Professor Deborah Needleman Armintor
Course Meetings: TTh 12.30-1:50 LANG 222
Office Hours: By Appointment @ LANG 409B
Contact Info: / 940-369-5018
Dysfunctional Families Bad Romances in Eighteenth-Century Fiction
(English 4433.001, Spring 2014)
Course Description: Before the ubiquitous ‘girl-meets-boy, girl- marries-boy’ heterosexual marriage plot and its compulsory happy ending was established in English-language fiction by nineteenth-century novelists like Jane Austen and Charlotte Bronte and perfected by Hollywood cinema in the following two centuries, the very first British and American novelists and writers of amatory and sentimental fiction in the 1700s—Samuel Richardson, Eliza Haywood, Oliver Goldsmith, William Hill Brown, John Thelwall, and Mary Robinson—established English prose fiction’s preoccupation with love, marriage, and family by weaving much darker and far less optimistic tales of romantic and familial failure and dysfunction. In this class we will explore eighteenth-century English fiction’s preoccupations with the dark sides of modern love and ‘family values’ in order to better understand this dark and quirky early period in the history of English-language novels and, in turn, to better understand novels themselves.
Required Books (available new or used at the campus bookstore, Voertmans, or online):
ISBN# Author Title Publisher, Year
1551115247 / Eliza Haywood / Fantomina and Other Works / Broadview, 20040199537542 / Oliver Goldsmith / Vicar of Wakefield / Oxford Worlds Classics, ‘08
0140431403 / Samuel Richardson / Pamela: Or Virtue Rewarded / Penguin Classics, 1981
0140434682 / William Hill Brown & Hannah Webster Foster / The Power of Sympathy and The Coquette / Penguin Classics, 1996
1554810639 / John Thelwall / The Daughter of Adoption / Broadview, 2013
1170216471 / Anonymous /
Eleanora; or a tragical but true case of incest in Great-Britain
/ Handout(or Gale ECCO, 2010)
117015199X / Mary Robinson / Vancenza, or the Dangers of Credulity / Gale ECCO, 2010
Course Requirements:
-Essay 1 (due week 8, the week before Spring Break): (50% of course grade) 1 original formal essay, 6-8 double-spaced pages, advancing an original argument (yours, of course) about any two of the texts we’ve read thus far in the course. Your paper must be structured around a clearly stated, thought-provoking, original thesis, and must demonstrate an understanding/awareness of all relevant topics and texts covered thus far in the course readings and discussions. I will primarily be looking to see how you go beyond the obvious (and beyond what we’ve already discussed in class) in your arguments, analyses, and close readings of the texts you have chosen to write about. Be sure to stick to the topic and argument at hand, avoiding unnecessary plot summary, sermonizing, irrelevant autobiographical or biographical information, and other kinds of rhetorical “filler” at all costs. If you choose to reference critical or primary sources from outside the course, you must provide complete bibliographical information for those additional sources in an MLA-style “Works Cited” list at the end of your paper. All papers must be well written, double-spaced, and in a reasonable font (Times New Roman 11-12, for instance), with 1-inch margins all around and parenthetically cited quotations.
-Essay 2 (due Wednesday, May 11, right after Finals Week) (50% of course grade); see format and writing instructions for Essay 1 above. For this paper, you may either substantially rewrite/revise/expand/continue your first essay OR write an entirely new paper on a related topic using any two the texts we’ve read thus far in the course.
-Mandatory Pre-Writing Conferences: Each student is required to schedule and attend one individual pre-writing/brainstorming meeting with me at least 1 week before each essay’s official due date (2 pre-writing conferences total, 1 for each essay). I will not accept your essay unless you have attended your individual pre-writing conference.
Course Policies:
Attendance: Attendance is mandatory and will be taken each class via sign-up sheet. You must come to class with a paper copy of the day’s reading in-hand (handout or required book); otherwise you will be marked absent for the day. Your absence will be considered “excused” if you notify me by email before your absence or shortly thereafter. Any student responsible for two or more unexcused absences will be asked to withdraw from the course.
Plagiarism: Any student suspected of plagiarism will be asked to meet with me. If I determine that plagiarism has occurred, I will report the student to the office of academic integrity and will recommend the maximum penalty (failure of the course). All students have the right to appeal. For more on UNT’s academic integrity policy & its definition of plagiarism, see: http://vpaa.unt.edu/academic-integrity.htm
Compliance with Americans with Disabilities Act: Any student with a disability requiring assistance is encouraged to register with the Office of Disability Accommodation. Please provide me with a written request by the fourth class day so I will know how best to accommodate you.
Syllabus
Week 1
Tues, 1/14: Introduction to the Course
Thurs, 1/ 16: Lecture: Introduction to Eighteenth-Century Fiction (no reading for today)
Week 2
Tues, 1/21: Handout: Lawrence Stone, “The Growth of Affective Individualism,” “Mating Arrangements,” and “The Companionate Marriage” (from The Family, Sex, and Marriage in England: 1500-1800, Abridged)
Thurs, 1/23: Handout: Daniel Defoe, “Conjugal Lewdness; or, Matrimonial Whoredom. A Treatise Concerning the Use and Abuse of the Marriage Bed.”
Week 3
Tues, 1/ 28 & Thurs, 1/ 30: Eliza Haywood, Fantomina: Or, Love in A Maze (1st and 2nd half)
Week 4
Tues, 2/4: Handout: Naomi Tadmor, “The Language of Kinship” (From Family and Friends in Eighteenth-Century England: Household, Kinship, and Patronage)
Thurs, February 6: Handout: Haywood, The Lucky Rape: Or, Fate the Best Disposer
Week 5
Tues, 2/ 11: Haywood, “Reflections on the Various Effects of Love”
Thurs, 2/13: Handout: Anonymous, Eleanora (bound book available for purchase as well)
Week 6
Tues, 2/1 & Thurs, 2/ 20: Samuel Richardson, Pamela (1st third of novel)
Week 7
Tues, 2/ 25 & Thurs, 2/27: Richardson, Pamela (2nd third of novel)
Week 8: ESSAY #1 DUE IN CLASS OR SLID UNDER PROFESSOR’S OFFICE DOOR (LANG 409B) ANY DAY/TIME THIS WEEK, MON-FRI; PAPER COPIES ONLY, PLEASE. Tues, 3/ 4 & Thurs, 3/6: Richardson, Pamela (final third of novel)
(SPRING BREAK: MARCH 10-15)
Week 9
Tues, 3/11 & Thurs, 3/ 13: Oliver Goldsmith, The Vicar of Wakefield (1st half of novel)
Week 10
Tues, 3/18 & Thurs, 3/ 20: Goldsmith, Vicar of Wakefield (2nd half of novel)
Week 11
Tues, 3/25 & Thurs, 3/ 27: William Hill Brown, The Power of Sympathy (1st and 2nd half)
Week 12
Tues, 4/1 & Thurs, 4/3: John Thelwall, Daughter of Adoption (1st third of novel)
Week 13
Tues, 4/8 & Thurs, 4/ 10: Thelwall, Daughter of Adoption (2nd third of novel)
Week 14
Tues, 4/ 15 & Thurs, 4/17: Thelwall, Daughter of Adoption (final third of novel)
Week 15
Tues, 4/22 & Thurs, 4/24: Mary Robinson, Vacenza (1st and 2nd half)
WEDNESDAY, MAY 11TH: FINAL PAPERS DUE @ LANG 409B BY 5 P.M; PAPER COPIES ONLY, PLEASE. THERE WILL BE NO CLASS MEETINGS DURING THE WEEK OF APRIL 26. THERE IS NO FINAL EXAM.