• Texts
• Course Description and Goals
• Requirements and Grading
• Calendar of Assignments

Texts (to be read in this order)

• Austen, Jane.  Pride and Prejudice.  Penguin Classic.  ISBN: 0141439513.
• ---.  Emma.  Penguin Classic.  ISBN: 0141439580.
• ---.  Persuasion.  Penguin Classic.  ISBN: 0141439688.
• Hardy, Thomas.  Far from the Madding Crowd.  Penguin Classic.  ISBN: 0141439653.
• ---.  The Return of the Native.  Penguin Classic.  ISBN: 0140435182.
• ---.  Tess of the D'Urbervilles.  Penguin Classic.  ISBN 0141439599.

Jane Austen's novels emerge from an aristocratic age, Thomas Hardy's from a democratic one--they bracket the 19th century.  While courtship is the major theme, Austen's larger concern is the relationship of the couple to society; Hardy's the relationship of the couple (or the two individually) to an inhuman, natural world.  And while Austen's novels are gently satirical and comic, Hardy's are realistic and typically tragic.  We'll consider the factors, cultural and temperamental, that account for this difference in tone, mood, theme, and formal design.  We'll also try to see each novel as an autonomous creation and a part of a coherent body of work.  Austen and Hardy are perennially popular novelists, film versions of whose work have also enjoyed commercial success.  These illuminate both the world of the novels and the novels themselves--be prepared to meet occasionally through the 11-o'clock hour to watch a film.  (Tentative dates appear on the Calendar of Assignments.)  You'll keep a reading journal, write two essays, and take two tests--with the general aim of becoming a better informed and more attentive and creative reader, whose analytical and interpretive skills manifest an ever greater sophistication and whose writing displays an ever finer clarity of expression.

• Active participation (10%).  You'll be participating actively in this course if you attend class regularly (missing only for official, College-sponsored activities or for emergencies), meet all deadlines, and demonstrate your engagement in the course by contributing valuably to in-class discussions and by scoring consistently well on reading quizzes.  It is unlikely that you will receive full credit for participation if you miss more than two weeks of class.  It is the Department's policy that anyone missing more than three weeks of class (six classes) for any reason will fail the course.  Reading quizzes will come, if they do, at the beginning of the period.  If you are late for class, you will miss the quiz.  You may make up a reading quiz only if you are absent because of required participation in a College-sponsored off-campus event, and then you may submit on the day of your return to class 10 objective questions and answers about the assignment that was due when you were absent.

• Journal (20%).  A brief reflection on the week's assignment is due each Friday by 3 PM.  (Exceptions are Weeks 7 and 8 and Preparation Week.)  We'll discuss in class the content of these reflections and the format.

• Two essays (40%).  You'll write two essays of at least 1250 words, one on Austen's novels (due Tuesday, October 11) and one on Hardy's novels (due Tuesday, December 6, Preparation Week), on topics to be announced.

• Test on Austen (10%).  There will be an objective test on Austen Thursday, October 6.

• Final exam (20%).  There will be a cumulative test on Austen and Hardy on a date to be announced by the Registrar.

• Active participation (10%)
• Journal of weekly reflections (20%)
• Essays on Austen and Hardy (40%)
• Test on Austen (10%)
• Final exam (20%)