Dr.

Donna Berliner
LIT 3319.021: British Romanticism
Summer (12-week) 2005
Monday, 9:00 a.m. – 1:00 p.m.
Classroom: GR4.204
Office: JO5.109 Phone: 972-883-6287

DESCRIPTION OF COURSE:

Few periods of literary history are more exciting than the Romantic era, with its
reverence for nature, its fascination with things medieval and Gothic,with the oriental and the
exotic; with the long-ago and the far away; its elevation of the dignity of the individual, its ideals
of liberty and equality -- and its despair following the Reign of Terror. It is the beginning of the
modern in many ways, not the least of which is the pervasive fascination with the human mind,
manifesting in theories of the creative imagination. In the Romantic era, the human psyche begins
to examine its own workings, its inter-relationship with the immediate world, and its quest to
reach the infinite and the eternal.
Readings from this great age of lyrical poetry will include writings of Robert Burns;
William Blake; William Wordsworth; Samuel Taylor Coleridge; George Noel Gordon, Lord
Byron; Percy Bysshe Shelley; and John Keats, as well as “minor” poets such as Tom Moore,
Joanna Baillie, Felicia Hemans, and Letitia Landon. We shall discuss the Romantic concept of
the poet, of poetry, and of the nature of the creative imagination as well as read prose essays of
contemporary political currency.
With regard to fiction, we shall read an example of the Gothic, The Romance of the
Forest by Ann Radcliffe, the preeminent “Mistress of the Gothic”; an example of the new genre
of the historical novel made famous by Sir Walter Scott, The Bride of Lammermoor, which
combines the contemporary interest in the historical past with the no less contemporary taste for
the supernatural; and Jane Austen’s Persuasion, which transforms the eighteenth-century novel
of sensibility and the novel of social satire into a brilliant love story.

REQUIRED TEXTS:

Ann Radcliffe, The Romance of the Forest.

Sir Walter Scott, The Bride of Lammermoor.
Jane Austen, Persuasion.
The Norton Anthology of English Literature: The Romantic Era.
William Richey and Daniel Robinson, eds., William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor
Coleridge, Lyrical Ballads and Related Writings, New Riverside Edition.

COURSE REQUIREMENTS:
Three major assignments of two tests and one paper will weigh equally.

TESTS will be part short-answer and part essay..

PAPERS:
Length: approximately 2000 words, excluding directly quoted material.
Topic: of student’s choice (providing a prospectus is handed in on the date due), but must
pertain directly to course content and must be cleared in advance. Further instructions will be
given in class.
Voice: third-person objective.
Manuscript form: Modern Language Association (MLA)

ATTENDANCE: Required. Class begins at 9:00 a.m.--please be on time.

COURSE CALENDAR:

Following is a detailed calendar of readings arranged chronologically. It is likely that we will not
be able to cover all material in class, and it is likely that we will not discuss every poem in detail.
The following is subject to change at the discretion of the instructor.

May 16:

Introduction to course.

1760
Anon., version from Percy’s Reliques, “Barbara Allen’s Cruelty,” LB 246-248.

1773
Anna Letitia Barbauld, “A Summer Evening’s Meditation,” 24-27.
William Blake, from Poetical Sketches.
“To Spring,” 39.
“To Autumn,” 40.
“To the Evening Star,” 40.

1784
Charlotte Smith, from Elegiac Sonnets.
“Sonnet 1,” LB 143.
“Written at the Close of Spring,” 33 (LB 144).
“Sonnet IV, To the Moon,” LB 144-145.
“To Sleep,” 33.
“To Night,” 33-34. (1788?)

1786
Robert Burns, from Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect
“To a Louse,” 106-107.
 “To a Mouse,” 105-106.

1787
Robert Burns, “Green Grow the Rashes O,” 101
Robert Burns, “Holy Willie’s Prayer,” 102-105.

1788
William Blake, “All Religions are One,” “There is No Natural Religion (a),” and “There is
No Natural Religion (b), 41.

1789.
Charlotte Smith, “Written in the Church-Yard at Middleton in Sussex,” 34. (LB, 152-153).
Richard Price, from A Discourse on the Love of Our Country, 118-121.
Robert Burns, “Holy Willie’s Prayer,” 102-105.
William Blake, from Songs of Innocence.
“Introduction,” 43.
“The Lamb,” 45.
“The Little Black Boy,” 45-46.
“The Chimney Sweeper,” 46-47.
“The Divine Image,” 47.
“Holy Thursday,” 47-48.
“Nurse’s Song,” 48.
“Infant Joy,” 49.

1790
Joanna Baillie, “The Storm-Beat Maid,” LB 248-253.
Edmund Burke, from Reflections on the Revolution in France, 121-128.
Mary Wollstonecraft, from A Vindication of the Rights of Men, 128-133.

1790-93
William Blake, “The Marriage of Heaven and Hell,” 72-82.

May 23:

Editors’ essays in LB:

“The Ballad Revival,” 236-242.
“Nature,” 320-324.
“Rustic and Humanitarian Poetry,” 272-275.
“Literary and Philosophical Backgrounds,” 119-125.
“Political Backgrounds,” 167-176.
***Note also that I have chosen the Norton Anthology because of the usefulness of its
background information: the introduction to the era and the introductions to the authors. Make
use of this source.
Selections from LB, “Literary and Philosophical Backgrounds,” LB:
David Hartley, from Observations on Man, LB 129-132.
Adam Smith, from Theory of Moral Sentiments, LB 132-136.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau, from A Discourse upon the Origin of Inequality, LB 137-139.
---. from Emilius and Sophia (Emile), LB 140-143.
Joseph Warton, “Ode I. To Fancy.” LB 125-128.

1791
Ann Radcliffe, Romance of the Forest, due: through Ch. VI, paragraph 3.
Thomas Paine, from Rights of Man, 133-137.
NAEL Eds., “Apocalyptic Expectations by Preachers and Poets,” 137-138
William Blake, from The French Revolution: A Poem in Seven Books, 144-146.
Robert Burns, “Tam O’Shanter,” 109-114.

1792
William Blake, “A Song of Liberty” (added as a coda to The Marriage of Heaven and Hell,” 82-84.
Mary Wollstonecraft, from A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, 166-192.
Robert Burns, “Afton Water,” 108-109.
Anna Letitia Barbauld, “The Rights of Woman” (pub. 1825), 28-29.

1793
William Blake, from America: A Prophecy, 146-147.
William Wordsworth, from Descriptive Sketches, 150-151

1794
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, from Religious Musings, 153-156.
Joseph Priestly, from The Present State of Europe Compared with Antient Prophecies, 142-144.
William Blake, from Songs of Experience.
“Introduction,” 49-50, and “Earth’s Answer,” 50.
“Holy Thursday,” 51.
“The Chimney Sweeper,” 52.
“Nurse’s Song,” 52.
“The Tyger,” 54.
“The Garden of Love,” 56.
“London,” 56-57.
“The Human Abstract,” 57.
“Infant Sorrow,” 57-58.
“To Tirzah,” 58-59.

May 30: Memorial Day holiday. No class.

June 6
Ann Radcliffe, Romance of the Forest

1795
Eds. “Apocalypse by Imagination,” 161-162.
Robert Burns, “Song: For a’ that and a’ that,” 116.
Mary Robinson, “January, 1795” (pub. 1806), 93-94.
“London’s Summer Morning,” 92-93
Hannah More, “Patient Joe,” LB 297-299.

1796
Robert Burns, “Auld Lang Syne,” 108.
Robert Burns, “A Red, Red Rose,” 115.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “The Eolian Harp,” 419-420.

1797
Robet Southey, “The Widow,” LB 304-305.
Anna Letitia Barbauld, “Washing Day,” 29-31.
Charlotte Smith, “On Being Cautioned against Walking on an Headland Overlooking the
Sea, Because It Was Frequented by a Lunatic,” 34-35.
“The Sea View,” 35.

1798
Joanna Baillie, from A Series of Plays, “The Introductory Discourse,” LB 159-166.
William Wordsworth, “Advertisement” to the first edition of Lyrical Ballads, LB 21-22.
William Wordsworth, from Lyrical Ballads.
“The Thorn,” LB 73-81.
“The Lat of the Flock,” LB 81-84.
“Simon Lee: The Old Huntsman,” 222-224.
“We Are Seven,” 224-226.
“Lines Written in Early Spring,” 226.
“Expostulation and Reply,” 227.
“The Tables Turned,” 228.
“Lines, Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey, on Revisiting the Banks of
the Wye during a Tour, July 13, 1798,” 235-238.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere,” LB 23-43. “The Rime of the
Ancient Mariner,” 1800 edition, is in NAEL, 422-438.
“Christabel,” 441-458.

1799
Robert Southey, “The Sailor Who Had Serve in the Slave Trade,” LB 368-372.
1800
William Wordsworth,
“Michael,” 270-280.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “This Lime-Tree Bower My Prison,” 420-422.
Mary Robinson, “The Poor Singing Dame,” 94-96.
Mary Robinson, “The Haunted Beach,” 96-97.
Robert Southey, “The Mad Woman,” LB 372-374.

1801
Mary Robinson, “To the Poet Coleridge,” 98-99.

1802
William Wordsworth, “Preface to Lyrical Ballads,” (expanded ed. of 1802), LB 390-411.
amd “Appendix [Poetic Diction], LB 412-416.

June 13

1802
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “Dejection: An Ode,” 459-462.
Mary Robinson, “The Camp.” www.rc.umd.edu/editions/warpoetry/intro.html

1804
William Blake, “And did those feet, (from Milton), ” 85-86.

1807
William Wordsworth, “Resolution and Independence,” 280-284.
“I Wandered lonely as a cloud,” 284-285.
“My heart leaps up,” 285.
“Ode: Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood,” 287-292.
“Composed upon Westminster Bridge, September 3, 1802,” 296.
“It is a beauteous evening,” 297.
“London, 1802,” 297.
“The world is too much with us,” 297-98.
The Prelude. 303 ff. TBA.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “To William Wordsworth, Composed on the Night after His
Recitation of a Poem on the Growth of an Individual Mind” (comp. 1807, p. 1817),
464-466.

1808
Sir Walter Scott, “Lochinvar,” 413-414.
Thomas Moore, “Believe me, if all those endearing young charms,” 527.
1812
George Noel Gordon, Lord Byron, “Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage,” (Cantos 1 and 2 pub.),
from Canto 1, 564-565.

1815
George Noel Gordon, Lord Byron, “She walks in beauty,” 556-557.
“When we two parted,” 557.
Letter to Leigh Hunt [Wordsworth and Pope], 689-691.

1816
Sir Walter Scott, “Jock of Hazeldean,” 415.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “Kubla Khan,” 439-441.
“The Pains of Sleep,” 462-463.
from The Statesman’s Manual, 489-492.
George Noel Gordon, Lord Byron, “Stanzas for Music,” 1816.
“Darkness,” 559-560.
“Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage,” (Canto 3 pub), from Canto 3, 565-582.
Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Mutability,” 701.
“To Wordsworth,” 701-702.
“Alastor; or, The Spirit of Solitude,” 703-719.
John Keats, “On First Looking into Chapman’s Homer,” 826-827.

1817
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, from Biographia Literaria, 467 ff. TBA.

June 20: Mid-Term Test

June 27: Prospectus due for term paper. If you do not turn in a prospectus before the end
of this class period, you will be assigned a topic.

1817 cont’d.
George Noel Gordon, Lord Byron, Manfred, 588-621.
Letter to Thomas Moore [Childe Harold, a Venetian Adventure], 691-693.
Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Mont Blanc,” 720-723.
“Hymn to Intellectual Beauty,” 723-725.
John Keats, from “Sleep and Poetry,” 827-828.
“On Seeing the Elgin Marbles,” 828-829.
Letter to Benjamin Bailey [The Authenticity of the Imagination], 887-888.
Letter to George and Thomas Keats [Negative Capability], 889-890.

July 4: No Class.
July 11:

1818
Jane Austen, Persuasion
Sir Walter Scott, “Proud Maisie,” 415-16.
George Noel Gordon, Lord Byron, “Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage,” (Canto 4 pub.) from Canto
4, 582-587.
Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Ozymandias,” 725-726.
John Keats,
Letter to John Hamilton Reynolds [Wordsworth’s Poetry], 890-891.
Letter to John Taylor [Keats’s Axioms in Poetry], 891-892.
Letter to John Hamilton Reynolds [Milton, Wordsworth, and the Chambers of
Human Life], 892-894.
Letter to Richard Woodhouse [A Poet Has No Identity], 894-895.

July 18: Papers Due at the beginning of the class period.

1819
George Noel Gordon, Lord Byron, Don Juan, Cantos 1 &2, 622-672. TBA.
Letter to John Cam Hobhouse and Douglas Kinnaird [Don Juan and Indecency], 693-695.
Letter to Douglas Kinnaird [Don Juan: ‘Is it not life?], 695-696.
John Keats, “Ode to a Nightingale,” 849-850.
John Keats, “Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art” (comp. 1819, p. 1838), 845
Letter to George and Georgiana Keats [The Vale of Soul-making], 896-900.
Letter to Fanny Brawne [Fanny Brawne as Keats’s ‘Fair Star’], 900-901.
Sir Walter Scott, The Bride of Lammermoor, to p. 169.
Percy Bysshe Shelley, “To Sidmouth and Castlereagh” (comp. 1819; p. 1832), 728-729.
“A Song: Men of England” (comp. 1819, p. 1839), 727-728.
“England in 1819” (comp. 1819, p. 1839), 728.

July 25:

1820
Sir Walter Scott, The Bride of Lammermoor, pp. 169 to end.
Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Ode to the West Wind,” 730-732.
from Prometheus Unbound, 733-762.
“To a Sky-Lark,” 765-767.
John Keats.
“La Belle Dame sans Merci: A Ballad,” 845-846.
“Ode to Psyche,” 847-848.
“Ode on a Grecian Urn,” 851-853.
“Ode on Melancholy,” 853-854.
 “To Autumn,” 872-873.
Letter to Percy Bysshe Shelley [Load Every Rift with Ore], 901-902.
Letter to Charles Browne [Keats’s Last Letter], 902-903.

August 1: Papers Due.

1821
George Noel Gordon, Lord Byron, Don Juan, Cantos 3-4, 672-689. TBA.
Letter to Percy Bysshe Shelley [Keats and Shelley], 697-698.
Percy Bysshe Shelley, Adonais, 772-786.
“A Defence of Poetry” (comp. 1821, p. 1840), 789-802.
John Keats, “The Fall of Hyperion” (comp. 1819; p. 1857), 873-886.

1822
Joanna Baillie, “Woo’d and married and a’,” 217-218.
Percy Bysshe Shelley, “The Indian Girl’s Song [The Indian Serenade],” 729-730.
Choruses from Hellas, “Worlds on Worlds,” 769-770, and “The world’s great
age,” 771-772.
Felicia Hemans, “England’s Dead,” 813-814.

1823
William Hazlitt, “My First Acquaintance with Poets,” 513-526.

1824
George Noel Gordon, Lord Byron, “January 22nd. Missolonghi,” 562-563.
Percy Bysshe Shelley, “Stanzas Written in Dejection-- December 1818, near Naples,” 726-727.
“To ---------- [Music, when soft voices die], 768.
“When the lamp is shattered,” 786-787.
“The Triumph of Life,” 679-694.
Felicia Hemans, “The Hour of Death,” 697-698.

1825
Anna Letitia Barbauld, “Life,” 31-32.
Letitia Elizabeth Landon (L.E.L.), “The Proud Ladye,” 1035-1040.

1826
Felicia Hemans, “The Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers in New England,” 814-815.
“Casabianca,” 815-816.

1827
Felicia Hemans, “The Homes of England,” 817-818.

1829
Letitia Elizabeth Landon (L.E.L.), “Revenge” 1040-1041.

1830
George Noel Gordon, Lord Byron, “So, we’ll go no more a roving,” 560-561.
“Stanzas Written on the Road between Florence and Pisa,” 561-562.
Felicia Hemans, “A Spirit’s Return,” 818-823.

1835
William Wordsworth, “Extempore Effusion upon the Death of James Hogg,” 299-300.

1850
William Wordsworth, from The Prelude. 303 ff. TBA.

August 8: Final Exam.