Week 1 (1/10) – Introduction
Course introduction
Week 2 (1/17) – The War in History
Michael Howard, The First World War: A Very Short Introduction
Stephen Kern, “Temporality of the July Crisis” (D)
What aspect of the War or its culture is most surprising or interesting to you, and why? How might you continue to think about it in relation to the literary content we will read?
Week 3 (1/24) – The War in Experience: Vera Brittain and the Loss of Innocence
Testament of Youth
- Ch. IV “Learning Versus Life” Pts. 4-13 (pp. 150-204)
- Ch. V “Camberwell Versus Death” Pts. 1-4 (pp. 205-24)
List of people referred to in the memoir:
- Edward – Vera's beloved younger brother and a soldier in the war. He was a gifted musician and composer.
- Roland – A friend of Edward and Vera's fiancé. He was a gifted poet and intellectual.
- Victor (aka "Tah") – A friend of Edward.
- Betty – A friend and fellow nurse.
- Geoffrey – An injured soldier whom Vera befriends.
- Nurse Hope Milroy (pseudonym) – An admired colleague.
What aspect of Vera Brittain’s experience is the most significant to you, and why? What does it say about the War’s effects?
Week 4 (1/31) – Brittain (con’t)
Testament of Youth
- Ch. V "Camberwell Versus Death" Pt. 7 (pp. 232-36)
- Ch. VI “When the Vision Dies…”
Pts. 1-3 (pp. 239-49)
Pts. 8-13 (pp. 261-89)
- Ch. VII “Tawny Island”
Pts. 11-12 (pp. 339-46)
Pts. 14-15 (pp. 355-61)
- Ch. VIII “Between the Sandhills and the Sea” Pts. 4-5 (pp. 372-80)
- Ch. IX “This Loneliest Hour” (pp. 427-63)
- Ch. X “Survivors Not Wanted” Pt. 1 (pp. 467-74)
Presentation: Destiny Hrncir
Week 5 (2/7) – All Quiet
Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front
What commonalities do you see between All Quiet and either Testament of Youth or Howard’s Very Short Introduction to the war?
Presentation: Steven Maulden
Week 6 (2/14) – The War in Context: Propaganda Posters & The Homefront
Read: Pearl James, “Introduction: Reading World War I Posters” (D)
Look: Review the WWI poster images at McFarlin Special Collections Flickr page:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/mfspeccoll/sets/72157624742434942/
Due: Blog post: Pick a poster from the Special Collections Flickr page, embed it in your blog post. How do you “read” it in light of Pearl James’ introduction? Can you tie it to Vera Brittain’s Testament of Youth?
Field Trip: Presentation of WWI materials at McFarlin Special Collections (2:00-2:45)
Presentation: Aubrey Delammermore
Week 7 (2/21) – The War in Context: Feminism & Politics
Claire Buck, “British Women’s Writing of the Great War” (D)
Read the Introduction to The Freewoman at the MJP:
http://modjourn.org/render.php?id=mjp.2005.00.116&view=mjp_object
Read all of The Freewoman of March 18, 1912 (vol. 1 no. 19), including ads, letters, etc., but focus particularly on Dora Marsden’s editorial “Creation and Immortality” (361-62) and the Correspondence section (373-78). *Remember that this is a pre-war publication when you read it.
http://modjourn.org/render.php?id=1301600832453127&view=mjp_object
Browse or search the Modernist Journals Project (http://modjourn.org) and choose one piece pertaining to suffrage or other women’s issues vis-à-vis WWI, to bring to the group and discuss in class. It can be an essay, a poem, a story, an advertisement, a photograph or other visual art – anything is fair game. Be sure to record the item title, magazine title, publication date, and page numbers of the item for everyone else’s reference.
Presentation: Wendy Voss
Week 8 (2/28) – The War in Context: Race & Politics
Jennifer D. Keene, “Images of Racial Pride: African American Propaganda Posters in the First World War” (D)
Read all of the June 1918 The Crisis (the “Soldiers Number” vol. 16 no. 2), paying special attention to the cover, the Editoral section (59-61), and Fenton Johnson’s “War Profiles” (65). We will discuss these three items. However, you are asked to take notes on something else you found interesting and be prepared to direct us to it and discuss in class.
http://modjourn.org/render.php?view=mjp_object&id=129294798430500
Browse or search for other content related to WWI in The Crisis at the MJP, using the Advanced Search tool. Pick one item such as an essay, a poem, a story, an advertisement, a photograph – anything is fair game – to show and discuss in class.
Presentation: Gail Ellis
Week 9 (3/7) – Martial Aesthetics & The Avant-Garde
Read Mark Morrisson’s introduction to BLAST magazine:
http://modjourn.org/render.php?id=mjp.2005.00.097&view=mjp_object
Read all of BLAST no. 1 (June 1914)
http://modjourn.org/render.php?id=1143209523824844&view=mjp_object
Read all of BLAST no. 2, “The War Number” (July 1915)
http://modjourn.org/render.php?id=1144595337105481&view=mjp_object
Given that BLAST began just before the war started and had a second wartime number, what do make of its changes from the first issue to the second?
Due: Special Collections exhibit project.
Presentation: Alex Barchet
Week 10 (3/14) – War Poetry & Dada
Short War Poems
- Rupert Brooke, “The Soldier” (1915) (D)
- Isaac Rosenberg, “Break of Day in the Trenches” (1916) (D)
- Siegfried Sassoon, “They” and “Everyone Sang” (1919) (D)
- Wilfred Owen, “Dulce et Decorum Est” (1917) (D)
Dada
- Marjorie Perloff, “The Great War and the European Avant-Garde” (D)
- Guillaume Apollinaire, “Thunder’s Palace” and “It’s Raining” (D)
- 291 no.5-6 (August 1915)
(Dada magazine edited by Alfred Stieglitz in New York City)
- Look for other war-related material in magazines at the Blue Mountain Project:
http://bluemountain.princeton.edu/bluemtn/cgi-bin/bluemtn?a=cl&cl=CL1&e=-------en-20--1--txt-IN-----
What do you make of the pictorial arrangements of text in Apollinaire or in Stieglitz’s dada magazine? How do these and the war poetry compare with BLAST?
Presentation: Justin Stanley
Week 11 (3/21) – SPRING BREAK
Week 12 (3/28) – The Waste Land
T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land (D)
In what ways does The Waste Land deal with WWI, and what seems to be its role in the poem’s overall meaning?
Presentation: Kelsey McAfee
Week 13 (4/4) – The Sun Also Rises
Ernest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises (1926).
In what ways has the war affected the characters of The Sun Also Rises?
Presentation: Harrison Brockwell
Week 14 (4/11) – To the Lighthouse
Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse, Part I “The Window”
Presentation: Chelsea Mullins
Week 15 (4/18) – To the Lighthouse (con’t)
To the Lighthouse, Part II “Time Passes” & Part III “The Lighthouse”
What is Woolf doing with the narrative technique, and how does it speak to the War and its aftermath?