Research Paper and Research Paper Prosepectus

RESEARCH PAPER PROSPECTUS
Due: Wednesday, November 6 [Email. Follow guidelines on syllabus.]
Length: 2-3 pages

The Research Paper Prospectus should describe the topic of your paper and give a tentative title. State clearly what the aims and scope of the paper are. That is, what question or questions are you trying to answer, and how are you going about the business of answering them (i.e. what materials--literary, historical, theoretical/philosophical--are you consulting?)? You should also say something about why the question or questions you are trying to answer are of consequence. Why are they important? What will such an undertaking show us? Doing all this will, of course, require familiarity with relevant historical, literary, and/or theoretical contexts, so like the Editing Project Prospects, this prospectus will require a significant first wave of research. If you have a sense of what your argument will be, include that information, too.


RESEARCH PAPER
Due: Friday, December 6 [Email. Follow guidelines on syllabus.]
Length: 15-20 pages

The major assignment of the course, the Research Paper should tackle a significant question and demonstrate: 
(1) that you have read relevant primary literary texts very closely.
(2) that you know how to advance a compelling argument and support it with evidence.
(3) that you know how to position that argument in relation to the ideas of other critics.
(4) that you know how to analyze literary texts in a way that is responsive to cultural and historical context. 
Also,
(5) your research paper is also expected to be free from problems of grammar and spelling and errors of fact.

I don't offer ready-made topics or prompts. At graduate-level it's crucial that you learn how to develop your own research topics--topics that are significant but still manageable. This is an important intellectual and critical skill, and it takes practice. It's also true, though, that scholarship often benefits from collaboration and discussion, so if you want help developing a paper topic, or if you just want to kick ideas around, please come talk to me. I'm more than happy to offer guidance.

English Poetry, Jonson to Marvell

Hi, everyone! We have a lot on our plates tomorrow Marvell-wise: the Mower poems, and perhaps a return to "Upon Appleton House." But tomorrow is also the last day of our 9-week overview of 17th-century poetry, so take a moment to skim back over your notes, revisit some older poems, and develop some general ideas about this body of writing.

Are there any central conflicts, struggles, or preoccupations that seem to hold this diverse group of poems together as a coherent group?

What are the primary conversations taking place in seventeenth century poetry? 

If you were to tell a little two-minute story about 17th-century English poetry (if, say, someone were to put you on the spot and force you to [ahem]), what would it sound like?

We should leave some time to talk about this stuff.

Interregnum, 1649-1660

Poems of Mr. John Milton (1645)

 

Text on EEBO here.

The English Poems of Richard Crashaw, ed. Richard Rambuss

https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/the-english-poems-of-richard-crashaw

George Herbert, The Temple (1633)

Text on EEBO here.

Charles I and the Duke of York, Peter Lely (1647)

Sir John Suckling and Richard Lovelace

Sir John Suckling, by Anthony Van Dyck (1637-38)

Richard Lovelace, attributed to William Dobson (1645)