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Medieval to Renaissance English Literature
This course gives you the opportunity to discover some of the most significant earlier works of English literature in their social and historical contexts, including Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, Edmund Spenser’s The Faerie Queene, and Shakespeare’s Sonnets. Taking you from the mythical court of King Arthur to the real world of ambition, intrigue, and danger in the courts of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I, the course introduces you to texts in a range of genres (romance, epic, fabliau, etc) and poetic forms. The works studied express some of the period’s highest ideals—‘trawthe’ or integrity, holiness—as well as exploring some of humanity’s darkest impulses: greed, deception, revenge, and aggressive sexual desire. You will develop your skills in close reading of earlier forms of English as well as tackling some of the critical themes broached by these texts, including the value and power of literature itself.