• Ghose Indira

In this seminar we will be looking at three Restoration comedies: William Wycherley's The Country Wife (1675), George Etherege's The Man of Mode (1676), and Aphra Behn's The Rover (1677). We will combine a close reading of the literary text with a look at the relationship between theatre and society during the period.

Credit requirements are regular attendance, active participation, class presentations, and an end of term paper of 4000 words. More than two unexcused absences disqualify students from gaining credit.

The number of students in this course is limited to twenty. Only the first twenty students to register will be accepted as participants.

On successful completion of the course, students will have acquired in-depth knowledge of three classics of seventeenth-century English literature, and have gained familiarity with the genre of Restoration comedy. They will have engaged in close analysis of the texts in class. They will have learned to evaluate texts critically in the form of research papers and to use both textual evidence and secondary sources to develop scholarly arguments.

All three plays are included in the following edition:

Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Comedy, ed. Scott McMillin, A Norton Critical Edition, 2nd. ed. (New York: W. W. Norton, 1997)

Please note: only scholarly print editions are acceptable. Online versions will not be accepted in class.