ENGLISH 152-01:
Introduction to Narrative Fiction
Spring, 1998
King 235
Jeff Pence
MWF, 10:00-10:50
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Office: Rice 26
Office hours: M. 12:30-2:00, W. 3:30-4:30, or by appt.
Phone: x8586
email: fpence@oberlin.edu
Materials:
Barnet, The Harper Anthology of Fiction
Cather, My Antonia
Forster, A Passage to India
Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God
Kureishi, The Buddha of Suburbia
Robinson, Housekeeping
Policies:
1. Regular attendance. What happens in class is the center of the course.
If you miss three classes, your grade will be affected, both potentially
and literally. Chronic lateness is disruptive and will also affect your
grade.
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2. Completion and consideration of all reading on the date it is assigned.
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3. All written work must be completed by the date assigned and turned
in during class. I will not read late drafts. You will not get credit for
late prep papers. Late finals will be penalized one letter grade.
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4. Thoughtful and engaged participation in class discussion. Like writing,
public discussion is a learned and invaluable skill. It is as important
that one learns how to listen as it is that one learns how to speak. Both
skills will be a major portion of your grade.
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5. This is a Writing Intensive course and a writing tutor is available.
You are required to make at least one appointment with the writing tutor
and one appointment with me (that's two, total) at some point in the semester
to discuss an issue or area you have defined in your writing. One of these
meetings must occur before Break. You may, of course, make other appointments
with either of us.
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6. For each essay, you will be assigned a peer review group. Everyone
in these groups is required to read and comment upon the essays of the
other members. Through reading someone else's work, you can become more
self-aware of your own writing. Through sharing your work with others,
you can learn that writing is a very social activity which benefits from
multiple perspectives. I'm looking for careful and conscientious suggestions
and questions for writers. I'm also looking for writers who can listen
to advice and adapt to it. Peer review is an extremely important part of
your participation grade.
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7. Essays must be typed, double-spaced and proofread. Citations will
be in the MLA style. These may be double-sided.
Written Requirements:
1. Seven prep papers, each about 400-500 words in length, will be required.
These are not miniature critical essays; rather, they are meant to offer
you a chance to think through your initial response to a particular text
by writing about it. Use these to ask questions, compare works, or propose
ways one might begin to interpret a text. Here's is a formula to try when
stuck: 1) formulate a critical question of a text; 2) explain why the question
might be important; 3) suggest an answer, with reference to the text. At
least three must be turned in before Break and three after; only one from
either half may be written on a short story (all HAF readings except for
Conrad). You may submit these on Mondays or Wednesdays but not Fridays.
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2. One essay, 4-5 pages in length, relating a single scene or a minor
character to the whole of any of the stories from the first three weeks
of the semester. You may not write on a story for which you wrote a prep
paper. Drafts will be due Friday, February 20. Finals will be due Friday,
February 27.
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3. One essay, 5-7 pages in length, which in some respect relates and
compares the form and content of two novels from the first half of the
course. Drafts will be due Wednesday, March 18. Finals will be due Thursday,
April 2.
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4. One essay, 8-10 pages in length, on a topic proposed and approved
by me. Proposals are due Friday, April 17. Drafts will be due Monday, May
4. Finals will be due at the end of Reading Period on Tuesday, May 12.
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5. All written work must be kept in a portfolio throughout the semester.
At the end of the semester, you will resubmit all of your work, along with
my comments, peer comments, and any other writing I may have asked you
to do. You will be graded on the quality and development of this portfolio.
I will not give you a grade until this portfolio is submitted; if you want
to check with me as to "where you stand," please make an appointment
to discuss the issue.
Schedule:
2/4 Introduction
2/6 Eagleton, "What is Literature"
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2/9 Edgar Allen Poe, "The Fall of the House of Usher" (HAF)
2/11 Edgar Allen Poe, "The Cask of Amontillado" (HAF);
Kate Chopin, "The Story of an Hour" (HAF)
2/13 Herman Melville, "Bartleby the Scrivener" (HAF)
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2/16 Leslie Marmon Silko, "The Storyteller" (HAF)
2/18 Raymond Carver, "Popular Mechanics" (HAF); Robert
Coover, "The Brother" (HAF)
2/20 Review and Preview; Drafts of Essay #1 Due
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2/23 Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness (HAF)
2/25 cont.
2/27 cont.; Finals of Essay #1 Due
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3/2 E.M. Forster, A Passage to India
3/4 cont.
3/6 cont.
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3/9 Hanif Kureishi, The Buddha of Suburbia
3/11 cont.
3/13 cont.
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3/16 Review and Preview
3/18 Drafts of Essay #2 Due
3/20
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Spring Break
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3/30 Flannery O'Connor, "A Good Man is Hard to Find" &
"Revelation" (HAF)
4/1 Eudora Welty, "Livvie" (HAF); Bobby Ann Mason,
"Shiloh" (HAF)
4/3 class cancelled
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4/6 Louise Erdrich, "Fleur" (HAF); Toni Cade Bambera,
"The Lesson" (HAF)
4/8 Amy Tan, "Two Kinds" (HAF); Cynthia Ozick, "The
Shawl" (HAF)
4/10 Joyce Carol Oates, "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?"
(HAF)
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4/13 Willa Cather, My Antonia
4/15 cont.
4/17 cont.; Proposals for Essay #3 Due
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4/20 Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God
4/22 cont.
4/24 cont.
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4/27 Marilynne Robinson, Housekeeping
4/29 cont.
5/1 cont.
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5/4 Drafts of Essay #3 Due
5/6 Peer Review in class
5/8 Last Class & Evaluations
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5/12 End of Reading Period; Complete Portfolios Due, including Finals
of Essay #3
Alta Vista Forum:
Alta Vista Forum is an electronic utility which permits on-line discussion
and sharing of work among a number of users. While I may give you an occasional
question to post and review answers to, for the most part we shall use
AVF as a convenient way to share papers for peer review. Here's the method:
To register on AVF:
1. Open Netscape
2. Go to Oberlin Online (http://www.oberlin.edu)
3. Click on Scholarly Resources
4. Click on Alta Vista Forum
5. Click on "Log in" button
6. Enter log in name. So that others may know who you are, and so you
won't forget your log in name, enter your first and last names without
spaces. AVF is case sensitive.
7. Enter password. It will be a nightmare if you forget this. So, either
use a password you already employ or use the word "password."
8. Click on English 152-01 forum name
To upload a document to AVF:
1. Create a document either in Word 6 or in a program which you can
open in Word 6.
2. After finishing document, Choose Save As... from the File
Menu
3. Name the paper using this formula: your initials + paper + essay
number + dot + rtf. Eg. Jppaper2.rtf
4. Go to the pop-up menu beneath the words "Save File as Type:"Choose
Rich Text Format
5. Click Save to save this file to your desktop
6. Log in to AVF. English 152-01 forum
7. Click on Add Topic button at top of page
8. Enter the title of your paper (eg. Jppaper2.rtf)
9. Enter any comments you would like readers to have in the text
box
10. Under Optional Attachment choose File
11. Click Browse button
12. Find your document and open it
13. Click Okay: file is now uploaded
To download a document from AVF:
1. While in AVF English 152-01 forum, click on the file's title
2. A copy of the file will be created on your desktop
.
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