John Millington Synge,  The Playboy of the Western World and Riders to the Sea
Brian Friel, Dancing at Lughnasa
James Joyce, Dubliners
     Handouts contemporary fiction
William Butler Yeats, Selected Poems and Plays
     Handouts contemporary poetry

Characterization:

Students read, analyze, and discuss the literature of the Irish Renaissance and trace the development of the Irish literary tradition in drama, fiction, and poetry throughout the twentieth century.

Evaluation Procedures:

Drills, quizzes, one short paper, and class participation.

General Information:

Class hours:  MWF 11:00-11:50
Classroom:   HM 110
Office Phone:  93435
Office:  HM 211
E-mail:  James.Farrelly@ notes.udayton.edu
             farrelly@checkov.hm.udayton.edu
 
 
 

Fiction Assignment Sheet

W 8/23  Introductory Remarks

F  8/25  Joyce Background and Themes
             Read "Araby"

M 8/28  Discuss "Araby"

W 8/30  Read "The Sisters" and "Clay"                           DRILL
              Discuss "The Sisters"

F  9/1     Discuss "Clay"

M 9/4     Labor Day: No class

W 9/6     Read "The Boarding House" and "A Mother"    DRILL
               Discuss "The Boarding House"

F  9/8      Discuss "A Mother"

M.9/11    Read and discuss "A Painful Case"                   DRILL

W 9/13    Read and discuss "The Dead"                          DRILL

F  9/15     Read Fiction Handouts                                    DRILL
                 Scenes from the film, The Dead"

M 9/18     Discuss Fiction Handouts

W 9/20     Quiz I

REVISED FICTION SYLLABUS

M 9/18     Discuss "The Dead"

W 9/20     Discuss "The Dead"

F  9/22      No class:  Stratford Trip

M 9/25      Quiz I

DRAMA SYLLABUS

W 9/27      Introduction to Drama

F  9/29       Read and discuss Riders to the Sea                            Drill

M 10/2       Continue discussion of Riders to the Sea

W 10/4       Read and discuss Playboy of the Western World          Drill

F   10/6       Continue discussion of Playboy of the Western World

M  10/9       Columbus Day: No class

W  10/11     Continue discussion of Playboy of the Western World

F   10/13      Read and discuss Dancing at Lughnasa                     Drill

M  10/16      Continue discussion of Dancing at Lughnasa

W  10/18      Continue discussion of Dancing at Lughnasa

F    10/20     Quiz II

Poetry Syllabus   (The following poems will be treated sequentially with no specific date assigned for each.)

"The Stolen Child"  (Teague)
"Fergus and the Druid" (Stecker)
"Who Goes with Fergus" (O'Donnell)
"To Ireland in the Coming Times" (Farrelly)
"The Song of Wandering Aengus" (Kelly)
"The Folly of Being Comforted" (Jacobson)
"Adam's Curse" (Herron)
"A Woman Homer Sung" (Frock)
"The Fascination of What's Difficult" (Harmon)
"The Mask" (Fiscus)
"The Magi" (Fienning)
"The Wild Swans at Coole" (Fairhead)
"The Phases of the Moon" (Farrelly)
"Easter 1916" (Ellrod)
"The Second Coming" (Dye)
"Sailing to Byzantium" (Dwight)
"The Tower" (Duell)
"Leda and the Swan" (DeCraene)
"A Dialogue of Self and Soul" (Carson)
"The Choice" (Carney)
"Crazy Jane Talks to the Bishop" (Bohan)
"The Gyres" (Birdsong)
"Lapis Lazuli" (Binder)
"Why Should Not Old Men Be Mad?" (Bash)
"Crazy Jane on the Mountain" (Edmonds)
"Under Ben Bulben" (Albert)
"The Circus Animals' Desertion" (Parker)
Purgatory (Farrelly)

Final Exam:  Thursday, December 14, 2:00-3:00 p.m.
 
 

Suggested Paper Topics

Fiction

1.  Explain the significance of one of the titles of Joyce's Dubliners stories

2.  Compare and contrast the narrators in "The Sisters" and "Araby."

3.  Analyze Joyce's use of religious imagery in any one of the Dubliners stories.

4.  Write a character analysis of Maria in "Clay" or Mr. Duffy in "A Painful Case."

5.  How free are the choices made by the characters in "The Boarding House"?

6.  Compare and contrast Mrs. Mooney in "The Boarding House" and Mrs. Kearney in "A Mother."

7.  How is Gabriel in "The Dead" a figure of the narrator of "Araby" and "The Sisters" all grown up?

8   How does the narrator in "The Dead" expose Gabriel to the reader?

Drama

1.  Write a character analysis of one of the characters in Riders to the Sea, Playboy of the Western World, or Dancing at Lughnasa.

2.  Trace the appearance vs. reality pattern in Playboy of the Western World.

3.  Is Riders to the Sea a tragedy in the classical sense?

4.  Is Maurya truly "satisfied" at the end of Riders to the Sea?

5.  Analyze Yeats's use of the supernatural in The Words Upon the Window-Pane.

6.  How does the memory play structure enhance the theme of Dancing at Lughnasa?

7.  Contrast any two of the opposing forces (e.g., pagan vs. Christian) focused on in Dancing at Lughnasa.

8.  Analyze the function of "ritual" and "ceremony" in Dancing at Lughnasa.

Poetry

Analyze a poem we did not do in class.