Caldwell, M

English

Eastern Illinois University

Eastern Illinois UniversityThe KeepSpring 2012 2012Spring 1-15-2012ENG 3802-001: Art and Ethics in ShakespeareM CaldwellEastern Illinois UniversityFollow this and additional works at: http://thekeep.eiu.edu/english_syllabi_spring2012Part of the English Language and Literature CommonsThis Article is brought to you for free and open access by the 2012 at The Keep. It has been accepted for inclusion in Spring 2012 by an authorizedadministrator of The Keep. For more information, please contact tabruns@eiu.edu.Recommended CitationCaldwell, M, "ENG 3802-001: Art and Ethics in Shakespeare" (2012). Spring 2012. 91.http://thekeep.eiu.edu/english_syllabi_spring2012/91Prof. Caldwell Office: Coleman 3050 Art and Ethics in Shakespeare English 3802: Shakespeare, Fall 2012 3<go ~-aa 1 Office Hours: M 4:15-5:15, W 1-2, Th. 4:00-5:00 (group reading hour) Email: mcaldwell@eiu.edu Course Purpose and Expectations This course is designed to introduce you to the sonnets and a selection of the major plays of William Shakespeare. A course devoted entirely to Shakespeare comes with many difficulties and rewards: sixteenth and seventeenth-century verse is rarely easy for the twenty-first century reader, but the experience of studying Shakespeare in depth-if undertaken seriously and with care-will make you a better reader and a more astute thinker. Be patient, give yourself plenty of time to do the reading carefully, and do not flinch when confronted by difficulty. In order to succeed in this class, it is absolutely essential for you do the reading, attend class with your text in hand, and take notes. Much class time will be devoted to discussing the conventions of Elizabethan theater and the political, religious, and intellectual context of Shakespeare's works; the material on the exams will come from class lectures and discussions. I will take role every day: I expect you to arrive to class on time, and I reserve the right to raise or lower final grades on the basis of active, consistent class participation or poor attendance/excessive tardiness, respectively. After 4 absences, your final grade will likely suffer; if I see you texting in class, I will ask you to leave and count you absent. If you are enrolled in this course, you must have passed English 1002. Plagiarists will be reported to the Office ofStudent Standards and will fail the course. These policies are non-negotiable; your enrollment in my class constitutes your agreement to this state of affairs. Office Hours My office hours have a single purpose: to meet with you as you require. Whether you are worried about your performance in the course, are confused about a moment in the text, or simply want to talk about the reading, please use my office hours as often as you desire. In addition to regular office hours, please note that I have also designated a "reading hour" for our class. Those who are interested will gather for an hour every week to read whatever work we will be working on in class in the following week (e.g. if we are discussing Merchant of Venice on Monday, Feb. 6, the reading hour on Thursday, Feb. 2 will be devoted to MV). Plays are written to be performed, and while we probably can't simulate performance, we can read the plays aloud together to help us get a feel for the rhythm of Shakespeare's verse, the humor and quick wit of his characters, and the emotions of tragedy and comedy (or tragicomedy!). This hour is entirely optional on your part. It's an opportunity I am offering to you to enhance your understanding of Shakespeare, to develop an intellectual community, and perhaps to have a bit of fun while doing so. You may come some weeks and not others, as your schedule allows. Meeting place TBD. Assignments and Grade Distribution Sonnet recitation and explication: 5% Textual and genre history exercise: 5% 2 short papers: 10% each (20% total) Research project and presentation: 30% Midterm: 15% Final: 25% Course Calendar M Jan 9 W Jan 11 M Jan 16 WJan 18 M Jan 23 WJan 25 M Jan 30 WFeb 1 M Feb 6 WFeb8 M Feb 13 W Feb 15 M Feb 20 W Feb 22 M Feb 27 WFeb 29 MMar5 WMar7 MWMar12-14 M Mar 19 W Mar21 M Mar 26 WMar28 MApr2 WApr4 MApr9 W Apr 11 M Apr 16 W Apr 18 M Apr 23 WApr25 Shakespeare and the Elizabethan Theater: Genius or Businessman? Sonnets, 1-126 (esp. 1-5, 12, 14, 15-21, 23, 29, 36, 39, 40-42, 55, 67, 68, 71-74,93,94, 105, 109,110, 116,126) MLK Holiday Sonnets, 127-154 Midsummer Night's Dream, Act 1-3 (all subsequent numbers refer to act of the play) Midsummer Night's Dream 4-5 Twelfth Night 1-3, turn in research preferences Twelfth Night 4-5 Merchant of Venice 1-3 Merchant of Venice 4-5 Henry IV, Part I, 1-3 Henry IV, Part I 4-5, textual and genre history exercise Titus Andronicus 1-2 Titus Andronicus 3, reading group discussion Titus Andronicus 4-5 Macbeth 1-2 Macbeth 3, short paper 1 due Macbeth 4-5, sonnet recitation due by this date Spring Break Midterm Hamlet 1-2 Hamlet 3, short paper 2 due Hamlet4-5 King Lear 1-2 King Lear 3 King Lear 4-5 Tempest 1-2 Tempest3-5 Group meeting day to discuss presentations Group Presentations, final papers due Group Presentations I Theories of Drama and the Dangers of Theater "To poets [and dramatists] ... we must issue orders requiring them to portray good character in their poems or not to write at all ... and prevent them portraying bad character, ill-discipline, meanness, or ugliness ... and if they are unable to comply they must be forbidden to practice their art among us. We shall thus prevent our [leaders] being brought up among representations of what is evil and so day by day and little by little, by grazing widely as it were in an unhealthy pasture, insensibly doing themselves a cumulative psychological damage that is very serious." Plato, The Republic, Book 3, On Education "The argument of Tragedies is wrath, cruelty, incest, injury, murder either violent by sword, or voluntary by poison. The persons, Gods, Goddesses, juries, friends, kings, queens, and mighty men. The ground work of comedies is love, cozenage, flattery, bawdry, sly conveyance of whoredom; the persons, cooks, knaves, bawds, parasites, courtesans, lecherous old men, amorous young men." Stephen Gosson Schoole of Abuse, containing a pleasant invective against Poets, Pipers, Players, jesters and such like Caterpillars of the Commonwealth (1579) "To declare ourselves by words or by gestures to be otherwise than we are, is an act executed where it should not, therefore a lie .. .In Stage Plays for a boy to put on the attire, the gesture the passions of a woman; for a mean person to take upon him the title of a Prince with counterfeit [behavior and demeanor], is by outward signs to show themselves otherwise than they are, and so within the compass of a lie, which .. .is naught of itself and to be fled. Stephen Gosson Plays Confuted in Five Actions (1582) "Poetry is the art of imitation .... that is to say, a representing, counterfeiting, or figuring forth-to speak metaphorically, a speaking picture-with this end, to teach and delight." "Comedy is an imitation of the common errors of our life, which [the comic] represents in the most ridiculous and scornful sort that may be, so as it is impossible that any beholder can be content to be such a one. Now, as in geometry the oblique must be known as well as the right, and in arithmetic the odd as well as the even; so in the actions of our life who sees not the filthiness of evil, wants a great foil to perceive the beauty of virtue ... And little reason hath any man to say that men learn evil by seeing it so set out; since, as 1 said before, there is no man living, but by the force truth hath in nature, no sooner sees these men play their parts, but wishes them in pistrinum [in jail], although perchance the sack of his own faults lie so behind his back, that he sees not himself to dance the same measure,-whereto yet nothing can more open his eyes than to find his own actions contemptibly set forth." "The right use of comedy will, I think, by nobody be blamed, and much less of the high and excellent tragedy, that opens the greatest wounds, and shows forth the ulcers that are covered with tissue; that makes kings fear to be tyrants, and tyrants manifest their tyrannical humors; that that with stirring the effects of admiration and commiseration teaches the uncertainty of this world, and upon how weak foundations gilt roofs are built... But how much it can move, Plutarch yields a notable testimony of the abominable tyrant Alexander Pherceus; from whose eyes a tragedy, well made and represented, drew abundance of tears, who without all pity had murdered infinite numbers, and some of his own blood; so as he that was not ashamed to make matters for tragedies, yet could not resist the sweet violence of a tragedy." Sir Philip Sidney The Defense of Poesy (written ca. 1581; pub. 1595) \ 

ENG 3802-001: Art and Ethics in Shakespeare

The Keep

Eastern Illinois University
The Keep
Spring 2012 2012
Spring 1-15-2012
ENG 3802-001: Art and Ethics in Shakespeare
M Caldwell
Eastern Illinois University
Follow this and additional works at: http://thekeep.eiu.edu/english_syllabi_spring2012
Part of the English Language and Literature Commons
This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the 2012 at The Keep. It has been accepted for inclusion in Spring 2012 by an authorized
administrator of The Keep. For more information, please contact tabruns@eiu.edu.
Recommended Citation
Caldwell, M, "ENG 3802-001: Art and Ethics in Shakespeare" (2012). Spring 2012. 91.
http://thekeep.eiu.edu/english_syllabi_spring2012/91
Prof. Caldwell 
Office: Coleman 3050 
Art and Ethics in Shakespeare 
English 3802: Shakespeare, Fall 2012 
3<go ~-aa 1 
Office Hours: M 4:15-5:15, W 1-2, Th. 4:00-5:00 (group reading hour) 
Email: mcaldwell@eiu.edu 
Course Purpose and Expectations 
This course is designed to introduce you to the sonnets and a selection of the major plays of 
William Shakespeare. A course devoted entirely to Shakespeare comes with many 
difficulties and rewards: sixteenth and seventeenth-century verse is rarely easy for the 
twenty-first century reader, but the experience of studying Shakespeare in depth-if 
undertaken seriously and with care-will make you a better reader and a more astute 
thinker. Be patient, give yourself plenty of time to do the reading carefully, and do not flinch 
when confronted by difficulty. 
In order to succeed in this class, it is absolutely essential for you do the reading, attend class 
with your text in hand, and take notes. Much class time will be devoted to discussing the 
conventions of Elizabethan theater and the political, religious, and intellectual context of 
Shakespeare's works; the material on the exams will come from class lectures and 
discussions. I will take role every day: I expect you to arrive to class on time, and I reserve 
the right to raise or lower final grades on the basis of active, consistent class participation 
or poor attendance/excessive tardiness, respectively. After 4 absences, your final grade will 
likely suffer; if I see you texting in class, I will ask you to leave and count you absent. If you 
are enrolled in this course, you must have passed English 1002. Plagiarists will be reported 
to the Office ofStudent Standards and will fail the course. These policies are non-negotiable; 
your enrollment in my class constitutes your agreement to this state of affairs. 
Office Hours 
My office hours have a single purpose: to meet with you as you require. Whether you are 
worried about your performance in the course, are confused about a moment in the text, or 
simply want to talk about the reading, please use my office hours as often as you desire. In 
addition to regular office hours, please note that I have also designated a "reading hour" for 
our class. Those who are interested will gather for an hour every week to read whatever 
work we will be working on in class in the following week (e.g. if we are discussing 
Merchant of Venice on Monday, Feb. 6, the reading hour on Thursday, Feb. 2 will be devoted 
to MV). Plays are written to be performed, and while we probably can't simulate 
performance, we can read the plays aloud together to help us get a feel for the rhythm of 
Shakespeare's verse, the humor and quick wit of his characters, and the emotions of tragedy 
and comedy (or tragicomedy!). This hour is entirely optional on your part. It's an 
opportunity I am offering to you to enhance your understanding of Shakespeare, to develop 
an intellectual community, and perhaps to have a bit of fun while doing so. You may come 
some weeks and not others, as your schedule allows. Meeting place TBD. 
Assignments and Grade Distribution 
Sonnet recitation and explication: 5% 
Textual and genre history exercise: 5% 
2 short papers: 10% each (20% total) 
Research project and presentation: 30% 
Midterm: 15% 
Final: 25% 
Course Calendar 
M Jan 9 
W Jan 11 
M Jan 16 
WJan 18 
M Jan 23 
WJan 25 
M Jan 30 
WFeb 1 
M Feb 6 
WFeb8 
M Feb 13 
W Feb 15 
M Feb 20 
W Feb 22 
M Feb 27 
WFeb 29 
MMar5 
WMar7 
MWMar12-14 
M Mar 19 
W Mar21 
M Mar 26 
WMar28 
MApr2 
WApr4 
MApr9 
W Apr 11 
M Apr 16 
W Apr 18 
M Apr 23 
WApr25 
Shakespeare and the Elizabethan Theater: Genius or Businessman? 
Sonnets, 1-126 (esp. 1-5, 12, 14, 15-21, 23, 29, 36, 39, 40-42, 55, 67, 
68, 71-74,93,94, 105, 109,110, 116,126) 
MLK Holiday 
Sonnets, 127-154 
Midsummer Night's Dream, Act 1-3 (all subsequent numbers refer to 
act of the play) 
Midsummer Night's Dream 4-5 
Twelfth Night 1-3, turn in research preferences 
Twelfth Night 4-5 
Merchant of Venice 1-3 
Merchant of Venice 4-5 
Henry IV, Part I, 1-3 
Henry IV, Part I 4-5, textual and genre history exercise 
Titus Andronicus 1-2 
Titus Andronicus 3, reading group discussion 
Titus Andronicus 4-5 
Macbeth 1-2 
Macbeth 3, short paper 1 due 
Macbeth 4-5, sonnet recitation due by this date 
Spring Break 
Midterm 
Hamlet 1-2 
Hamlet 3, short paper 2 due 
Hamlet4-5 
King Lear 1-2 
King Lear 3 
King Lear 4-5 
Tempest 1-2 
Tempest3-5 
Group meeting day to discuss presentations 
Group Presentations, final papers due 
Group Presentations 
I 
Theories of Drama and the Dangers of Theater 
"To poets [and dramatists] ... we must issue orders requiring them to portray good 
character in their poems or not to write at all ... and prevent them portraying bad character, 
ill-discipline, meanness, or ugliness ... and if they are unable to comply they must be 
forbidden to practice their art among us. We shall thus prevent our [leaders] being brought 
up among representations of what is evil and so day by day and little by little, by grazing 
widely as it were in an unhealthy pasture, insensibly doing themselves a cumulative 
psychological damage that is very serious." 
Plato, The Republic, Book 3, On Education 
"The argument of Tragedies is wrath, cruelty, incest, injury, murder either violent by sword, 
or voluntary by poison. The persons, Gods, Goddesses, juries, friends, kings, queens, and 
mighty men. The ground work of comedies is love, cozenage, flattery, bawdry, sly 
conveyance of whoredom; the persons, cooks, knaves, bawds, parasites, courtesans, 
lecherous old men, amorous young men." 
Stephen Gosson 
Schoole of Abuse, containing a pleasant invective against Poets, Pipers, Players, jesters and 
such like Caterpillars of the Commonwealth (1579) 
"To declare ourselves by words or by gestures to be otherwise than we are, is an act 
executed where it should not, therefore a lie .. .In Stage Plays for a boy to put on the attire, 
the gesture the passions of a woman; for a mean person to take upon him the title of a 
Prince with counterfeit [behavior and demeanor], is by outward signs to show themselves 
otherwise than they are, and so within the compass of a lie, which .. .is naught of itself and to 
be fled. 
Stephen Gosson 
Plays Confuted in Five Actions (1582) 
"Poetry is the art of imitation .... that is to say, a representing, counterfeiting, or figuring 
forth-to speak metaphorically, a speaking picture-with this end, to teach and delight." 
"Comedy is an imitation of the common errors of our life, which [the comic] represents in 
the most ridiculous and scornful sort that may be, so as it is impossible that any beholder 
can be content to be such a one. Now, as in geometry the oblique must be known as well as 
the right, and in arithmetic the odd as well as the even; so in the actions of our life who sees 
not the filthiness of evil, wants a great foil to perceive the beauty of virtue ... And little 
reason hath any man to say that men learn evil by seeing it so set out; since, as 1 said before, 
there is no man living, but by the force truth hath in nature, no sooner sees these men play 
their parts, but wishes them in pistrinum [in jail], although perchance the sack of his own 
faults lie so behind his back, that he sees not himself to dance the same measure,-whereto 
yet nothing can more open his eyes than to find his own actions contemptibly set forth." 
"The right use of comedy will, I think, by nobody be blamed, and much less of the high and 
excellent tragedy, that opens the greatest wounds, and shows forth the ulcers that are 
covered with tissue; that makes kings fear to be tyrants, and tyrants manifest their 
tyrannical humors; that that with stirring the effects of admiration and commiseration 
teaches the uncertainty of this world, and upon how weak foundations gilt roofs are built... 
But how much it can move, Plutarch yields a notable testimony of the abominable tyrant 
Alexander Pherceus; from whose eyes a tragedy, well made and represented, drew 
abundance of tears, who without all pity had murdered infinite numbers, and some of his 
own blood; so as he that was not ashamed to make matters for tragedies, yet could not 
resist the sweet violence of a tragedy." 
Sir Philip Sidney 
The Defense of Poesy (written ca. 1581; pub. 1595) 
\ 


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