Introduction to the Novel: Reports

Below are a number of possible topics for our brief reports and a schedule of dates for reports. You may well not know a thing about the topic you choose; that is the point: to find out about a subject and present it in an entertaining and intelligent manner to the rest of us. We will generate some other topics in class, such as "frame stories."


3/2     Close Reading Defoe Panel		Matt H., Pam, Stacey, Melissa

3/9     Mary Shelley's Life			Meagan
3/11    Frame narratives			Bridget
3/13    Gothic					Sarah E.

3/16    
3/20 	Frankenstein through film		Chris

3/23	Irony					Ann Garber
3/25    Charlotte Bronte			Kristyn
	detective fiction/bildungsroman		Jamaal
3/27 [not available]

4/1						John, Emily
4/3						Danielle

Spring Break

4/13    Joseph Conrad				Kathleen C.
4/15						Daniell V.
4/17    Conrad   (Scenes from Apocalypse Now)

4/20    					
4/22    					
4/24						Jim, Kathy D.    

						Paper panel: 
						Becky, Karen, Anna

4/27    Zora Neale Hurston			bio: Sabriyah	
4/29    					reception: Toni
5/1     History & Their Eyes			

5/4     					
5/8  Harlem Renaissance   			Kathryn Howell

5/11     Jean Rhys--Biography			Heather
		   primogeniture		Andrea
5/13	narrators/stream of consciousness 	Michelle
						Johanna
5/18	timeline				Mike    

Reports should be brief presentations to the class on a subject of interest to the class. Do not read your report or simply quote from an outside source.

Alternatively, you can come up with your own idea for a presentation. (All kinds of relevant, creative, and thoughtful presentations are encouraged.) You might report on modern movie versions of Frankenstein, for instance. You may also pair up to do a report.

Recommended reference book for literary terms: M.H. Abrams, A Glossary of Literary Terms (available at Morris Library in the reference department, PN41.A184 1993).

List of Literary Terms

ambiguity
anti-climax/climax
bildungsroman
biography/autobiography/memoir/diary
character
criticism
defamiliarization/estrangement
denotation/connotation
detective fiction
dialect
dialectical thinking
discourse
denouement
deus ex machina
description
epigraph
epistolary
eponymous
form/content
framing
free indirect discourse.
gothic
hegemony
historical novel
ideology
irony
literary canon
metaphor
unreliable narrators
omniscient narrators
first-person narrators
plot 
point of view
prolepsis/foreshadowing
roman � clef
roman � theses
speech act
stock character
stream of consciousness

Return