Paper Topics for "The Merchant's Tale":

1) Consider how issues of speech and language come into play in both THE PIANO and "The Merchant's Tale."

2) Both Ida and May commit adultery. How do their stories characterize these actions? Do the texts condemn or defend them, or do they offer a more complicated representation?

3 pp. maximum. Due November 3.

Using keywords: a model

"Another index of the prevailing innocence is a curious prophylaxis of language. One could use with security words which a few years later, after the war, would constitute obvious double entendres. One could say intercourse, or erection, or ejaculation without any risk of evoking a smile or a leer. Henry James's innocent employment of the word tool is as well known as Browning's artless misapprehensions about the word twat. Even the official order transmitted from British headquarters to the armies at 6:50 on the morning of November 11, 1918 [the day of the armistice] warned that 'there will be no intercourse of any description with the enemy.' Imagine daring to promulgate that at the end of the Second War! In 1901 the girl who was to become Christopher Isherwood's mother and whose fiance was going to be killed in the war could write in her diary with no self-consciousness: 'Was bending over a book when the whole erection [a toque hat she had been trimming] caught fire in the candles and was ruined. So vexed!' She was an extraordinarily shy, genteel, proper girl, and neither she nor her fiance read anything funny or anything not entirely innocent and chaste into the language of a telegram he once sent her after a long separation: 'THINKING OF YOU HARD.' In this world, 'he ejaculated breathlessly' was a tag in utterly innocent dialogue rather than a moment in pornographic description."

From Paul Fussell, The Great War and Modern Memory, 23.

Revised Syllabus

10/8 Thu	Ovid, Metamorphoses, Minerva and the Muses, p. 157 (“The Muse was still...”) to p. 169 (“...victorious and proud”), Arachne, p. 177-183 (“...she fashioned webs”); Tereus, Procne, and Philomela, p. 193 (“The regions close...”), Orpheus and Eurydice, Ganymemde, pp. 325-332 Pygmalion, pp. 335-338.	Working with evidence: fondling the details
10/13 Tue	Dinesen, “The Blank Page” Gubar, “’The Blank Page’ and Female Creativity.” Discussion Leaders: Tina and Kalee What is Gubar's thesis? Note the places where it shifts direction.	Daily poem: Adrienne Rich “Moving in Winter”
10/15 Thu	The Piano Discussion Leaders: Nicole Eisenmann and Kris Brassard	Writing about film
	“Silence will speak”: Speaking through Art
10/20 Tue	The Piano	Daily poem:
10/22 Thu	Paper due on The Piano: Group B 4 papers will be selected for workshopping	Topic: Apply Gubar's analysis of the situation of the female artist before feminism to Ada in The Piano. How do Gubar's theories about silence and the body shape a reading about the characterization of Ada? Be sure to focus on specific scenes and filmic detail in supporting your argument. When you quote from the film, quote exactly. 3 pp. max Email a copy of the paper to me at wpeek@stonehill.edu by 8:00am on the due date, and bring a hard copy of your paper to class
10/27 Tue	Chaucer, “The Merchant’s Tale” Discussion Leaders: Marc Piquette, Chelsea Haedrich, John Piantedosi	Sarah Vowell tonight Writing: Key words
10/29 Thu	Chaucer, “The Merchant’s Tale”	Daily poem:
11/3 Tue	Paper due on “The Merchant’s Tale”: Group A 4 of the papers will be workshopped.	Topic: 3 pp. max Email a copy of the paper to me at wpeek@stonehill.edu by 8:00am on the due date, and bring a hard copy of your paper to class
11/5 Thu	Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, Act 1 Discussion Leaders: Stacey Genest, Kathleen Keeley, Jessica Andrews
11/10 Tue	Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, Acts 2-3 Discussion Leaders: Rebecca Plock, Brooke Rose
	“I am not that I play”: Speaking the Hidden Self
11/12 Thu	Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, Acts 4-5 Discussion Leaders: Kerri Anne Shea, Danielle Sutherby
11/17 Tue	Paper due on The Merchant of Venice: Group B 4 of the papers will be workshopped.	Topic: 4 pp. max Email a copy of the paper to me at wpeek@stonehill.edu by 8:00am on the due date, and bring a hard copy of your paper to class
11/19 Thu	Poetry of World War I Owens, "Dulce et Decorum Est," "The Parable of the Old Man and the Young" Sassoon, "Repression of War Experience," "They" Graves, "Two Fusiliers"
11/24 Tue	Barker, Regeneration, through p. 74	Guppy Presentations: Commas, etc. and Paraphrasing and Plagiarism
	Thanksgiving Vacation 11/26
12/1 Tue	Barker, Regeneration, finished Discussion Leaders: Marc and Danielle Ascoli on WWI poems	Guppy Presentations: Quotations, and Modifiers and Agreement
12/3 Thu	Discuss writing about Regeneration Discussion Leaders: Matt Conte, Tim Ferreira, Andrew McDonald	Guppy Presentation: Improving Sentence Style
12/8 Tue	Paper on Regeneration due: Group A 4 papers will be workshopped.	Topic: 4 pp. max Email a copy of the paper to me at wpeek@stonehill.edu by 8:00am on the due date, and bring a hard copy of your paper to class
12/10 Thu	Guppy Quiz Evaluations More work with punctuation, etc. Discussion of final papers and revisions
	Final papers due during the day and time scheduled for our final exam: 9-11 AM Saturday, Dec. 12. This paper should be at least 4—and ideally 5—pages long, with close reading of key details in the texts. On that same day, you have the option of turning in a revision (or two if you attended Sarah Vowell's presentation) of a previously written paper for a new grade that will replace the old.