Format your response according to MLA guidelines for margins, spacing, name, date, etc., headers, etc. as outlined on my "simple stuff" page. Works cited pages are unnecessary for critical responses; do still follow the MLA conventions for documenting quotations as explained in Q1-4 on my quotations page.

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2.5 Due Saturday, July 19th: Review the list of writers and works on the course schedule. Which two writers or works do you think most important to keep on the syllabus in future versions of this class. Explain your reasoning carefully. If you are short of the 200-word minimum, choose one or more "runners-up" that you would add to the list and explain their particular importance.

On deck: maybe? Email if you need one more option.

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Previous critical response topics—no longer valid for submission:

1.1 Due Saturday, May 31st: address one topic, not both:
a) Explore Wordsworth's central ideas about nature in "Lines Written a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey," including at least four meaningful quotations to illustrate your claims; also note how any of these ideas are borne out in any of the other poems we're reading in this unit, following MLA style for citing poetry outlined in Q4.

b) Discuss common beliefs or ideas shared in the poems we're reading by Wordsworth and Coleridge. Include at least two quotations from each poem you mention, following guidelines for citing poetry outlined in Q4.

1.2 Due Sunday, June 8th: address either option (not both):
a) Open assignment: respond to anything that strikes you as interesting or significant in two or more of the Shelley poems we're reading (be analytical, avoid summarizing). If you're stuck: you might consider which of the first-generation Romantics Shelley seems to have the most in common with, or you might consider Shelley's view of nature or his evident radicalism. Include at least three quotations from the poetry, following MLA guidelines outlined in Q4.

b) How does the Keats poetry we're reading differ from the other poetry we've explored thus far? How is Keats "Romantic" (reread "Romanticism")? Quote two or more poems at least twice in your analysis, following the MLA guidelines in Q4.

1.3 Due Sunday, June 15th: Do one, not both:
a) Open assignment on Elizabeth Barrett Browning: respond to anything that strikes you as interesting or significant in one or more of the E.B.B. poems we're reading (be analytical, avoid summarizing). An obvious topic would be her progressive and/or feminist views (probably not in the sonnets). Include at least three quotations from the poetry, maybe more. See MLA conventions for quoting and citing poetry in Q4.

b) Doing your best to avoid repeating comments from others' discussion posts, discuss Tennyson's portrayal of loss in any two of his poems we're reading this week, quoting each at least twice following MLA conventions for quoting and citing poetry as indicated in Q4.

1.4 Due Sunday, June 22nd: Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is both "so Victorian" and continually, perpetually relevant. Discuss two or more different ways that Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde portrays the fundamental human condition (the essence of humanity), including at least two quotations from the novella for each point (four total, at minimum)..

2.1 Due Sunday, June 29th: Wilde's farcical The Importance of Being Earnest has been described as a "garden of sheer delight, a modern Eden where winter never enters." What is the most important, still-very-relevant social criticism Wilde offers in this lighthearted play? Which targets of his satirical wit seem more pertinent or applicable to his late-Victorian time period than to the twenty-first century? Include at least four quotations in your response.

2.2 Due Monday, July 7th: Address one, or perhaps both only if you haven't submitted any critical responses yet:
a) Compare the samples of radically experimental stream of consciousness we find in Woolf's "Mark on the Wall" and Joyce's "Lestrygonians" episode (i.e., chapter 8) from Ulysses. How do both writers convey realistically the way people's thoughts do indeed tend to flow from one instant or idea to another, and another, and then another, etc.? And then, too, how do the two versions of stream of consciousness differ significantly? What does Joyce do, for instance, that Woolf doesn't? Which seems more genuinely accurate or real, Woolf's or Joyce's stream of consciousness? Include at least two quotes from each work--and feel completely welcome to go beyond two quotes for each.

b) Explore ways that either or both modernist classics, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" and "The Hollow Men," are dramatically different from the literature we've read to this point in the term. Quote the poetry at least four times (total, not for both poems if you do two). You might consider subject matter, style, and/or literary technique, as you see fit: there are no "right" answers, so trust your own judgment.

2.3 Due Sunday, July 13th: Open assignment. Avoiding plot summary, discuss whatever in strikes you as interesting or significant in Beckett's Happy Days. Include at least three quotations illustrating your observations. I'd advise reading a good bit of this week's discussion before writing the response: as you'll see, Happy Days is rather strange!

2.4 Due Wednesday, July 16th: Address one:
a) Open assignment on any one of the Auden poems we're reading, any one of the Larkin poems, or any one of Heaney's. Avoid summary, and include at least three quotations from the poem you examine.

b) Consider how any two or three of the poems by Auden, Larkin, and Heaney can be seen to speak more immediately, or with more explicit relevance, to readers today than those of other poets we studied earlier in the term. Support your observations with at least two quotations from each poem you discuss.