08.28.03 Beowulf
"Famed was this Beowulf: far flew the boast of him, son of Scyld, in the Scandian lands."
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09.04.03 Beowulf: The Rest
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09.09.03 Beowulf: The Wanderer, Wife's Lament
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09.11.03 Courtly Love, Marie de France
"Marie de France's Lais were read in her own time; her French is "easy" (a widely-read Anglo-Norman literary language) and the poems are relatively short (the longest is only about a sixth as long as the verse romances being written at the same time by Chr�tien de Troyes); readers usually seem to have read them in French, though they were translated, for example, into Old Norse and read in Iceland."
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09.16.03 Sir Gawain, Parts 1 and 2
"Written in the late fourteenth century, Sir Gawain is made up of two stories, one (the testing at Bercilak's castle) set inside the other (the beheading of the Green Knight at the beginning and the return blow at the end)."
Writing Assignment 1

09.18.03 Sir Gawain, Parts 3 and 4
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09.23.03 Chaucer, Prologue
"Geoffrey Chaucer led a busy official life, as an esquire of the royal court, as the comptroller of the customs for the port of London, as a participant in important diplomatic missions, and in a variety of other official duties. All this is richly recorded in literally hundreds of documents."
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09.25.03 Chaucer, Miller's Tale
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Writing Assignment 2

09.30.03 Chaucer, Wife of Bath
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10.02.03 Chaucer, Pardoner
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10.07.03 Malory
"Le Morte Darthur is undoubtedly the last definitive interpretation of the Arthurian myth before the dawn of the English Renaissance. Yet the identity of its author, Sir Thomas Malory, the knight prisoner, remains as elusive and as mysterious as the knights who inhabit his book."
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10.09.03 Wyatt
"Wyatt was knighted in 1535, but in 1536 he was imprisoned in the Tower for quarreling with the Duke of Suffolk, and possibly also because he was suspected of being one of Anne Boleyn's lovers. During this imprisonment Wyatt witnessed the execution of Anne Boleyn on May 19, 1536 from the Bell Tower, and wrote V. Innocentia Veritas Viat Fides Circumdederunt me inimici mei. He was released later that year, and in November of the year his father Henry died."
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Writing Assignment 3

10.14.03 Surrey
"Henry Howard was born in Hunsdon, Hertfordshire, in 1517, as the eldest son of Thomas Howard, 3rd duke of Norfolk, and Lady Elizabeth Stafford (daughter of the Duke of Buckingham). Surrey was descended from kings on both sides of his family; he was brought up at Windsor with Henry VIII's illegitimate son Henry FitzRoy, Duke of Richmond, at Windsor."
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10.16.03 Spenser
"Edmund Spenser was possibly the son of John Spenser, a free journeyman clothmaker resident in East Smithfield in London, though this relationship is far from certain. Whatever his parentage, it is likely that the Spensers (or Spencers) originated in Lancashire, where they would have been connected with prominent local families such as the Nowells and Towneleys."
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10.21.03 Ralegh
"Go, Soul, the body�s guest,
Upon a thankless arrant:
Fear not to touch the best,
The truth shall be thy warrant:
Go, since I needs must die,
And give the world the lie."
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10.23.03 Shakespeare Sonnets
"All the sonnets are provided [in the link above], with descriptive commentary attached to each one, giving explanations of difficult and unfamiliar words and phrases, and with a full analysis of any special problems of interpretation which arise."
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10.28.03 King Lear (Acts 1 and 2)
"The play opens with King Lear deciding how to retire his throne. He decides to divide his land up among his three daughters. Whichever daughter can lavish him with the most praise and prove they love him most, will get the best land..."
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10.30.03 King Lear
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11.04.03 Donne - Songs and Sonnets
"Who are a little wise the best fools be."
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11.06.03 Donne
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11.11.03 Jonson, Wroth
"Give me a look, give me a face,
That makes simplicity a grace;
Robes loosely flowing, hair as free,�
Such sweet neglect more taketh me
Than all the adulteries of art:
They strike mine eyes, but not my heart."
Epic�ne; Or, the Silent Woman. Act i. Sc. 1.
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11.13.03 Browne, Vaughn, Crashaw
"Dear, beauteous death, the jewel of the just!
Shining nowhere but in the dark;
What mysteries do lie beyond thy dust,
Could man outlook that mark!"
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11.18.03 Herbert, Herrick, Suckling
"Only a sweet and virtuous soul,
Like seasoned timber, never gives."
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11.20.03 Marvell
"The world in all doth but two nations bear,�
The good, the bad; and these mixed everywhere."
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11.25.03 Milton
"A mind not to be chang�d by place or time.
The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven."
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12.02.03 Milton, Paradise Lost, Books 1 and 2
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12.04.03 Paradise Lost, Books 3 and 4
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