
PL. Just won't do it. As for newer voices, I tend to include women 
authors, such Lanyer and Carey.

I hope this helps, and I look forward to hearing the other sage 
suggestions from others on this list,

Peter C. herman



At 08:12 AM 3/4/2008, you wrote:
>Dear colleagues,
>
>    This coming term I will teach a sophomore-level course on 
> English Renaissance Literature.  I have done so before, and have 
> taught broader courses (Literatures in English, beginnings to 1650 
> is our staple course for majors, and it includes colonial 
> literature and the New World) for 20 years.  So I'm no upstart 
> here.  But as I approach this course, eager to make it shine, I 
> wonder if list members have particular suggestions in the following areas:
>1.  Texts (Anthologies; or has anyone had success using a group of 
>individual author texts?  If so, which?)
>2.  Milton  (Have folks simply left out the big guy, or tried to fit 
>in some selections?  If so, which?)
>3.  Newer voices (In my course on "Radical Voices" I teach writers 
>such as Elenore Davies and James Nayler, but these seem less 
>important in the long haul from, at least, Wyatt to Milton, Bacon to Behn).
>
>    You can reply to me individually at durocher at stolaf.edu if you 
> prefer.  Many thanks to all for suggestions.
>
>    Rich DuRocher
>    St. Olaf College
>
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