HUMA 202: Civilization and Literature

Course Objectives

In reading important literary works from a span of almost three thousand years, we will open up our community of learners to include the wisdom of what G. K. Chesterton terms “the democracy of the dead.” Some of the authors we’ll be studying were committed Christians, but two lived long before Christ was born. So one of the questions we’ll ask is how Christ’s coming altered the human imagination. Hang on, because it’s a chaotic and fascinating transformation.

Yet some of the fundamental questions to which all of these authors addressed themselves remain constant: What is a home? How do we get there? What virtues are required to sustain our homes? What is the nature of human freedom? These questions raise issues of community, virtue, and human telos that recur through the millennia. And because we are reading authors who wrote works of imaginative literature to respond to these issues, they each believe that literature is one of the fundamental means that humans have to work out answers to such questions. By the end of the semester, I hope that you’ll understand why.

Grading Breakdown:

Course Grading Scale: A 100-93; A- 92-90; B+ 89-87; B 86-83; B- 82-80; . . . F 59-0.

Required Texts:

  • The Odyssey, by Homer, translated by Emily Wilson. ISBN: 0393356256
  • The Burial at Thebes (Antigone), by Sophocles, translated by Seamus Heaney. ISBN: 9780374530075
  • Beowulf, translated by Seamus Heaney. ISBN: 9780393320978
  • The Divine Comedy, by Dante, translated by Allen Mandelbaum. ISBN: 0679433139
  • King Lear, by William Shakespeare, edited by Barbara A. Mowatt and Paul Werstine. ISBN: 9780743482769
  • Paradise Lost, by John Milton, edited by William Kerrigan. ISBN: 0375757961
  • Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley, edited by Karen Swallow Prior. ISBN: 1462796664
  • Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri. ISBN: 0307278255
  • Remembering by Wendell Berry. ISBN: 1582434158

Recommended Text:

  • The Office of Assertion: An Art of Rhetoric for the Academic Essay, by Scott Crider. ISBN: 978-1932236453

Course Calendar:

HUMA 202A meets in SHAL 114 from 12:00-12:50 on MWF. This schedule is subject to change.

Week 1

  • Monday 1/23: Introduction
  • Wednesday 1/25: Odyssey Books 1-3, 5, 7
  • Friday 1/27: Odyssey Books 9-13

Week 2

  • Monday 1/30: Odyssey Books 14, 16-19
  • Wednesday 2/1: Odyssey Books 21-24
  • Friday 2/3: The Burial at Thebes 1-39

Week 3

  • Monday 2/6: The Burial at Thebes 39-74
  • Wednesday 2/8: Beowulf 1-71
  • Friday 2/10: Beowulf 71-149

Week 4

  • Monday 2/13: Beowulf 149-213
  • Wednesday 2/15: Inferno Cantos 1-6; Virtue Reflection 1 due
  • Friday 2/17: Inferno Cantos 7-11, 13-15

Week 5

  • Monday 2/20: Inferno Cantos 26, 31-34; Short Essay 1 due
  • Wednesday 2/22: Purgatory Cantos 1-6
  • Friday 2/24: Purgatory Cantos 9-11, 17-18, 25

Week 6

  • Monday 2/27: Purgatory Cantos 26-27, 30-33
  • Wednesday 3/1: Midterm (you can see the Midterm essay questions here)
  • Friday 3/3: no class (Westmont)

Week 7

  • Monday 3/13: Paradise Cantos 1-3, 17-20
  • Wednesday 3/15: Paradise Cantos 26-33
  • Friday 3/17: Paradise Lost Book 1; These reading questions I’ve prepared may help you follow Milton’s argument.

Week 8

  • Monday 3/20: Paradise Lost Book 2
  • Wednesday 3/22: Paradise Lost Book 3
  • Friday 3/24: Paradise Lost Book 4

Week 9

  • Monday 3/27: Paradise Lost Book 5
  • Wednesday 3/29: Paradise Lost Book 6
  • Friday 3/31: no class, Christian Writers Conference

Week 10

  • Monday 4/3: Paradise Lost Book 8
  • Wednesday 4/5: Paradise Lost Book 9
  • Friday 4/7: no class, Easter Break

Week 11

  • Monday 4/10: no class, Easter Break
  • Wednesday 4/12: Paradise Lost Book 10, 11.1-125, 12.285-649
  • Friday 4/14: no class, Jeff in Oklahoma

Week 12

  • Monday 4/17: Lear 1-95 (1.1-2.2); Virtue Reflection 2 due
  • Wednesday 4/19: Lear 95-171 (2.3-3.7)
  • Friday 4/21: Lear 171-261 (4-5); Short Essay 2 due

Week 13

  • Monday 4/24: Frankenstein 27-121 (volume 1)
  • Wednesday 4/26: Frankenstein 129-206 (volume 2)
  • Friday 4/28: Frankenstein 211-306 (volume 3)

Week 14

  • Monday 5/1: “Once in a Lifetime”
  • Wednesday 5/3: “Year’s End”; Meetings for final essay must be completed. You can make an appointment for these here.
  • Friday 5/5: “Going Ashore”; Virtue Reflection 3 due

Week 15

  • Monday 5/8: Remembering 1-51; Short Essay 3 due
  • Wednesday 5/10: Remembering 51-103
  • Final will be on Friday, 5/12 from 1:00-3:00.