English 252 - 16TH CENTURY LITERATURE
Fall
2015
01
4.00
William Oram
TTh 01:00-02:50
Smith College
20858-F15
SEELYE 310
woram@smith.edu
Topics course.
Renaissance writers thought in different, incompatible ways about love. Is it a pastime to be outgrown or a means of self-transcendence? How is it affected by notions of gender? How does sexual desire relate to the the love of God? The course investigates various literary/philosophical "models" for loving that Renaissance writers inherit, from Petrarch, Ovid, Plato and the mixture of attitudes inherited from romance tradition. We consider how English Renaissance writers revise these traditions to create particular visions of love and sexuality. Sonnet sequences by Sidney, Spenser, Shakespeare and Lady Mary Wroth; narratives by Marlowe, Shakespeare, Spenser and others.
Renaissance writers thought in different, incompatible ways about love. Is it a pastime to be outgrown or a means of self-transcendence? How is it affected by notions of gender? How does sexual desire relate to the the love of God? The course investigates various literary/philosophical "models" for loving that Renaissance writers inherit, from Petrarch, Ovid, Plato and the mixture of attitudes inherited from romance tradition. We consider how English Renaissance writers revise these traditions to create particular visions of love and sexuality. Sonnet sequences by Sidney, Spenser, Shakespeare and Lady Mary Wroth; narratives by Marlowe, Shakespeare, Spenser and others.
Topic: Writing about Love in the Sixteenth Century. Not open to first-years