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The Romantics
Lessons and projects by students and teachers on the works of the British Romantic Movement.
Ode on a Grecian Urn - the poem by John Keats
The poem by John Keats -- just the poem, no pictures, no notes -- with plenty of room for the students to write and take notes. As a lesson, I first divide the students into the number of stanzas in the poem. Then I give them about 10 minutes to plan out how to act out their particular stanza. The only rules are that they must somehow make clearer what the words are saying. They may have one narrator, or they may all take speaking parts -- whatever they think will help explicate the poem. I should say, the story of the poem -- rather than any deeper meaning.
William Blake - Songs of Innocence and Experience
This cooperative in-class exercise has students examine some of the poems from Blake's Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience. In addition to doing a close reading of the poems, they are also asked to rethink the idea that all of the poems in Songs of Innocence are completely, well, innocent. In fact, they are shown sections of the poems that hint at the later, darker, more cynical readings of Songs of Experience.
Eulogy for an Elegy: Thomas Gray's Elegy in a Country Churchyard Group Work
While this group work does engage the students in a close analytical reading of Gray's poem, it also asks them to consider some other issues "about" the very nature of the poem. The students are asked to look at the possibility that there is a patronizing attitude or tone in the poem towards the "simple" residents of the churchyard and comparisons are made with other literature whose authors looked at the "happy" lives of the people who lived their lives unnoticed. This poem plays an important part of the students' understanding of the "realistic" versus the "idealized" pastoral when they look at Wordsworth's "Michael."
William Wordsworth: Eight Poems and Pictures
These poems appear on two separate handouts -- with pictures related to the poems as backgrounds for the text. The first handout contains "A Slumber did my Spirit Seal" and "She Dwelt among the Untrodden Ways." When we discuss these "Lucy" poems we related them to each other as well as to other poems we've read such as Thomas Grey's "Elegy in a Country Churchyard." This handout next has "I wandered lonely as a cloud."
Kubla Khan with your eyes closed - A lesson on Coleridge's poem
I used this handout of Coleridge's poem in a lesson. I begin by not passing out the poem, but instead passing out a blank sheet of paper and turning off the lights and asking the students to close their eyes and put their heads down. Next, I recite (with much flourish, I must say) "Kubla Khan." When I am done, I ask the students to as quickly as they can draw as many images from the poem as they can remember (or one image with detail). After they are finished we talk about the poem -- originating in a dream -- and how Coleridge mourned its passing from his memory, and how what we have is just a fragment of what he said existed. We then pass the drawings around the room. Over the last few years I have also brought to each class a dandelion that has gone to see and talked about how the most of the poem that Coleridge dreamed of disappeared like...then I blow and 1000 dandelion seeds float across the room.
Sadder but Wiser: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner Group Work
A cooperative exercise for 3-4 students, designed to be completed in one class period. This exercise facilitates a close reading of Coleridge's epic poem.It has students examine (or find) specific lines to try and answer some pointed questions about the mariner, the hermit, the wedding guest and the other characters from the poem. It also brings in previous works, such as earlier Romantic poems as well as a play that we've read in class -- The Tempest by Shakespeare.
The Adventures of Baron Munchausen - Movie Questions and Extra Credit - Revised 2009
When I teach the Romantics, I use this wonderful, underrated movie as a bridge between the Enlightenment (Age of Reason) and the Romantic Era. When you see the movie, it almost feels at though that was the director's intention: the Romantic and imaginative Baron versus the forces of reason and reality that battle, and nearly kill him. There are movie questions for three days of viewing in class, as well as an extra credit assignment involving multiple artistic depictions of the same scene from the story of Baron Munchausen, that asks students to comment on those depictions and their relationship to "imagination." Read more »
William Blake - Fly Away: The Chimney Sweep & Lou Reed
This handout has the two "Chimney Sweep" poems -- (combined) next to a song by Lou Reed entitled "The Dirty Boulevard." After we read the poems, I play the song (a slightly censored version -- so be aware here) and students are always amazed at how similar they are -- and how little has changed in what they percieve to be so large a gap in time. The sweep and the street hustler in New York, in the end, both just wish to "fly away."
The Proverbs of Hell - Enough is not Enough
This work which may be done in partners or alone begins by assigning students certain of William Blake's "Proverbs of Hell." This version is actually from a much older text book -- as "The Proverbs of Hell" found in the newer text book was heavily censored. While all students will receive his more well known (and perhaps important) proverbs, the rest of the proverbs are divided among the students. There is a chart for them to fill out to help them understand what is understandable here (and I don't think that all of his proverbs are understandable -- but that's just me).
William Blake - Some poems, drawings, and cartoons
This handout has some of Blake's more famous poems and illustrations ("The Lamb," "Tyger, Tyger") along with some modern cartoons of Blake's poetry. It also has the two "Holy Thursday" poems from Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience. The cartoons are modern and insightful and could be used as part of a lesson explaining how Blake's own illustrations of his poems furthered the meaning and, for the reader, understanding of his verse.
My heart leaps up: An Introduction to the Romantics
This four page handout lays the groundwork for the lesson that introduces my students to The Romantics. The lesson begins when I turn off the lights and ask the students which age this represents (dark ages). Next, I turn on the lights and ask them which age we are in now (they all shout out: "the enlightenment.") Finally, I shut those lights off again and open the drapes -- now, now I ask which age is it -- The Romantics (the natural light replacing the harsh artificial lights of the classroom). Ahhh... a beautiful light and a sense of recognition dawns on them.
The death of the Pastoral: Wordsworth's "Michael" and the lives of "Real Men"
This cooperative exercise designed to be completed in one class period focuses on William Wordsworth's "Michael," a poem about a poor shepherd, his wife, and the loss of his son. Year after year, students tell me how poignant and powerful the poem is -- how realistic. It is a long way from Marlowe's "Shepherd" poem (or even Thomas Grey) and the group work has the students delve into that realism and how it fits into Wordsworth and Coleridge's precepts found in the preface to Lyrical Ballads.
Friendly Confines: Coleridge's "This Lime Tree Bower my Prison" Group Work
A group work on Coleridge's Lime Tree Bower poem. It examines the predicament that Coleridge was in while his friends had the chance to go for an extended walk -- it also examines (through, as always -- a close examination of the text) the opportunity that his friends' sojourn gave him. In addition to the analysis of the text, students are asked to relate (if possible) a similar experience that they may have had - I time when they were left behind - and though at first it seemed a "bad thing" there was also some comfort in imagining their friends' journey.
Roberts Burns - A pastoral poem and a song on a song
The first poem is a pastoral poem by Robert Burns -- very useful for comparing to pastorals by Thomas Grey (ideal) and Marlowe (mythically ideal). It also helps place Burns squarely in the Romantic camp (real lives; real words). The second handout contains the lyrics to the Dan Fogelberg song "Another Auld Lang Syne." I find playing this song while the students write on these handouts compelling in exploring the nostalgia in Burn's lines to "Auld Lang Syne." The death of Dan Fogelberg at an early age adds even poor poignancy to the song.
Flying Away from Mortality: Group Work on Shelley's "Ozymandius" and "To a Skylark"
This cooperative exercise has students do a close reading of "To a Skylark" and "Ozymandius" by Percy Shelley. It is different than most of the group works here in that it focuses on a line by line reading of the two poems, more than asking more general questions about the poems as a whole. It begins with "Ozymandius" and gets students to realize the futility of the ancient king's bid for immortality --
