Thomas Stearns Eliot 3301-LB216
Students will be acquainted with the chosen examples of Eliot’s dramatic and poetic works, as well as his critical essays and social views, presented against the wider background of the cultural history of modernism.
1. We will analyze in detail The Love Song of Alfred Prufrock, relating to the reasons which impelled the poet to choose the form of dramatic monologue and create objective correlative. We shall refer in this context to Eliot’s critical attitude to Milton and Romantic Poets as rebels against tradition and enthusiasts of individualism. We shall relate this aspect of Eliot’s thought to the main thesis of Harold Bloom’s seminal text The Anxeity of Influence.
2. A close reading of Gerontion will serve as a trading point for the discussion concerning Eliot’s attitude to language; we shall point out elements which foreshadow the poet’s diagnosis of cultural crisis included in The Waste Land.
3. An analysis of The Waste Land will focus mainly on the rich network of inter-textual references to other poets: Chaucer, Shakespeare, Metaphysical Poets.
4. In the classes devoted to Ash Wednesday we shall put emphasis on Eliot’s turn towards Anglo-Catholicism.
5. Religious elements will be also emphasized in the analysis of The Journey of the Magi and Four Quartets.
6. We shall define the main features of poetic drama on the example of Murder in the Cathedral.
Type of course
Learning outcomes
After the course the student will have gained the following skills.:
Knowledge:
The participant:
- will have gained the knowledge of terminology used in literary studies, with particular emphasis on their use in the field of English Studies;
- will have gained advanced knowledge of poetic and dramatic works of T.S. Eliot;
- will have gained/ deepen or develop the knowledge of religious and philosophical aspects of Eliot’s poetry (e.g. Bergson’s notions of psychological time, the turn towards phenomenology);
- will have gained the knowledge of Eliot’s poetic style and understand the notion of “objective correlative”;
- will have obtained the knowledge of poetic allusions to other poets (Andrew Marvell and other Metaphysical Poets, William Shakespeare, French symbolists) in Eliot’s works;
- will have gained the knowledge about Eliot’s poetic drama;
- will have gained/deepen the knowledge of Eliot’s impact on R.S. Thomas, G. Hill and other poets of the second half of the 20th century;
- will have developed the knowledge of major trends in contemporary literary studies in relation to the poetry and drama of T.S. Eliot.
Skills:
The course is designer to generate the habit of systematic reading and teach students independent, creative response to literary texts.
After the course the student will be able:
- to employ in his research the terms used in English studies
- to employ the definitions provided during the course for the analysis of Eliot’s poetry;
- to connect the interpretation of particular poems with philosophical and theological ideas;
- to analyze the language of Eliot’s poetry;
- to employ the notion of intertextuality for the analysis of Eliot’s references to the poets of earlier periods;
- to analyze Eliot’s impact on later poets.
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Social competence:
The student will learn to understand the importance of continuous education and will appreciate the necessity of individial and professional development; will be able to define the stages of this development; student will understand the ethical dimension of his professional activity and will be able to observe the norms of professional ethics
Assessment criteria
Only three absences are allowed.
1. Active participation: 10%
2. Short repsonse papers (30%)
3. Final essay (60%)
The following criteria will be taken into consideration: the knowledge of critical terminology, the development of knowledge concerning Eliot’s poetry, the ability to construct argument, language fluency.
Bibliography
BIBLIOGRAFIA Bloom, H. (1997) The Anxiety of Influence. Oxford: OUP.
Edwards, M. (2015) „Gdy dziś słucham Eliota”, w: Ward, J. and Fengler, M. (2015) Między słowem a rzeczy-wistością. Poezja T.S. Eliota, Gdańsk: WUG: 63-90.
Edwards, M. (1984)Towards a Christian Poetics. London.
*Grzegorzewska M. (2016) Światłocienie, Kraków: Homini. Rozdział nt. Pieśni miłosnej J. Alfreda Prufrocka
Grzegorzewska, M. (2017) “Words Born/Miscarried/Stifled in the Poetry of T. S. Eliot,” Poetic Revelations, ed. Mark Burrows, Jean Ward, Małgorzata Grzegorzewska, Ashgate, 2017: 132-146.
*Grzegorzewska, M. „Słowo poczęte, płod poroniony?”, w: Ward, J. and Fengler, M. (2015) Między słowem a rzeczy-wistością. Poezja T.S. Eliota, Gdańsk: WUG: 283-299.
*Gutorow, J. Słowa przeciw słowom. Cztery kwartety i porażka poezji, w: Ward, J. and Fengler, M. (2015) Między słowem a rzeczy-wistością. Poezja T.S. Eliota, Gdańsk: WUG: 265-282.
*Hart, K. (2015) „Różany ogród T. S. Eliota: kilka uwag o fenomenologii i teologii Burnt Norton, w: Ward, J. and Fengler, M. (2015) Między słowem a rzeczy-wistością. Poezja T.S. Eliota, Gdańsk: WUG: 227-264.
Kenner, H. (1959) The Invisible Poet. T.S. Eliot. Harcourt.
*Rulewicz, W. (1990)„Wstęp” w T.S. Eliot, Wybór poezji, opr. W. Rulewicz i K. Boczkowski. Wrocław: Ossolineum.
Pozycje oznaczone gwiazdką są nieobowiązkowe
Additional information
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