[Milton-L] Renaissance course tips

Tue Mar 4 12:09:01 EST 2008

Hmm.  I entirely sympathize with Peter Herman's feelings about excerpting Paradise Lost, in fact I hate excerpting anything (though FQ and Gulliver's Travels and such work because in distinct books/chapters).  At the same time, leaving Milton out entirely seems worse.  Especially with surveys (and I'm not sure if this is true of the one Prof. Durocher has in mind), we need to remember that the students may only take one such course (i.e., one Renaissance, one Brit Lit, or even one lit!).  Don't we want to give them SOME taste of Milton?  And assuming that students take the surveys in some logical fashion within the major (HA!), i.e., chronologically, before specializing further -- how can they really understand later writers without Milton?  The list of Milton-influenced writers is huge: Cowper, Blake, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats, both Shelleys, Melville, and on and on to Phillip Pullman and Charles Frazier.

This said, I confess in recent Brit Lit surveys I've taught, I reluctantly dropped FQ Bk. 1, because (a) at OSU we have only 10 weeks from Beowulf to Swift, and (b) the students almost always (with a few bright exceptions) dislike it.  Milton, on the other hand, they usually enjoy.  That's not to say one should always cater to student tastes, but it is (sadly) a practical consideration.

If you are looking to excerpt PL, I'd recommend (it was recommended to me) the excerpted PL that Barbara Lewalski did for the Norton Anthology a few editions ago (it's now complete).

Hannibal

Hannibal Hamlin
Associate Professor of English
The Ohio State University
Book Review Editor and Associate Editor, Reformation

Mailing Address (2007-2009):

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----- Original Message -----
From: "Peter C. Herman" <herman2 at mail.sdsu.edu>
Date: Tuesday, March 4, 2008 11:36 am
Subject: Re: [Milton-L] Renaissance course tips

> 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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> >Milton-L at lists.richmond.edu
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