The Early Romantic Period: 1789 to 1816

--A Class held Fall 1996 at Miami University

--Click here if you wish to see a class held Fall 1997, English 441B.

Welcome to the English 441A Home Page. Items will be added to it throughout the semester.

You can access the course syllabus by clicking here.

Go Directly to Student Projects to see some beautiful web pages!

Click here to see students' comments on making these projects.

Remember to check the Romantic Chronology to see what was going on during the time that the selections you are reading for class were composed and/or published. There are a series of specific Date Assignments using the chronology which you can see by clicking on their titles:

1. Date Assignment #1; Due September 26
2. Date Assignment #2; Due October 3
3. Date Assignment #3; Due October 24
4. Date Assignment #4; Due November 7
5. Date Assignment #5; Due November 21

You can access the handouts for this class by clicking on their titles in the following list:

Class Handouts

• New Ideas about Government
• Stereotypical Views of Women
• Sensibility
• Close Reading: Wordsworth
• The Prelude: History of Composition
• Romanticism On Line: a List of URLs
• Major Moments in Romantic Criticism
• List of Texts on Reserve
• List of Specific Items on Reserve to be Read For Class, with full publication details

New Course Materials added after 27 August:

• The Gender Divide
• Participate in a Message Forum with Students at the University of Texas at Austin on some of the Romantic Women Poets you have learned about
• Instructions for the Annotated Bibliography
• Making Web Pages
• Final Web Page Project
• Class Phone and Email List

Listserv Assignments:

More info., a fuller description of the question, and helpful suggestions for thinking about it will be added a week before each assignment is due: click on the Assignment title a week before the due date to get a fuller description of each assignment.

1. Listserv Assignment #1, Due 19 September: What one or two ideas about government given in the readings for 19 Sept. impressed you as interesting or valuable, and why?
2. Listserv Assignment #2, Due 26 September: List three of the ways, according to Mary Wollstonecraft, that women differ from men, telling us her explanation as to why they differ. Do you agree or disagree?
3. Listserv Assignment #3, Due 3 October: Describe the effects that sentimental descriptions of the plight of slaves have on readers: how do they affect you? does this kind of art promote action or inaction? Why?
4. Listserv Assignment #4, Due 17 October: What is Charlotte Smith's relation to those people who have emigrated from France, losing everything, or indeed what is her relation to any people who are dispossessed or downtrodden?
5. Listserv Assignment #5, Due 24 October: ASSIGNMENT CANCELLED
6. Listserv Assignment #6, Due 31 October: List two or three of the claims that Joanna Baillie makes about what good art looks like or how it works. Do you agree?
7. Listserv Assignment #7, Due 7 November: According to Wordsworth's The Prelude, how does imagination work? How are imaginative writers connected to political events? Do you agree with Wordsworth?
8. Listserv Assignment #8, Due 12 November: Pick out one or two of the poems you read for today's class: what do you like about it? dislike? find interesting?
9. Listserv Assignment #9, Due 21 November: ASSIGNMENT CANCELLED
10. Listserv Assignment #10, Due 5 December: In Mansfield Park, does Fanny have a home? Why or why not?

Web Assignments:

Again, to see the assignment described in greater detail, click on the assignment title; more info. will be added closer to the time that the assignment is due.

1. Web Assignment #1, Due 10 September (Group 1) / 17 September (Group 2): Using the list of URLs (Web addresses) in the handout called Romanticism On Line, perform three tasks: 1. Find out what texts by romantic writers were published the year the French Revolution began (1789); list them. 2. Find on line three texts written by romantic writers and print out a few pages of them. 3. Type "romantic" into a Web search engine: what kinds of online sites did you come up with? List a few and describe them.
2. Web Assignment #2, Due 10 October: Go to The New Child Exhibit On Line; pick out and describe the picture in the exhibit you find most interesting. What are children like, in the painter's view? Do you agree?

Click here to see how students completed assignment #2.

Go to Student Projects;

Click here to see students' comments on making these projects.

Questions or Comments? Send email to Laura Mandell by clicking on her name in this sentence.

Go to Laura Mandell's Home Page