Part I: Short questions and short essay on a Charlotte Smith sonnet not read or discussed in class. For this section of the exam, you will be expected to employ the literary terms and reading strategies discussed this semester. You will not be asked to scan the poem, but you need to know the conventions of both the English and Italian sonnet. (40 points)
Part II: You will be asked to write one long essay that addresses the material read since the last semester exam. I will add more essay prompts after crowd-sourcing from the class. You are encouraged to bring in a 4X6 card to assist you in writing this in-class essay. (60 points)
Rules for the 4X6 card: you may have a thesis statement, an outline, and short phrases of supporting textual material.
You may not use the card to assist you in Part I of the exam. If you do so, there will be a whole letter grade deduction.
Essay Prompts:
- In your essay, analyze the ways in which both Wordsworth and Coleridge endeavor to create a “new” poetry that they hope will serve a “moral” purpose in an England that they see as sorely in need of an aesthetic “revolution.” Your response should draw upon both Wordsworth’s Preface(s) to Lyrical Ballads and Coleridge’s Biographia Literaria, and at least one poem by each author.
- In your essay, please analyze the depiction of nature and its connection to authorship in Wordsworth and Coleridge’s lyric poetry. You may also discuss the work of Charlotte Smith in this essay but do not replicate material from part one. In short, your essay must discuss Wordsworth and Coleridge, but you can also write on Smith.
- In your essay, analyze the function of memory in literature read since the last exam. While you may certainly discuss the poetry of Charlotte Smith and Dorothy Wordsworth, your analysis must consider the work of Wordsworth and Coleridge as well.
*Each essay should address no less than four works of literature read since the last exam (inclusive of prose and poetry)*