Introduction to Literature:

Analyzing and Comparison

Not a Conclusion 2006/1/12

This course

selects interesting English poems, short stories (and a novel next semester) and plays for us to read and

-- appreciate how literary texts convey their meanings to us through both form and content; 

-- understand different literary genres, their conventions and components, (e.g. romance, gothic)

-- analyze different parts of a text and how they are connected to its overall meaning; and, most importantly,

-- relate the knowledge and experience we have in reading English literature to our understanding of ourselves and our society. You need to be analytical, imaginative and self-reflexive!

Reading Process:

(1) Understanding (with your own ‘horizon’ 地平線 ) Appreciation

(2) Interpretation and Analysis

(3) Your Self-Understanding and horizon broadened.

Let’s use a metaphor! A patient spider

From Personal Appreciation to Careful Connections

And you O my soul where you stand, Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space, Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the

spheres to connect them, Till the bridge you will need be form'd, till the ductile anchor

hold, Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my

soul.

(1) Understanding (broadening

your ‘horizon’ of expectation) [Learning Activities] (1) Reading & Annotation; Summarizing &

Paraphrasing --attentive to details, taking notes –reading comprehension

Relating Form to Content –sensitivity to language

Answering study questions & Quiz in class –active thinking

Group Discussion –self-expression & understanding multiple viewpoints

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(1) Understanding (broadening

your ‘horizon’ of expectation) [Learning Activities] (2)

Creative Adaptation (play performance & using a metaphor to compare yourself) – “concrete” understanding, self-understanding & creativity

Comparison –broader understanding of issues & themes

Essay Writing –organizational skills Mid-Terms & Final Exam – summative test

(more later)

(2) Analysis: Collecting Details Patterns within a Text Pattern (repetition, similarities and

differences; sound and sense): How, when the aged are reverently, passionately

waiting For the miraculous birth, there always must be Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating On a pond at the edge of the wood;

Sacredness vs. everyday life; Regularity + irregularity

(2) Analysis: Collecting Details

Patterns in Text Those in Life Pattern (repetition, similarities and differences; sound and sense irony and ambiguity):

Since then-- 'tis Centuries--and yet each

Feels shorter than the day

I first surmised the Horses' Heads

Were toward Eternity- (“spondaic since then” and “-- + Century+ --”

iambic “feels shorter than the day”?

Eternity different from Immortality?

contrast ambiguity and irony in historical context)

Optimism???

(2) Analysis: Collecting Details

Patterns and Complexities in Pygmalion (1)

In sentences (long and short) -- epigrams: "The great secret, Eliza, is not having bad

manners or good manners or any other particular sort of manners, but having the same manner for all human souls: in short, behaving as if you were in Heaven, where there are no third-class carriages, and one soul is as good as another."

Dialectical thinking – 1) possible only in heaven; Higgins idealistic; 2) in reality – not considerate; not possible even for

himself 3) flawed idealism

Mid-Term

(2) Analysis: Collecting Details

Patterns and Complexities in Pygmalion (1) Patterns in plot: e.g. Two major encounters

in Act 1 (two minor ones); two visitors to Mr. Higgins in Act 2; two parties in Act 3; E’s confrontation with two men in Act 4; the results of two transformations in Act 5.

Parallel Thematic development (transformation) //social superficiality in language—small talk and rhetoric—and in morality)

Mid-Term

Larger Patterns: Comparison: Some Examples

1. How do we make comparison?

2. Finding out similarities and differences

3. * Be careful in your explanatione.g. “A Rose for Emily” and Pygmalion – both reveals

the importance of marriage for women, but their backgrounds (American south & Victorian society) are quite different.

e.g. “Those Winter Sundays” “My Mother and the Bed” -- different social contexts –

We all ignore our parents’ efforts? Journal

Larger Patterns: Comparison: Some Examples

4. For those which can be compared, make Sense of them by

1) Showing your awareness of the basic or inevitable differences (e.g. between a poem and a story);

2) Selecting the important differences, analyzing them both in terms of form and content

3) explaining why (e.g. in terms of historical and social background, the authors’ views, some general issues, etc.)

4) Expressing your opinions—optional

Some Possible Connections –general issues1. Gender Relations

and Marriage

2. Family Relations

Eliza and Higgins (P)

Doolittle and Eliza

“Araby”

“Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers” “Hour”

“Those Winter Sundays”

3. Life: ideal (the tragic) vs. the ordinary

Higgins –classless society

“Musée”

“Days”

4. Knowledge, Science vs. the Human

Higgins (P) “Astronomer” uses charts

5. “Social Changes” and Attitudes towards them

Language (accent & slang), Class Mobility –(P)

“Metro” “Terrorist”

“Rose for Emily”

(P) = Pygmalion

Social Factors

Some Possible Connections (2) Love and “Romance” – How are they different

in different societies and times? e.g. “A&P,” “A Rose for Emily,” “The Story of an Hour” and

“Araby” Pygmalion – different endings suggest different views of

“romance” and “self-made woman” More later …

Essay Writing: Main Argument and Structure poet uses different method to express

themselves including ironic tone, rhyme and repetition. And natural element is frequently used as a symbol of other issues. (Name them!)

Essay Writing: Main Argument and Structure --rev. [main argument] Both poems show a

contrast between art and nature—art’s patterns and nature’s liveliness. If both poems find art productive of meanings, nature in “Musée des Beaux Arts” is part of the human world, while in “Anecdote of the Jar,” it is wildness domesticated but not incorporated into human world.

Journal Writing: General Comments Give your main argument in the introduction;

one paragraph one main idea (topic sentence).

[punctuation]: quotation marks for poem (“We Real Cool”), italics for book and play titles

(evidence) (where) meaning I need your evidence to be convinced

Stay close to your texts.

Journal Writing: Close Analysis In the third line ‘’with cracked hands that

ached’’ we know that his father really loved them.

Rev. The father’s love is expressed quietly through his making fire and polishing shoes “with cracked hands that achedfrom labor in the weekday weather.”

Journal Writing: Logic

[“We Real Cool”] Since they are not interested in going to school, the teenage boys “strike straight.” This suggests that they are vigorous, but repulsive(why?). Thus, all the clues that I’ve mentioned show that they have a weak sense of identity.

Rev. The teenage boys “left school” possibly because they are not interested in studying. Out of school, they are active in drinking (“[thinning] gins”), talking nonsense (“[jazzing] June”) and in using their brutal force ( “[striking] straight”). All of this suggests that they are vigorous, but not productive—either socially or for themselves. No wonder they have a weak sense of identity.

Main Argument and Structure --rev. (2) Art’s pattern –

in “Musée des Beaux Art” – three paintings and the old maters’ interpretations, (Here you

should still explain the main point of the poem.) repetition of “how” occasional rhymes

in ” Anecdote of the Jar” the jar, its roundness, and the human hand of “I” (Here you

should still explain the main point of the poem.) occasional end rhymes internal rhymes of round and surround

Nature’s role -- in “Musée des Beaux Art” –

part of the human world and an ironic contrast to it: sun, dog and horse

in ” Anecdote of the Jar” surrounding human artifact Simply different: life-producing less anthropocentric view

Final Exam: A Summative Exam • Altogether you should answer 6 questions.

Close Analysis-- Choose 3 (from the Quiz questions 30 %)

-- 3 sentence interpretation of the meaning and significance of the poetic lines.

Short Essay Questions – 2 (30%)

Final Exam • Altogether you should answer 6 questions. Long Essay Question: (40%) All the texts we have read deal with the relations between an

individual and his/her society/community in one way or another. Pick up 2 texts (one of them has to be a poem) and compare them.

1. Define the types of social community the individual characters/speakers have to deal with. How are they positioned in it? (By conforming to it, rebelling against it, being detached from it and/or seeking companion in it?)

2. What do we know about the characters/speakers (their identities) through the ways they handle their social positions and/or their social relations?

3. What can possibly be the texts’ main message(s) about “society” or our social identity?

Self-Reflexivity

What do these texts tell YOU about the following issues? Family Relations & Class Our Positions in the Modern world Science vs. the Human (or Nature vs. Culture) Changes and Attitudes Towards Change Love Individual in Society, Etc, etc.