RICE UNIVERSITY

ENGLISH 300/WTSG 314:

WOMEN

WRITERS

FROM 1400 TO 1900

FALL, 1999

Dr. Jane Chance

9-10 MWF

A survey of major British early women

writers. Poems, memoirs, plays, and

novels by significant women, and

their film adaptations.

READINGS

Marie de France, Lais, ed. Robert Hanning and Joan Ferrante, Baker Books (1992?)

Julian of Norwich, Revelations; Motherhood of God, trans. Frances Beer, Boydell & Brewer (1998)

The Floure and the Leafe, The Assembly of Ladies, The Isle of Ladies, ed. Derek Pearsall (1990)

Aemilia Lanyer, Poems: Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum, ed. Susanne Woods, Oxford University Press (1993)

Katherine M. Rogers and William McCarthy, ed. Meridian Anthology of Early Women Writers, NAL/Dutton (1987)

Katherine M. Rogers, ed. The Meridian Anthology of Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Plays by Women, Meridian/Penguin (1994)

Frances Burney, Evelina, ed. Kristina Straub, Bedford Cultural Edition (1997)

Mary Wollstonecraft, Maria, ed. Norton Editions (1994)

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus, ed. D.L. Macdonald and Kathleen Scherf, Broadview Literary Texts (1994)

Films (On Reserve): Chris Newby’s "Anchoress" (1993) PN1997.A5341993

Kenneth Branagh’s "Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein" (1994)

Requirements: 2 exams, two 5-7 page papers, class participation Distribution Course: Group I

Note: you are expected to attend class. More than three absences will affect your grade.

Web-Page: http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~jchance/WOMSURVEY.html

Previous syllabus: English 283/WTSG 349:British Women Writers from 1400-1900 Fall, 1996, 9:25-10:40 TTH

  • Syllabus

    Week One

    Aug. 30 M Introduction

    I. The Middle Ages and Renaissance

    Sept. 1 W Marie de France, Lais (1155-70): Guigemar

    Sept. 3 F Marie de France, LaFresne

    Week Two

    Sept. 8 W Marie de France, Eliduc

    Sept. 10 F Julian of Norwich, Revelations; Motherhood of God (1373)

    Week Three

    Sept. 13 M

    Sept. 15 W The Floure and the Leafe (in Pearsall) (1460-88)

    Sept.17 F Showing of Chris Newby’s "Anchoress" (1993) (108 mins.)

    Week Four

    Sept. 20 M The Assembly of Ladies (in Pearsall) (1470-80)

    Sept. 22 W

    24 F Showing of Chris Newby’s "Anchoress" (1993) (108 mins.)(cont.)

    Week Five

    Sept. 27 M Amelia Lanyer, Poems

    Sept. 29 W

    Oct. 1 F Examination #1

    II. The Seventeenth-Century

    Week Six

    Oct. 4 M Aphra Behn (1640-1689), Sir Patient Fancy (1678) , in Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Plays by Women, ed. Katherine Rogers

    Oct. 6 W

    Oct. 8 F Aphra Behn, Oroonoko: Or The History of the Royal Slave (1688)

    Week Seven

    Oct. 11 M

    13 W Anne Finch (1641-1720), Countess of Winchilsea, in Rogers and McCarthy, pp. 77-111

    15 F

    Week Eight

    Oct. 18 M Mid-term Break

    Oct. 20 W Mary Astell (1666-1731), pp. 112-141 Paper # 1

    Oct. 22 F

    III. The Eighteenth Century

    Week Nine

    Oct. 25 M Lady Mary Wortley Montagu (1683-1762), pp. 171-224

    Oct. 27 W

    Oct. 29 F Frances Burney, Evelina, or, The History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World (1778), pp. 51-116

    Week Ten

    Nov. 1 M Frances Burney, Evelina, pp. 117-177

    Nov. 3 W Frances Burney, Evelina, pp. 177-248

    Nov. 5 F Frances Burney, Evelina, pp. 248-313

    Week Eleven

    Nov. 8 M Frances Burney, Evelina, pp. 313-373

    Nov. 10 W Frances Burney, Evelina, pp. 373-436

    Nov. 12 F Mary Wollstonecraft, Maria (1798)

    Week Twelve

    Nov. 15 M

    Nov. 17 W

    Nov. 19 F Examination #2

    IV. The Nineteenth Century

    Week Thirteen

    Nov. 22 M Mary Shelly, Frankenstein (1818)

    Showing of "Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein"

    Nov. 24 W Showing of "Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein"

    Nov. 26 F Thanksgiving Vacation

    Week Fourteen

    Nov. 29 M

    Dec. 1 W

    Dec. 3 F

    Week Fifteen

    Dec. 6 M

    Dec. 8 W PAPER #2 (5 pp.)

    OFFICE HOURS: 10-11 MWF and by appointment, 301 Rayzor (x2625); messages to the Department Secretary, 527-4840

    E-MAIL: jchance@rice.edu

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