Choose one of the following topics

1. “Love is a battlefield”: Focussing on works since the midterm, discuss the differing views of love presented by Renaissance authors.

2. “Sympathy for the devil”: Again, looking at works since the midterm, compare presentations of the devil, or the dark side generally.

3. “We don’t need another hero”: Once again, looking at works since the midterm (though you may, for comparison, refer to earlier works) discuss the changing values represented by the presentation of the hero in works we have studied.

All of these should be MINIMUM 750 words – more reasonably, aim for 1000 plus. You should be able to discuss three works for any of these topics, but may get away with two in depth with reference to others.

You may bring an outline to the exam and hand it in with your exam paper.

I haven’t seen it yet, and am not sure I want to. I’d rather like to go with my 280 students and sit in the back and be silly and throw things, but I think we’re all mired in writing papers and marking papers and just Getting Through the next few weeks. Maybe we’ll go – we’ll see.

Anyway, I thought you might be interested to read a few responses from the scholars of Old English and/or Medieval studies on my blogroll.

Dr Virago calls it similar to a student’s B- paper, which I think is a very good analogy. Something that has good intentions and some ideas but fails in the application.

Michael Drout, on Wormtalk and Slugspeak, has rather the opposite reaction: he thinks there are some marvellous visuals (naked Angelina Joli being one) but that the themes are tedious and cliche.

Richard Nokes is still waiting for the Great Beowulf Film. He seems to quite like the theme (of narrative unreliability) but didn’t seem to like much else except Angelina Jolie’s prehensile tail braid.

If you were counting on having a chance to make up for bad work in this next one, you may redo or submit ONE entry out of the four to help boost your mark. I will now be calculating your journal mark based on the best THREE instead of the best four.

When I return your 4th assignment next week, I will give you the total mark for the journal assignment.

This journal is intended to help you practice skills that you will need for the final paper. You will be assigned* one of the articles in the Signet edition of the play (if you don’t have a copy, that’s your problem, not mine: I ordered this text deliberately so that the articles would be available for you. However, I own a copy, and many of your classmates will have one – it will be possible for you to borrow a copy and photocopy an article. Not having the text is NOT an excuse for not doing the essay assigned)

Write a brief (BRIEF!!) summary – or, even better, an abstract, if you know how – of the main idea/points of the article. This should be no more than a paragraph or two. Then, in at least one paragraph each, a) choose the point that you find the most compelling, and, with evidence from the text, explain why, expand on it or introduce more support for it from your own reading, and b) choose the point that you find least convincing or interesting, and explain why, with evidence from the text, proposing a counter argument or refutation.

Do: treat the author of the article with respect. To get an article of this kind published is difficult. You can assume he or she knows what he or she is talking about. You may think the argument is wrong, but be prepared to argue against it in an intelligent way. Even if the overall argument is unconvincing, there should be one or two good points.

Don’t: skimp on your own interpretation, fail to support your own argument or call the author of the article “ignorant” or other such epithets. Don’t complain that the article is too long and wordy. There is a level of discourse in academia that you need to be familiar with and work with, not against.

*If you were in class, your name is on the handout with the last name of an author next to it. If you were not in class, you’ll have to contact me or a classmate to find out which one you’ve been assigned. “I didn’t know” is not an acceptable excuse.