For Credit: The Blurb (Robinson Crusoe)

In eighteenth-century fiction, short prefaces and introductions often served the same function that book jackets do now: telling you a little bit about the book to get you to buy it.

[In the Penguin edition ordered for this course, the eighteenth-century "Preface" to Robinson Crusoe is printed on the page immediately before the novel begins.  It's not numbered, but if it were it would be page 3.  Do not confuse it with John Richetti's fine "Introduction" to the edition.  Richetti's essay is well worthy reading, but it is (a) not required and (b) not the subject of this blog post.]

On what basis does "The Preface" to Robinson Crusoe try to sell you this book?  What reasons are supplied to make the reader think it's worth buying?  What assumptions about the reader's desires and interests does the Preface draw on?  Please refer to the specific language of the Preface to explain what you mean.

Deadline: Thursday (9/1), start of class.

For Credit: Fantomina (The Playlist)

Suggest a track or two for the Fantomina (and/or Beauplaisir) soundtrack, and say why you think it's a good choice.  You are welcome (encouraged!) to include links, but unfortunately it is not possible to embed video or audio clips in blog responses.

To get credit, your response must include a thoughtful rationale for the track you suggest.

Deadline: Tuesday (8/30), 5pm.

For Credit: Does Haywood Support the Status Quo...or not?

A few people suggested in class today that Haywood might have been advancing a feminist agenda in writing this novel, and there were a few different ideas about what the content of that agenda might be:

• pointing out the unfairness of the sexual double-standard (that Beauplaisir can sleep around with impunity, while Fantomina has to go to great lengths in order to satify her desires);

• stressing the limited opportunities for women to use their minds and suggesting that greater educational and vocational opportunities might give the Fantominas of the real world a better outlet than chasing men; or

• showing that women have more intelligence and ingenuity than they are usually credited with

What do you think? This novel demonstrates some of the ways that women (even rich and well-born women) found their lives limited in ways that the lives of similar men were not. Is Haywood encouraging her contemporary readers to reflect critically on that fact--or are the inequities of her world simply the necessary backdrop for the entertaining and salacious story she wants to tell?

Please note that you don't have to answer this question exhaustively and conclusively with regard to all four personas! A simple "I do/don't think Haywood is crafting these four personas towards some significant literary end, and here's a reason why..." is enough. If you have more to say, that's great!--but a pithy three-sentence response that bears on just one of these identities will meet the expectations for this blog question. By all means, though, cite some specific text to support your claims (however limited or broad in scope they may be).

Deadline: Tuesday (8/30), start of class. Please note that responses posted before midnight on Saturday (8/27) count towards your Week 1 blogging; responses posted after midnight on Saturday will count towards Week 2.

For Credit: Progression of Identities?

The young woman we are referring to as "Fantomina" takes on four separate identities in her quest to sustain Beauplaisir's interest: Fantomina, Celia, the Widow Bloomer, and Incognita.

What significance (if any) do you detect in this selection and sequence of identities?  Is it just a haphazard array, reflecting Fantomina's imagination, ingenuity, and acting ability (and Haywood's slapdash story-telling)--or is there some greater significance behind these particular identities and/or the order in which they appear (reflecting Haywood's deliberate literary artistry)?

Please note that you don't have to answer this question exhaustively and conclusively with regard to all four personas! A simple "I do/don't think Haywood is crafting these four personas towards some significant literary end, and here's a reason why..." is enough. If you have more to say, that's great!--but a pithy three-sentence response that bears on just one of these identities will meet the expectations for this blog question. By all means, though, cite some specific text to support your claims (however limited or broad in scope they may be).

Deadline: Tuesday (8/30), start of class. Please note that responses posted before midnight on Saturday (8/27) count towards your Week 1 blogging; responses posted after midnight on Saturday will count towards Week 2.

Expectations for Blog Responses

[Please note that this post does NOT have "For Credit" in the title--that means this one is just information, so anything you post in response will not count toward the blogging requirement.]

It may take you a few posts before you get comfortable with writing for the blog. The best way is just to jump in! One advantage of the blog is that it's fairly fast-paced and emphemeral. If you post something that you later realize was ill-informed, or poorly expressed, or just plain dumb, it's quickly forgotten and you'll have plenty of opportunities to put a better foot forward. That's part of the point: the blog exists so that you speculate, think-out-loud, and take some interpretive risks, without the pressure of classroom discussion or the high stakes of a paper assignment.

Blog posts don't need to be long. Just because the question is one you COULD write a three-page paper about, that doesn't mean that you have to! In fact, the blog works best if responses are short and to the point. A few (2 - 5 sentences) are plenty to stake a specific claim and back it up (a direct quote from the text helps!), while leaving plenty for your classmates to say.

It's also okay to disagree: with a classmate, with the general direction of the responses, with the way the question was framed in the first place. The blog is there to help you learn and make better sense of the novels we read. If a particular blog conversation is frustrating you because it seems off-point or not to be going anywhere, or to skirt issues you find more compelling, you can say so!--particularly if your opinion is accompanied with a suggestion for an alternative way to think about the text or issue in question.

And it's fine to build on someone else's point. "Yes, I agree!" doesn't contribute much to the conversation, but developing someone else's idea or taking it in a different direction can be helpful: e.g., "what Pat said about XXX also explains YYY" or "I think Pat's point could be taken even further..." or "I think Pat is right but a different episode explains the point better."

For Credit: The Narrator and Beauplaisir

Eliza Haywood

Note that the story of Fantomina (as we'll call her) is related by a third person narrator.  Some unnamed, unspecified voice tells the story of who Fantomina is, what she does, where she goes.  That narrator doesn't have as much to say about Beauplaisir, but the narrator does, inevitably, relate his role in the story as well.

What is the narrator's attitude toward Beauplaisir?   How does the telling of the story nudge the reader to interpret his actions?  Here are three possible ways to describe the depiction of Beauplaisir:

1. Beauplaisir is a dog, scumbag, player...you name it.  Whatever you think of Fantomina's shenanigans, Beauplaisir deserved to be played like she played him.

2. Boys will be boys.  What can you do?

3. Boys will be boys--but Beauplaisir is a pretty upstanding guy, considering the circumstances.

Does one of these possibilities accurately convey your sense of what Haywood is doing with her male character?  If so, which one?  Or would you like to suggest a different way of understanding this character?  You can start the conversation by writing a couple of sentences to support your choice (it's a good idea to include a quote or two from the story that will back up your claims).  Or you can take issue with someone else's response (kindly and collegially, please!

Keep in mind that the way you judge Beauplaisir may not be the way that Haywood (or the eighteenth-century reader) judges him.  For that reason you need to be attentive to the tone and precise wording of the passages that you consider in forming your response. 

Deadline: Thursday (8/25), start of class.

The First Week of Class

Welcome back to the fall semester! I look forward to meeting everyone on Tuesday (and saying hello to a few familiar faces). Let me answer a few questions right off the bat...

Can I get a copy of the syllabus?

I'll be e-mailing everyone the syllabus, but there's a "Syllabus" link over there in the sidebar in case you need another copy. I'll be killing enough trees over the course of the semester, so you will not be getting a hard copy of the syllabus in class (though you can of course print one out for yourself).

What's this blog all about? How does it work?

Over in the sidebar on the right (under "Course Information") are links to guidelines for how the blog functions as a course requirement and some suggestions for troubleshooting. There's a post below you can respond to in order to get comfortable with the blog. It's worth a point (if you respond you get the point; if not, not). More posts will be available for you to respond to for full credit after the first day of class. Please e-mail me if you run into any problems or have any questions!

Is there any reading for the first week of class?

There is no reading that you need to do in advance for our first day of class (Tuesday), but for Thursday you should read Fantomina by Eliza Haywood, which is available in a reliable online edition. Please print it out and bring the hard copy to class with you!

Why do I have to bring a hard copy of the reading to class? I'll be reading it in advance on my Ipad (laptop, tablet, smartphone, Kindle...), which I'll be bringing with me anyway.

Two reasons:
(1) I do not allow electronic gizmos of any variety (laptops, tablets, ereaders, smartphones) in class: they are distracting and they dilute the shared communal experience of class discussion.

(2) Ereaders serve many excellent purposes, but to get the most out of an upper-level discussion and analysis of literature, you need a hard copy of the text. An ereader makes it difficult to locate passages quickly in the course of discussion, and you cannot annotate and underline (which is helpful when it comes time to write for the course). Many of the course readings ARE available in cheap electronic editions, but you get what you pay for: such texts are often poorly edited, differ substantially from the assigned edition, and make it difficult to stay on track with your classmates as we talk about the readings. If this course inspires you to read more widely in eighteenth-century fiction for your own pleasure, cheap ebooks are a great way to go, but the scholarly purposes of this course require the assigned print editions.

You didn't answer my question here; what should I do?

If the syllabus doesn't give you an answer to your question, you can e-mail me (kwilcox@illinois.edu), ask me after class, or come to office hours (2pm - 3pm Tues. and Thurs., 321 English Bldg.)

For Credit: Is This Thing On?

To get familiar with how the comment function of the blog works, feel free to post a response to this question. If you post a response, you get a point; if you don't, you don't.

One purpose of this post is to make sure that the blog is working smoothly for everyone, so if you run into problems or have trouble posting, please email me (kwilcox@illinois.edu) to let me know.

So here's the question you can answer (in as much or as little detail as you wish):

What's the best movie you saw (either in the theater or on the small screen) this summer?