For Tuesday the 9th, you may link to the assigned essay  "Of Death" by Francis Bacon.

Classes this week will involve a bit more lecture than usual; I will be exploring the ways in which the various works we are reading reflect the literary genres in which they are written.  To prepare, familiarize yourself with and/or review the following genres of poetry and prose:
 

sonnet-- a fourteen-line poem in iambic pentameter, usually following a rhyme scheme corresponding to one of two basic patterns:  1)  the Italian or Petrarchan rhyme scheme contains an octave rhyming ABBA ABBA and a sestet which may rhyme in any of a number of ways, including such patterns as CDDCEE, CDCCDC, CDCDCD, CDECDE, etc.  The Italian sonnet tends to involve the development of an idea or theme through the eight lines of the octave, and then a rethinking or redirecting of that theme in the sestet.  The transition from octave to sestet is called the turn.  2)  The English or Shakespearean rhyme scheme contains three quatrains and a couplet, rhyming ABAB CDCD EFEF GG.  The poet using this sonnet form usually develops an idea or elaborate metaphor in the opening quatrain, then explores the same idea from different angles in the following two quatrains, and closes with a pithy commentary or reflection in the couplet.  The word sonnet comes from the Italian word for "room," and poets working in the genre are very conscious of the form as a small space or enclosure.  It was first developed as a form suitable for love lyric, and particularly for the expression of frustrated, unrequited love of the sort Francesco Petrarch described in his lyric poetry (14th c. Italy).  Poets working in the tradition of Petrarch wrote what is referred to as "Petrarchan love poetry"; it was all the rage in 16th-century England, and many writers wrote sonnets on the subject of unrequited love for a fair-complected, virtuous, distant lady.  They used both the Italian (Petrarchan) rhyme scheme and the English (Shakespearean).  But Petrarch had also used the sonnet to explore religious devotion (meditation on spiritual matters, expression of love of and desire for God) and political themes, and these uses of the sonnet gradually worked their way into English poetry as well.  Traditionally, sonnets are filled with elaborate metaphors (also called "conceits"), puns, oxymorons, paradoxes, and imagery that draws on natural beauty, precious gems and metals, and the language of religious devotion.  Sonnets are often very "meta-poetic," commenting on the nature of poetry and of sonnets in particular even as they explore their declared subject.  epitaph-- the epitaph is a short, sometimes witty poem written as if to serve as an inscription on a tombstone or monument commemorating a deceased person.  exequy-- an exequy (more often used in the plural, "exequies") is a funeral rite, a ceremony of mourning and burial meant to honor the dead and lament his or her passing; thus, a poem entitled "The Exequy" presents itself as a ceremonial rite of burial or poetic funeral service.  hymn-- a lyric addressed to God or to heroes or saints, usually designed to be set to music and performed by a choir or congregation as part of a religious service  pastoral elegy-- see the study guide on "Lycidas" below  Pindaric Ode (Great Ode) -- review the Norton introduction to Jonson's Ode on Cary and Morison (pp. 1235-6).  meditation-- In Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, Donne pondered the stages of a serious illness he was suffering, exploring each stage of the disease and each experience (such as hearing the tolling of a funeral bell outside his window).  There are 23 stages or stations in his reflection; and each of the 23 is divided into a Meditation (in which he reflects on the meaning of the experience), an Expostulation (in which he addresses himself to God, expressing his emotions in response to the experience), and a Prayer (in which he petitions God to assist him spiritually, emotionally, and physically).  The prose Meditation Donne uses in this format is uniquely his own; it does not follow strictly any of the several methods of meditation used by Catholics and Protestants during the 16th and 17th centuries.  biography / hagiography-- a biography is a prose account of someone's life and personality; it becomes a hagiography when the person in question is represented as a saint, a person of particular holiness and goodness whose life may be taken as exemplary.  essay-- a short composition in prose on a more or less specific topic; the French term "essai" (attempt) was first applied to the genre by the late-16th-century French author Michel de Montaigne; the next person to use the term in a title of collected pieces was Francis Bacon, whose essay "On Death" we are reading.  See the Norton introduction to Bacon.

 
 

On Monday the 8th, the discussion portion of the class will focus on Donne's "Hymn to God, My God, in My Sickness" and Walton's Life of Dr. John Donne.  Consider both in light of the following excerpt from historian Philip Ariès' book The Hour of Our Death (translated by Helen Weaver, New York: Vintage Books, 1982):  [I]n the fifteenth century,the iconography [religious art] of the Last Judgment was replaced by a new iconography that was popularized by the printing press in the form of books containing woodcuts, individual images that each person contemplated in his own home.  These books were the treatises on the technique of dying well, the artes moriendi [or ars moriendi].  Each page of text was illustrated with a picture so that not only the literati [the literate] but also the laici, [the lay people who could not read], could catch the meaning.  For more on the ars moriendi, follow this link to see a painting (c. 1490) by the Dutch artist Hieronymous Bosch depicting how not to die.  Be sure to click on the image to see an enlarged version; also, when reading the text on Bosch's painting, follow another link to two images from a book on the ars moriendi that was probably Bosch's inspiration.  Discussion questions:  1.  Donne's "Hymn to God . . ." is a kind of ars moriendi.  What techniques does the poet use to prepare himself for death?  2.  In what sense does this poem work as a "hymn"?  In what ways does it stretch the definition of that genre?  3.  How do the techniques used in the poem to prepare for death compare to those described in Walton's account of Donne's final days?  In particular, compare the musical metaphor in stanza one and the cartographic/geographic language of stanzas 2-4 with Donne's posing for a portrait of himself in his shroud, his contemplation of that portrait, and his repetition of a line from the Lord's Prayer.  How do these artful methods of self-scrutiny and performance function for Donne?  For the reader of the poem?  For the reader of Walton?  4. In the last two stanzas of the "Hymn," Donne plays upon the tradition of biblical typology, which finds in the New Testament the fulfillment of various Old Testament figures and events.  Typologically, for example, Christ is the "second Adam."  How does the logic of typology help to prepare Donne for death?  5.  In his Life of Donne, Walton presents two epitaphs, one written by Donne for himself in Latin, another written in charcoal by an anonymous "fan."  How do the two compare?  What is the effect of Walton's including them both?

 

On Tuesday, March 9, the discussion portion of the class will focus on King's "The Exequy" and Milton's "Methought I saw . . ."  Note:  King is mentioned in Walton's Life of Donne as Donne's "dearest friend" and the executor of his will.   1. In what ways does King's poem resemble an epithalamion?  2.  King's poem opens with an address to his wife's tomb or grave but soon moves to address the wife herself directly.  Consider the various words and phrases he uses to address her and define what she was and is to him; how do these terms define her? and how do they define the nature of his bereavement?  3.  Lines 61-78 turn temporarily from addressing the deceased to addressing the earth.  How does this section of the poem relate to the rest of it?  4.  How does Milton's poem compare with King's?  Consider the occasion of each poem and the nature of the emotions explored.  Do any of the differences arise from the choice of genre?  Or does the choice of genre in each case seem to reflect the particular kind of emotion each poet is expressing?  5.  How does Milton's sonnet compare with Donne's sonnet "Since she whom I loved . . ."?

 
 
 

On Thursday, March 11, we will discuss both of the assigned works.    Here are some background materials on "Lycidas" and some study questions on both "Lycidas" and "To the Pious Memory . . ."  Milton wrote "Lycidas" on the death of Edward King, who was drowned in 1637 on a voyage from England to visit his family in Ireland.  King was a classmate of Milton's at Cambridge, and Milton's is only one of several elegies that were published by King's fellow-students in a collection honoring him.  Keep in mind that King was training for a career as an Anglican clergyman.   We will focus on two key issues in the study of "Lycidas":   I.  The poem's relation to the genre of pastoral elegy.   II. The identities of the several different voices heard in the poem, and the interrelation of   their concerns with Milton's own concerns as a poet.  I.  "Lycidas" as PASTORAL ELEGY: Using the following description of pastoral by M. H. Abrams as a point of reference, consider how the pastoral mode provides a framework for Milton's elegy:    The originator of the pastoral was Theocritus, a Greek of the third century B.C. who wrote Latin poems that represented the life of Sicilian shepherds.  ("Pastor" is Latin for "shepherd.")  Virgil later imitated Theocritus in his Latin Eclogues and established the enduring model for the traditional pastoral: an elaborately conventional poem expressing the urban poet's nostalgic image of the peace and simplicity of the life of shepherds and other rural folk in an idealized natural setting.  The conventions that hundreds of later poets imitated from Virgil's imitations of Theocritus include a shepherd reclining under a spreading beech and meditating the rural muse, or piping as though he would ne'er grow old, or engaging in a friendly singing contest, or expressing his good or bad fortune with his beloved, or grieving over the death of a fellow shepherd.  From this last type developed the pastoral elegy, which persisted long after the other traditional types had ceased to be written. . . .    Classical poets often described the pastoral life in terms of the mythical golden age.  This term derives from the mode of chronological primitivism that was propounded in the Greek Hesiod's Works and Days (8th cent. B.C.) and by many later Greek and Roman writers.  The earliest period of humanity was regarded as a time of felicity, and described figuratively as an age of gold; the continuous decline through time was expressed by the sequence "the age of silver," and "the brazen age," to the present sad condition of humanity, "the iron age."  Christian pastoralists combined pagan allusions to the golden age with the biblical garden of Eden, and also eploited the symbolism of "shepherd" (the ecclesiastical or parish "pastor," and the figure of Christ as the Good Shepherd) to give many pastoral poems a Christian range of reference. . . .  In the Renaissance the traditional pastoral was also adapted to satirical and allegorical uses.  Spenser's Shepherd's Calendar (1579), which popularized the mode in English poetry, included most of the varieties of pastoral poems current in that period.    (From M.H. Abrams, A Glossary of Literary Terms, 5th ed. [Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1988].)     II.  The many voices of "Lycidas."   Note the various speakers in the poem and their various addressees:    Lines 1-14: A first person persona (whose words identify him as the poet about to compose the work) announces his poem's occasion in an apostrophe to the Laurels, Myrtles, and Ivy.    Lines 15-24:  The poet/speaker addresses the Muses and ponders his own future fate.    Lines 25-36: The poet/speaker recalls the past, remembering the life he and Lycidas shared.    Lines 37-49: The poet/speaker addresses Lycidas directly, mourning the sad reality of the present, from which Lycidas and his music are absent.    Lines 50-63: The poet/speaker addresses the "Nymphs," nature deities who ought to have watched over the shepherd Lycidas.    Lines 64-84  The poet/speaker ponders the difficulties of the poetic/shepherding life and meditates on the horror of youth cut off in its prime.  Within this section, a new speaker is introduced:  Phoebus, god of the sun and of poetry, who addresses the poet/speaker, consoling and instructing him.    Lines 85-102  The poet/speaker addresses the waters that symbolize the pastoral muses, calling them back in order to resume the poem's earthy pastoral music after the voice of Phoebus (which he calls a "strain . . . of a higher mood") has ceased.   But rather than making its own music, his "Oat" or shepherd's pipe "listens" to other voices: first, that of Triton, "the Herald of the Sea," who questions other personifications (waves, wind).  They answer Triton through Hippotades, the god of winds, who (in an indirect quotation by the speaker) explains that the wreck of Lycidas' ship was not due to stormy weather.  At the end of this section, someone (presumably the poet/speaker) again addresses Lycidas, asserting that his death was caused by the fatal unreliability of the ship in which he sailed.    Lines 103-107:  The poet/speaker recounts the words of Camus, the personification of the River Cam and of Cambridge University, which is built on its banks.    Lines 108-13:  The poet/speaker introduces a final "guest" speaker,  the "Pilot of the Galilean lake" (St. Peter).     Lines 132-151:  The poet/speaker returns again to the pastoral mode, summoning back the river pastoral river "Alpheus" now that "the dread voice" of the stern saint "is past."  He addresses the river as the "Sicilian Muse," urging  it to summon the valleys and their flowers, which will "strew the Laureat Herse where Lycid lies."    Lines 152-164: The poet/speaker undermines the beautiful flower-passage just past, saying that we have just been letting "our frail thoughts dally with false surmise," since in fact Lycidas body has not been recovered and cannot be honored with funerary rites.  Addressing Lycidas again, he speculates as to where he may wander or sleep.  Then, he addresses St. Michael (the angel who guards the coast of Britain) urging him to look inland and "homeward" with pity, and the dolphins of the sea, urging them to "waft the hapless youth."    Lines 165-181: The poet/speaker addresses Lycidas's fellow-shepherds, urging them to cease their weeping since Lycidas is not really dead, but "mounted high" by the power of Christ, "him that walk'd the waves."  In the heavenly realm, the speaker insists, Lycidas is "entertain[ed]" by choirs of saints who "wipe the tears for ever from his eyes."    Lines 182-185: The poet/speaker addresses Lycidas, declaring him "the Genius of the shore" and protector of seafarers.    Lines 186-193:  In eight final lines, using the Italian verse form ottava rima (which rhymes ABABABCC), someone else suddenly speaks (in highly conventional pastoral language) and refers to the main speaker of the rest of the poem as "the uncouth Swain."  Questions to ponder for discussion:  1. What psychological, religious, social, and/or artistic functions does this poem serve?  How are those various functions related to one another and to the pastoral mode?  2.  Why does Milton's headnote call the poem a "monody" (i.e., a dirge sung by a single voice), when it contains so many different voices?  3.  What is the effect of the multiple voices?  What do they add? detract?  4.  How does the final ottava rima passage affect your reading of the previous 185 lines?    For an introduction to Dryden's ode on Anne Killigrew, see p. 1822 in the Norton.  Questions to ponder for discussion:  1.  How does Dryden's ode compare with Jonson's on Henry Morison and Lucius Cary?  2.  How does Dryden's approach to Killigrew's death compare with Milton's approach to the death of Edward King?  3.  Does Dryden's praise of Killigrew reflect in any way the female sex of the deceased?  Consider in particular his handling of classical allusions to the Muses.  4.  What definition of the art of poetry, its function and purpose, emerges from Dryden's poem?  How does that definition compare with the idea of poetry emerging from and underlying "Lycidas"?