Poetry: 1600-2000

3 Credits · Level: Undergraduate

This course will examine poetry by a range of writers between 1600 and 2000, including Shakespeare, Dryden, Pope, Browning, Tennyson, Yeats, Eliot, Marianne Moore, Elizabeth Bishop, and Wallace Stevens. The emphasis throughout will be on close analysis of text, and group discussion in which all students are expected to participate. The aim will be to enable students to analyze verse with a full understanding not just of its meaning but of the formal elements of prosody. A principal course text will be Philip Hobsbaum’s Meter, Rhythm and Verse Form (Routledge), which students are expected to read and memorize. Students should be prepared to write regular short essays on aspects of poetry. Each essay will contribute to your overall assessment, as will your attendance record and performance in class. Students are expected also to attend one-to-one tutorials with Professor Wu in order to discuss their work. There will be occasional tests. These activities will contribute to each student’s final grade.