"Flora," Morris and Co., 1884

This course will study some aesthetic issues important to nineteenth century British writers: what is the nature and purpose of art, who are artists, what constitutes “beauty,” and what is art’s potential, if any, to console or improve our world? Should literature and art be seen as result of “great minds,” or may everyone create them? And should its subject matter celebrate specially preserved, “noble” settings or examine the actual world around us?

Most of all, however, we will ask how poetry, fiction, painting, and the decorative and book arts complemented and cast light on each other during the nineteenth century. We will consider Romantic and Victorian aesthetic debates and discuss poetry and fiction which uses art as a theme or models itself on works of art. We’ll also spend several class periods looking at examples of Romantic and Victorian painting and the decorative arts, and in conjunction with Special Collections, in studying examples of fine book illustration and design.

During the semester, we will study aesthetic criticism by Joanna Baillie, John Ruskin, Walter Pater, William Morris and Oscar Wilde; poetry by William Blake, Alfred Tennyson, Robert Browning, Dante Rossetti, Christina Rossetti, William Morris and Michael Field (Katherine Bradley and Edith Cooper); and novels, prose romances and fantasy by George Eliot, Sarah Grand, William Morris and Oscar Wilde.

Students will be asked to post weekly reading notes on the class web site, compile an annotated bibliography, and prepare a 15 page research paper. We’ll consider illustrated versions of the works of several of our authors, view slides on British painting and the decorative arts, and visit Special Collections to study examples of 19th century fine book design. Time will be alloted for students to discuss a draft of their long paper in class and to make revisions.