Topic outline

  • General

    GENERAL INFO AND COURSE MATERIALS FOR ENGLISH 9H, "PORTRAITS OF THE ARTIST":

    • COURSE DESCRIPTION AND REQUIREMENTS (DOWNLOAD AND READ)
    • BLOG/DISCUSSION LEADERSHIP GUIDELINES AND ADVICE (DOWNLOAD AND READ)
    • BLOG/DISCUSSION SIGN-UP SCHEDULE (will be posted once everyone signs up)
    • FILES AND LINKS GIVING YOU GOOD ADVICE ABOUT WRITING ANALYTICAL PAPERS, SUCH AS WHAT MAKES THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A STRONG AND WEAK THESIS; HOW TO TAKE YOUR USE OF TEXTUAL EVIDENCE (QUOTATIONS) TO THE NEXT LEVEL; HOW AND WHY TO USE A "COUNTER-ARGUMENT" IN A PAPER; ETC.
    • "How 2 Not Write Bad" and other files and links giving you good, clear advice about how to avoid common punctuation errors and other mistakes (things your previous English teachers may not have told you)
    • Swarthmore gives severe penalties for plagiarism (academic dishonesty).  See my note on what plagiarism is and why you nevertheless SHOULDN'T be afraid of collaborating with others and borrowing good ideas from them (but be sure to give credit where credit is due).

    FOR THE COURSE SYLLABUS (CLASS ASSIGNMENTS), SCROLL DOWN BELOW THIS INTRODUCTORY MATERIAL.
    • Blog post and discussion leadership schedule File

      Correct as of Sept. 8, 2015.  Please let me know of any errors or if changes need to be made.

      Deadline for your 2 blog posts:  8pm the night before class (to allow others time to access it before class).  FOR YOUR FIRST POST, PLEASE CONSULT THE BLOG POST AND DISCUSSION LEADERSHIP GUIDELINES posted above.  Questions?  Prof. Schmidt will be happy to talk with you ahead of time

      All students will receive feedback on their blog posts.


    • Prof. Schmidt's contact information, fall 2015 Page

      Office:  LPAC 206

      Office hours, Fall 2016:  TTh 11:15 - noon, and by appointment.

      Phone:  610-328-8156

      Email:  pschmid1


    • English 9H course description and requirements File

      plus other info about the course, including discussion and writing skills all English Literature first-year seminars focus on improving.  DOWNLOAD AND READ THIS DOCUMENT DURING THE FIRST WEEK OF CLASS; YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR KNOWING ITS CONTENTS.

    • Guidelines for 9H blog posts and class discussion leadership File

      Download this and study it before you do your first post and lead your first class discussion.

      As I mention in the guidelines, I'll be happy to advise you beforehand regarding both the post and how to lead discussion--but read these guidelines first.

    • GUIDELINES FOR PAPER #1 File

      DUE Sept. 25 (Friday), uploaded to our English 9H Moodle site using the below.   Use Word .docx or .doc format only please, not pdf etc.  

      4-6pp., double-spaced, on The Arabian Nights OR a Shakespeare sonnet.  Danticat may also be discussed, but the primary focus should be either Arabian Nights or a sonnet.

  • GENERAL RESOURCES FOR YOUR WRITING FOR 9H THIS SEMESTER

    We'll discuss these in class at varied points during the semester; download and save all these files.

    For guidelines that apply to specific paper assignments, see above and also consult the syllabus.

  • Sept. 1 and Sept. 3

    Week 1 9H Moodle readings to print or download and bring to class.

    Sept. 1:  Read Cain and Gaiman essays ahead of time, before our first class.  See the pdfs below.  Have both pdfs available for class, in either digital or print form.

    Sept. 3:  Read Arabian Nights introductory stories (pdf below).  Afterwards, check out Prof. Schmidt's study questions (pdf).  Have both pdfs accessible for class.

    NOTE:   PLEASE BRING A DIGITAL DEVICE (SUCH AS A LAPTOP OR PAD/TABLET OR PHONE) WITH INTERNET ACCESS TO EVERY CLASS.  If you prefer to print some of all of the course materials, of course, you're welcome to do so.  

    I ALSO RECOMMEND CREATING AN ENGLISH 9H FOLDER IN YOUR COMPUTER OR OTHER DEVICE TO STORE ALL YOUR DOWNLOADED COURSE MATERIALS, INCLUDING YOUR PAPERS AND COPIES OF THE PAPERS RETURNED TO YOU WITH MY COMMENTS.  (YOU WILL REVISE ONE PAPER OF YOUR CHOICE AS PART OF THE FINAL EXAM FOR THE COURSE.)


  • Sept. 8 and Sept. 10

    Week 2

    Student discussion leaders for this week should first consult the Guidelines for posting on the blog and leading discussion (see the main Course Materials section above).  ALL BLOG POSTS SHOULD BE POSTED ON THE ENGLISH 9H BLOG BY 8PM THE NIGHT BEFORE CLASS.  BE CONSIDERATE OF YOUR CLASSMATES:  POST ON TIME.

    Remember that on days when students will lead part of the discussion, it's the responsibility of all the other students and the professor to check the 9H Blog sometime between 8pm on the night before a class and 9:30am or so before class.

    The Blog/Discussion sign-up sheet (see Course Materials), when complete, will indicate who will be doing what for each week of the semester.

  • Shakespeare: selected sonnets, Sept. 15 - Sept. 24


    Use the link below to connect to shakespeares-sonnets.com for sonnet texts and annotations.

    Use Prof. Schmidt's guide to interpreting sonnets, with particular emphasis on how to appreciate and discuss the music, meter, and structure of sonnets.  Online you can easily find further information about sonnet form, including its "Italian" and "English" variations and their history.  We'll spend part of several class sessions learning how to hear and analyze how Shakespeare's music and rhythms "fit" the argument of a sonnet, so that music and meaning match (or contrast in dramatic ways).  We'll also learn how to understand why the sonnet's structure is a key element in its dramatic action, its argument.

    Sonnet assignment schedule (also bring Prof. Schmidt's sonnets guide to each class):

    • Sept 15:  sonnets 12, 23, 30
    • Sept. 17:  55, 61, 65, 73, 87
    • Sept. 22:  116, 129, 130, 138
    • Sept. 24:  review; further work; and conclusions

    BELOW IS ALSO THE RESOURCE TO USE TO UPLOAD YOUR FIRST PAPER FOR ENGLISH 9H.  I should receive it by Friday at 5pm, Sept. 25.

    • Shakespeare's Sonnets online--notes and commentary URL

      Use this link to access this great online site, with the text for all the sonnets and very clear and helpful annotations.  Study carefully the annotations for lines and sonnets you don't understand, but I also recommend looking at them for sonnets you like and think you understand!

    • sonnet worksheet File

      "Problem set" exercises to help you learn and apply key concepts, from alliteration/assonance to caesuras, structure, and figures of speech.  We'll work on some of these together in class, but spend some time doing these on your own as well.  They model for you some kinds of analysis that you should incorporate into any paper on a sonnet.

    • Shakespearean actors Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart doing Taylor Swift and Bruno Mars lyrics URL

      in a "Shakespearean" voice:  "Blank Space," "Bad Blood," and "Uptown Funk."

      Also check out this Twitter link:  15SecondShakespeareActors and others reading contemporary pop lyrics and other things in a "Shakespearean" voice.  https://twitter.com/hashtag/15secondshakespeare?src=hash


    • Upload paper #1 using this link Assignment

      4-6pp., double-spaced.  Please use .docx or .doc (Word) format, not pdf or other formats.  

      Due 5pm, Friday Sept. 25.  Topic:  focus on either our Arabian Nights reading or a Shakespeare sonnet; for further instructions about paper #1, see the paper #1 guidelines above.  

      I also highly recommend that you read the other accompanying materials above, including advice about getting a strong thesis and using evidence carefully to support your most important points.  Yes, you may think you know how to do both of these things, at least according to your high school teachers, but check out the materials above: I bet you will learn some things.

  • Sept. 29 - Oct. 8

    Amadeus, the movie (weeks 5 and 6, Sept. 30 through Oct. 9). Use the link here to access the streaming video.  Amadeus is 3 hours long, so plan ahead.

    We'll show excerpts of particular scenes in class, but you should watch the entire movie before our first class meeting on Sept. 30.

    • Requiem Confutatis K.626 - Scrolling Score URL

      Marvelous YouTube video of the scene from Amadeus where Mozart composes the Confutatis section of his Requiem with Salieri's help.  Includes music, scrolling score, a translation of the Latin words from this part of a Requiem mass, and the movie soundtrack -- all synched so you can follow along.  We'll play in class to help us discuss this scene.  Thank you to "Gerubach," who posted this!


      If you're not a musician and don't know what "tonic" and "dominant" notes are in a scale, look up these terms on Wikipedia.  We can discuss in class if you have questions, and musicians in the class can help us.

  • FALL BREAK

    • Oct 20 - Nov. 3

      Frida Kahlo (2.5 weeks)

      • Reading and viewing assignments for 5 classes on Frida Kahlo File

        Download and/or print and use for all 5 class preparations.  We'll read and discuss substantial portions of the biography, as well as study both the color and black and white plates.

      • more info on (and a color illustration of) Rivera's destroyed Rockefeller Center mural URL

        from National Public Radio's website, regarding a recent show about the mural and its history put together by the Mexican Cultural Institute in Washington DC.

      • Frida Kahlo and 2 huge Judas figures File

        Made of papier mache, they were probably transported to the main square in Obregón, where Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo lived near Mexico City, for the Easter festival Quema de Judas (the Burning of Judas).

      • Malcolm Gladwell on tokens, pariahs, and pioneers URL

        50 minutes, followed by 20+ minutes of astute questions and illuminating responses.  

        Includes a discussion of the 19th century English painter Elizabeth Thompson.  Let's discuss MG's key terms and whether they are helpful in thinking about Kahlo's career, including the assumptions she faced.  I think MG's discussion of various kinds of "tokens" and how they function within power structures is especially worth exploring.  Kahlo perhaps moved from pariah to token to a pioneer, a door-opener?  If so, how did she do it?

        THIS TALK WILL BE A FOCUS FOR OUR FINAL CLASS ON KAHLO, NOV. 3.

      • Upload paper #2 here Assignment

        Please use either .docx or .doc format (in Word).  The new due date for uploading your second paper is: Friday Oct. 30, 5pm.  

        4-6pp., double-spaced.  You may write on any work not yet discussed that we've studied in this course so far—from The Arabian Nights to Frida Kahlo.  This time you should incorporate a counter-argument into your analysis, focusing on an interpretation of a key detail or details that you disagree with.  For guidelines on exploring counter-arguments and why they are useful in analytical papers, see the general paper guidelines and resources above, the "counter-arguments" link.  We'll also discuss ways to use a counter-argument in class before the paper's due date.  If you'd like one-on-one advice about paper #2 before you complete it, set up a meeting with Prof. Schmidt.  Once you have a draft of your paper, you're also welcome to set up an appointment at the Writing Center in Trotter—just don't try to get an appointment at the last minute, such as a day before the paper's due.

    • UPLOAD PAPER #2 USING THE LINK ABOVE BY FRIDAY, OCT. 30, 5pm

      • Ruth Ozeki, _A Tale for the Time Being_ (2013)

        5 classes:  Nov. 5 — Nov. 19

        Nov. 5:  read all of Part I (pp. 1-108)

        Nov. 10:  Part II (109-258).  This is the longest reading assignment; allow extra time.

        Nov. 12:  Part III (259-355)

        Nov. 17:  pp. 357-420 (Part IV, plus Appendices, Bibliography, Acknowledgments)

        Nov. 19:  re-read selected passages (tba); review our discussion and make conclusions.  Optional: check out one or both of the essays below, by Schmidt and Sunshine.


        • "Where does all the plastic go?" URL

          on mid-ocean garbage patches (discussed in A Tale for the Time Being)

        • Wave or Particle? Crossing Borders in Ruth Ozeki’s novel A Tale for the Time Being (2013) File

          by Peter Schmidt.  This is a brand-new essay; I wrote it last summer to honor a colleague and friend of mine, Amritjit Singh, for an anthology celebrating his life and work.  It was very much inspired by discussing this amazing novel with Swarthmore students in my English 52B "U.S. Fiction, 1945 to the Present" (spring 2015).  Ruth Ozeki visited our class and also gave a public talk on the novel and its origins.  I've now decided to add the novel to some of the versions of "Portraits of the Artist," the first-year seminar I teach.

          This essay is optional reading.  I recommend you read it after you've either finished the novel or are well into it.  For those who read it, I hope it provides a good guide or map to the novel's use of Buddhist and quantum ideas in the form, not just in its content, of the stories it tells.  The beginning 8pp. or so of the essay and some other passages also place the novel within some contemporary developments in fiction, cultural studies theory, and environmental studies.

        • Optional reading to go with Ozeki: Lisa Zunshine's "The Secret Life of Fiction" File

          Other optional reading, from PMLA, a publication of new scholarship from the Modern Language Association, 2015.

          Uses concepts from "theory of mind" psychology to discuss how reading fiction promotes vocabulary development and adeptness at imagining others' mental states (and empathizing with them?).  Yet children are assigned less and less imaginative literature as they progress from primary school to high school--especially when they live in poorer neighborhoods and go to poorer schools.  Sunshine argues that this development is disastrous for education, goes against clear scientific findings, and will increase social inequity.

          This article may also give you some new ways of conceptualizing the key role played by empathy, "nested mental states," and "constructive learning" in Ruth Ozeki's A Tale for the Time Being. 

        • Rivka Galchen's article on quantum computing URL

          from The New Yorker, May 2, 2011.  Cited in Tales for the Time Being, p. 395, note 160.

          Optional reading.   Compare and contrast the ideas in this article with those in Ozeki's novel, particularly pp. 393-98 and 409, 413-15?


      • class on Tuesday, Nov. 24th: study hall

        Class today with be a study hall, where students can get help on drafts of their papers and/or work quietly on their own.

        For best results, have a solid draft of your entire paper before this class, not a rough outline.  Bring to class either in digital or print form.

        Due date:  upload below by Wed., Nov. 25, 5pm (note change).

        • Upload paper #3 here Assignment

          Wed.. Nov. 25, 5pm, paper #3 due, uploaded onto the 9H Moodle site.  4-6pp. double-spaced, on any course materials you’ve studied, from Arabian Nights through Time Being, but have not yet written on.

      • Topic 13

      • Steve Martin, 2 plays

        Dec. 1 (Patter for the Floating Lady) 

        Dec. 3 (Picasso at the Lapin Agile)

        Dec. 8 (final Martin discussion; also read 2 short items for our concluding reflection and discussion of "portraits of the artist": 

        • William Deresiewicz's essay on the "death of the artist" and the rise of the "creative entrepreneur"; and
        • a New York Times article on a controversial mural in Brooklyn protesting the silencing of Muslim women--yet this mural has drawn protests from Brooklyn residents, who want it painted over

        We'll also discuss details about the final exam (including how to prepare for taking an open-book and open-notes, self-scheduled exam like this one).  Note that one of the parts of the exam will involve your turning in a revised copy of either your essay #1 or essay #2.


      • Dec. 10-19

        • "Portraits of the Artist" FINAL EXAM File

          The exam is now posted (as of Dec. 11).  It's an open-book and -notes self-scheduled exam and you may download it and study it ahead of time.  You may work on your exam at any time during the exam period.  Once you have completed all 3 sections, upload the exam as 2 separate files (see below) at any time during the exam period.  

          Final date by which your complete English 9H exam must be uploaded is the official end of the exam period, 5pm Saturday Dec. 19.

          The exam has 3 parts:  1) a revision of one of your 3 essays, plus a brief essay reflecting on what you learned from doing this revision; 2) an essay on a Steve Martin play or any other item on our syllabus on which you've not yet written; and 3) a concluding essay reflecting on your overall experiences in the class: what was the most important thing to you that you learned from our class (including from both the assignments and from our class discussions) about critical thinking and why experiencing the arts is important to a liberal arts education?  

          Note: You will be able to download and view this exam ahead of time.  It will be an open-book and open-notes exam, and you may work on it whenever you like during the exam period.  You must upload the exam by the deadline listed above or there will be a grade penalty.

          You are to upload the exam in 2 phases below, using the appropriate links.  Upload Part I separately.  Upload Parts II and II together (as one file.  Please use only .doc or .docx formats for your files.  Your exam with comments and (shadow) grade will be emailed to you in January.

        • Upload Part I of the Final Exam Here, Using This Link Assignment

          Part I is your thoroughly revised paper #1, #2, OR #3, with 2-3 pages of reflections on what you learned by doing this revision and why what you learned is important to you.  (We'll discuss all this in more detail in class.)  

          Please create a Word .docx file for your revised paper and upload it here, using this link.   For Parts II and III of the exam, use the link below.  

          Note:  I will have on my computer a copy of your earlier papers with my comments, to compare with your revised essay uploaded here.

          Questions?  We'll have a chance to discuss this part of the exam in class.

        • Upload parts II and III of your final exam HERE Assignment

          There's a separate link to upload Part I of the exam (your revised copy of paper #1 or 2, plus brief reflections on what you learned by doing the revision).  

          Please make Parts II and III of your exam a single Word .docx file; add your name to the exam file (such as "lastname-FinalExam-9H" and upload it using this link.  Deadline for the exam is the end of the exam period:  5pm Saturday Dec. 19 (though you may of course upload your exam files earlier than that).

          Questions?  Email me or set up an office visit.