#08-374: Satan as Hero

At his fall, "Satan first knew pain..." (Wikimedia)

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Note: Can Satan in any way ever be considered a hero? The answer of some literary scholars is YES!

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Get Ready: What characteristics make a hero a hero, and a villain a villain?

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#08-364: The Rape of the Lock

Arabella Fermor in a 19th-century print (Wikipedia)

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Note: One way to trivialize a potentially serious event is the logical technique called reductio ad absurdum--taking an idea all the way to a ridiculous conclusion. See how the poet Alexander Pope applied this to a social squabble.

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Get Ready: How big a deal would it be if someone snipped off a bit of your hair without your permission?

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#08-355: Ode on a Grecian Urn

Tracing of an engraving of the Sosibios vase by Keats (Wikipedia)

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Note: Some people are just--different. John Keats saw the world with fresh eyes, and left it at age 25, after creating such masterpieces as this poem.

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Get Ready: Which is "truer": one's own experience of a thing or event (say, a mountain) or the lasting art produced of that thing or event (say, a painting of a mountain)? A woman, or the painting of her (say, the Mona Lisa)?

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#08-344: Florante and Laura

Florante and Laura, Flerida and Aladin, in a 2015 stage production (website)

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Note: Two sets of lovers meet in a forest, reminiscent more of Shakespeare (A Midsummer Night's Dream?) than a long 19th century Filipino poem!

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Get Ready: How big a role do you think coincidence plays in our lives, and how much is "fate"?

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#08-342: Puff, the Magic Dragon

A cartoon dragon (probably not "Puff") (Wikimedia)

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Note: This sweet nostalgic story has been a favorite for generations--and it's fun to sing!

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Get Ready: What do we gain by growing up? What do we lose?

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#08-304: The Raven

Illustration by John Tenniel (Wikipedia)

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Note: This is by far Poe's most famous poem, and one of his most famous works in any genre. It is much reprinted--and much parodied.

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Get Ready: How might grief over a lost loved one affect a person's imagination?

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#08-302: Four Long Poems by William Shakespeare

Illustration from A Lover's Complaint (Wikipedia)

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Note: Think Shakespeare only wrote plays, and perhaps sonnets? Think again! He also wrote four longer (and fascinating) narrative poems.

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Get Ready: Why do you think Shakespeare's plays remain far and away his most popular works today, totally eclipsing his sonnets and narrative poems?

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#08-299: The Waste Land

Percival is greeted by the Fisher King, in a story that helped inspire The Waste Land(Wikimedia)

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Note: This modernist poem about the effects of the First World War has its roots in the magnificent medieval story of Parzival (Perceval) and the Fisher King.

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Get Ready: In what ways do modern literature and art differ from that of previous eras?

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#08-262: Una and the Lion

Una and the Lion by Briton Rivière (1840–1920) (Wikipedia)

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Note: Spenser's Faerie Queene works as an allegory, in which each character represents a virtue (or vice). Let's meet a few of them now.

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Get Ready: Do you enjoy a story with clear-cut "good guys" and "bad guys," or do you prefer characters to be portrayed with more subtlety?

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#08-260: Gareth and Lynette

Gareth and Lynette, photograph by Julia Margaret
Cameron (1874) (Metropolitan Museum)

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Note: Tennyson's highly readable Idylls of the King is a stirring revisiting of twelve of the tales of King Arthur, from a modern (Victorian) point of view. "Gareth and Lynnette" is one of the best of them.

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Get Ready: Have you ever been truly frightened of something (or someone), only to discover that in fact there was nothing at all to fear?

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#08-259: Tennyson's Ulysses

The Return of Ulysses, by E. M. Synge (1909) (Wikipedia) Note
his old dog Argos licking his hand (just before dying),
one of my favorite scenes in all of literature.

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Note: We often hear stories of heroes in their full vigor of life, but don't think about what happens to them when the adventure is over. In this stunning poem, Tennyson does just that with Odysseus, a hero in the works of Homer.

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Get Ready: Have you ever read something, or heard a song, or seen a show or film, that you thought was boring, and then--maybe years later--read or heard or seen it again and been surprised by how good it is? What changed, the work or you?

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#08-255: Jabberwocky

The Jabberwock
(Wikipedia)

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Note: Lewis Carroll's poem "Jabberwocky" is a great example of nonsense literature--or is it? Find the sense underlying this "nonsense"!

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Get Ready: What kind of person does the word "jabberwock" make you think of? If someone called you a jabberwock, would you be flattered? Why or why not?

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#08-244: Courtly Love

A lady giving a favor to a knight about to do battle
(Wikipedia)

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Note: Every society has rules that people of various classes are supposed to live by. In Medieval Europe, the nobles were to abide by, among other things, the Rules of Courtly Love.

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Get Ready: What are the rules you follow for the relationship between men and women (or men and men, or women and women)?

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#08-231: Old English Literature

The first page of Beowulf in an old manuscript
(Wikipedia)

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Note: Some people think Shakespeare's language was "Old English." Bad news: that's Early Modern English! Read on to see what Old English is all about.

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Get Ready: Do you know, or have you ever heard, German? Were you aware that English is considered a "Germanic Language"?

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#08-213: "The Hill We Climb"

Gorman reciting "The Hill We Climb" at Joe Biden's inauguration
(Wikipedia)

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Note: Amanda Gorman, a 22-year-old from Los Angeles, rocketed to national fame when she read a poem she composed at the presidential inauguration in January, 2022.

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Get Ready: Do you like to read poetry? Have you ever written your own poems?

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#08-210: Edward Lear

Lear's "Old Man with a Beard"
(Wikipedia)

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Note: Many of us have heard "The Owl and the Pussycat," but the author wrote perhaps hundreds other fun "nonsense" poems.

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Get Ready: Do you know any limericks? They often start, "There once was a man from..." and a place name. Recite some if you can!

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#08-163: Cyrano de Bergerac

From a 19th-century production of Cyrano
(Wikipedia)

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Note: A classic play about a man with a big nose and a bigger heart, as good at swordplay as at wordplay.

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Get Ready: Is it better to be good-looking but not too good with words, or unattractive but a good talker?

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#08-162: The Rime of the Ancient Mariner

The Crew ties the albatross around thee Ancient Mariner's neck
(Wikipedia)

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Note: Coleridge's eerie story of an old man doomed to wander the earth telling his tale or "rime" has left a number of expressions scattered about in our language.

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Get Ready: Do you believe in luck? Do you believe that some actions can change a person's luck?

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#08-154: The Faerie Queene

Prince Arthur and the Faerie Queen
(Wikipedia)

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Note: Centuries before us considered The Faerie Queene to be one of the greatest works in the English language. Though it's not easy to read, it's still a fascinating work today, with many a moral lesson.

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Get Ready: If you were to write a book about morality, what virtues would you consider the most important? Name at least three or four.

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#08-142: Ozymandias

The statue fragment of Ramesses II in the British
Museum--the inspiration for Shelley's poem.
(Wikipedia)

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Note: At the height of the power of the British Empire, British poet Percy Bysshe Shelley offered a poetic reminder that power is not permanent, and that all empires fall.

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Get Ready: Do you think it's the job of poets (or other creative writers) to "speak truth to power"? If not, whose job is it?

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