During this first week we will consider the question "What is poetry?" by discussing various types of poetry with which we are (or are not) familiar, our reactions to them and their place in a social context. From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Yeats, Kinnell, Homer, Browning, Olds, Owen.

Definitions of Poetry Due

Poetic language often differs from prose or even colloquial language. We will discuss the various aspects of poetic language, how poets emply them and their ultimate affect upon the reader. From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Williams, Carroll, Cummings, Wordsworth, Marvell, Hall.

Definitions of Poetic Terms #1 Due

"A poem does not mean, it simply is." True, but it does mean something to each one of us. We will examine how poems create meanng, and oftentimes, an ambivalence of meaning, thrugh a variety of methods. From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Blake, Frost, Keats, Plath, Hopkins, Shakespeare.

Home Page Information Due; Website Review #

The language of poetry is a language of images. Just how do these images stimulate our senses and heighten our response to poetry? From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Pound, Roethke, Hopkins, Coleridge, Yeats, Stevens, Coleman.

Due Poetic Analysis #1 Due

Remembering our previous discussions concerning language and meaning, we will examine the various figures of speech which assist the poet in developing a specific poem. From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Shakespeare, Plath, Momaday, Levertov, Burns, Ashberry.

Definitions of Poetic Terms #2 Due

Every poem follows a pattern and has a form. A poem may be patterned arund a central theme providing an essential form. Or a poem might utilize rhyme scheme, meter, stanza length, and graphic representation on the page as elements of formal construction. We will analyze these various formal elements paying attention to the particular established forms -- sonnet, etc. -- and how form influences content. From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Donne, Petrarch, Bishop, Whitman, Herbert, Dickinson.

Website Review #2 Due

A poem's origin lies in song. We will examine the musicality of a poem, and consequently, the emphasis it places upon voice. From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Run DMC, Robinson, Simon, Poe, Lennon & McCartney, Housman.

Poetic Analysis #2 Due; Midterm Examination

We will continue our discussion of poem as song. From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Hopkins, Brooks, Parker, Millay, Hughes, Whitman.

Website Review #3 Due

Symbolism and Myth are essential aspects of all art forms. In poetry they are of particular interest to the literary critic. We will analyze their significiacne and spend time discussing Formalist Criticism of poetry. From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Baudelaire, Pound, Eliot, Yeats, Brooks, Frye.

Definitions of Poetic Terms #3 Due

Just as poets speak poetry, poetry speaks the poet. A poem offers us insight into the voice and identity of a specific poet. In discussing voice and identity we will also examine Biographcal and Feminist criticism. From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Plath, Hughes, Justice, Lorca, Olds, Fiedler, Showalter.

Poetic Analysis #3 Due

Just a a shell impresses itself upon sand, so too, does the world impress itself upon the poem. How does the poem serve as an artifact of the time in which it was written? In answering this question we will pay special attention to Historical Criticism of poetry. From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Hughes, Tennyson, Owen, Reed, Sassoon, Whitman, Lukacs.

Explication Poem Selection Due

In light of previous discussion, we will examine the aspects of conversation, collaboration and interactivity and their special place in the poem. While engaging this topic we will pay close attention to Reader-Response Criticism of poetry. From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Fish, Scholes. Bidart. Ai.

Explication Outlines Due

We will continue our discussion concerning how we read poetry. As well, we will critically examine the way hypertext functions within the study of poetry. From your textbook and handouts read the following selections: Mallarme, Eliot.

Explications Due

We will continue our discussion of the act of reading the poemn and conlude our course by reviewing the interactive process which poetry and hypertext demand.

Final Drafts of Course Work Due; Take-Home Final Examinations Assigned