University of Houston Downtown 
Dr. Merrilee Cunningham, PhD. 
cunninghamm@uhd.edu. 

(A linked course with Dr. Yvonne Kendall's Renaissance Music Class)
Crn: 21062 Mondays and Wednesday
1:00 - 2:15 p.m.
N. 613
Homepage: http//www.uhd.edu/~cunningm

Office Hours: Almost all the time, but certainly an hour before and after class.
Office Phone: 713-221-8107 
Office: 1038S
Office Fax : 713-226-5205

This course surveys English drama by contemporaries and near contemporaries of Shakespeare with special emphasis on the early Renaissance comedies and tragedies, particularly the tragedies of Christopher Malowe and the comedies of Middleton and Dekker. Then we will study the works of Ben Jonson, masques and satires, as well as the tragedies of John Webster. This is a linked class with Dr. Yvonne Kendall's Renaissance Music course and the class will be expected to take part in a dramatic presentation although no acting skills are required. The dramatic presentation will further link this course, even closer than the co-ordinated materials do, to Renaissance Music. Class meetings will explore Shakespeare's contemporaries, the rise of the modern Machiavellian state, studies of town and court, women's changing roles, reactions to increasing social mobility, and historical events such as the Spanish Armada, the transition from Tudor to Stuart monarchy, and the age of exploration.

By the end of the course, the student should be able to:

1. understand how Renaissance texts function in non-textual ways as spoken work and as one of the major ways Renaissance Englishmen had to allow them to talk to each other about issues of culture-wide importance. (Did we really escape the Armada? Should Elizabeth marry? Should a scholar have some say about the university curriculum? Can an Englishmen be faithful to his monarch and his god at the same time? Should daughters be able to deny their father's wishes on issues such as their marriage?).
   
   
2. know something about the cultural and intellectual milieu of the London theater in Renaissance England.
   
   
3. Be an active reader of English Renaissance Dramatic texts.
   
   
4. Develop further critical reading and analytic skills by reading drama and critical theory related to the English Renaissance.
   
   
5. Trace the development of important modes such as tragedy, satire, comedy, and romance.
   
   
6. Improve writing and analytic skills, particularly the skill of writing literary analyses in essay form, using the conventions of the university academic community.
   
   
7. Demonstrate how to write cogent, extended library interpretations incorporating critical sources acquired through library research and documented correctly and adequately using the MLA style of documentation.

Rabkin and Fraser, Drama of the English Renaissance, Vol. I: The Tudor Period

Jonson, Ben Volpone, Dover Thrift Editions

Webster, John, The Duchess of Malfi, Dover Thrift Editions

Middleton and Dekker, The Roaring Girl (on-line)

These are my personal books, but I will put them on reserve in the library for you.

Bentley, G. E. The Profession of Dramatist in Shakespeare's Time, 1971.

Eccles, C. The Rose Theater, 1990.

Nicoll. A. Stuart Masques, 1938.

Reasonable Accommodation: UH-Downtown adheres to all applicable federal, state and local laws, regulations and guidelines with respect to providing reasonable accommodations for students with disabilities. Students with disabilities should register with Disabled Student Services and contact their instructor in a timely manner to arrange for appropriate accommodation.

Late Work: All assignments in this class must Be submitted on time, even if you are absent. Late assignments are taken at the discretion of the instructor and carry a minimum penalty of 10% of the grade to Be deducted for each and every late assignment.

Individual Needs: I will make every effort to maximize my accessibility to you relating to assignments. I will Be available before and after class, during office hours, which will Be posted on my door, and you are welcome to knock on my door at any time and , if I can, I will see you without an appointment.

Philosophy of the Course: In this course we will approach Renaissance Drama with many questions in mind, some of which are articulated in the educational objectives. We are, first and foremost, a learning community, a community of scholars, and as such we will approach the contemporaries of Shakespeare with a maximizing of the learning experience as our first purpose.

Attendance and Participation: Drama is social collaborative effort. The study of the genre requires the same of the student. Your absence and tardiness will adversely effect the people with whom you are working and your own grade. The class is deliberately limited so that students can enjoy an upper-level experience close to the seminar model. Group activity will Be a regular party of your class work. I take a very dim view of the student who does not participate to his or her best ability in this class and is absent or silent. If you must choose between being late and no coming at all, of course, come to my class late and I will attempt to prevent you from being embarrassed.

1. Appropriateness of response to the topic. (If the essay does not address the topic, the grade is 0).
   
   
2. Appropriate and strength of proofs.
   
   
3. Originality of essay.
   
   
4. Grammatical correctness.
   
   
5. Clarity and rhetorical level of writing style
   
   
6. Detailed textual evidence used in essay
   
   
7. Conceptual sophistication of essay
   
   
8. Adherence to the conventions of academic writing, including thesis, organization, proofs, structure.
   
   
9. Use of correct documentation for secondary sources

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Grades:

900-1000 - A = Excellent college-level work
800 - 899 - B = Good college-level work
700 - 799 - C = Adequate College-level work
650 - 699 - D = Poor college-level work
0 - 649 - F = Failing college-level work

Participation, including any quizzes = 150 points

During several classes, I will give a quiz over the day's reading assignment. To Be eligible to take a quiz, you must Be in class at the time of the quiz, which is usually, but not always, the beginning of class. Students who arrive after or leave before I administer a quiz will not Be allowed to take the quiz. There will Be no opportunities to make up missed quizzes. Quizzes are the instructor's deliberate attempt to reward those who read the assignment before class and then attend the entire class listening to the pearls of wisdom that the instructor and one's colleague have to offer. Quizzes are a wonderful way for a struggling student of Renaissance Drama to level the playing field a little, to help his or her cause, and to use determination and perseverance in pursuit of academic victories.

Midterm - 200 points

The midterm examination will consist of short answer and short essay questions. Before the exam I will hand you a review sheet and study questions. Essay responses should Be organized clearly with thesis, clear support for the answer in a variety of relevant specific references to the reading, and demonstrations of your skills in critical reading and thinking.

Annotated Bibliography - 50 points

The annotated bibliography is due 14 days before the research paper and gives an account of your work on that paper in terms of your sources. I will hand out a template, which will self-correct according to the MLA style as well as an example of an annotated bibliography.

The Long Paper - 200 points

An extended study, due towards the end of the semester, the ticket to entrance into the final examination, but due 10 days before the exam, this is a serious piece of scholarship for the course. Some areas of research interest accompany this syllabus.

Linked Project - 200 points

This group semester project links us with Dr. Kendall's Renaissance Music class and will study the Masque tradition, particularly the Jonsonian mask. We may decide to use Cupid's Banishment(1617), a masque written by women students who danced in the production. We ma decide on Lady Mary Wroth's Love's Victory(c. 1620). We may do whatever Dr. Kendall tells us to do and like it since she's the one with the PhD. From Stanford.

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"Mine honor is my life; both grow in one;
Take honor from me, and my life is done."
King Richard II

You will fail this course if you plagiarize. Plagiarism is the unacknowledged use of ideas(whether paraphrased, summarized or quoted) by a writer who seeks to pass of those ideas as his or her original thought. If you fail to document or attribute a source of the idea, even if you restate another writer's ideas, you have plagiarized. A serious university offense, plagiarism may Be punished by failure or expulsion. Students who plagiarize on the research paper will receive an F on the paper.

To avoid plagiarism, you must document your papers using the MLA citation format. We will not cover this format in class, since it was covered in English 1302, but if you do not know how to document your paper, I would Be happy to teach you by taking you personally through the system. The library has a handout on MLA citations format and directions on citations are easily found on the web. If you do not know how to use CD-ROM databases in the library or in the computer center, I would Be happy to help you with those also. I will provide you with a template that you can download that self-corrects your bibliography to MLA Bibliographical style.

Week I

Introduction to the course; London - Bankside and Shoreditch. The state of the theater before the Tudor Monarchy.

Handout: A. G. Dickens, "The Early Expansion of Protestantism in England 1520 - 1558" Archive for Reformation History 78(1987).

Week II

Kyd, The Spanish Tragedy;

Discussion: The nature of tragedy in early Renaissance England after Gorboduc.

Marlowe, The Jew of Malta

Discussion: Religious satire in early Renaissance England, Spanish themes in English plays. Malta as symbol and the Jew as code.

Week III

Gammer Gurton's Needle

Discussion: Material Poverty and Wealth in Renaissance England, the school play, the boys' theater, and theme.

Marlowe, Edward II

Discussion: Homosexuality and the Renaissance theater, Sexuality and the Courtier.

Week IV

Lodge and Green, Arden of Feversham

Collaborative Writing and The Pastoral Tradition.

Marlowe, Dr. Faustus. Texts A and B

Discussion: Textual editing and renaissance drama; the reformation and counter-reformation, Elizabeth's spy network, the curriculum of the university, scholasticism and humanism.

I will Be happy to meet with you in special study sessions that you arrange anytime that I am not in class. However, it is up to you to organize this study session. I will bring the study guide and myself.

Week V

Midterm Examination

Marlowe, Tamburlaine, Part
Tamberlaine and the hero's will to power.

Week VI

Dekker's The Shoemaker's Holiday

Discussion: Dekker's The Shoemaker's Holiday, Social Mobility, and Marriage as an avenue to social advancement.

Marlowe, Tamburlaine, Part II

Discussion: Renaissance sequels and prequels.

Week VII

Spring Holidays

Spring Holidays

Week VIII

Greene, Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay

Discussion: Anti-clericism, early pseudo-science, and Greene, the thematic Similarities and distinctions of the plays of the University Wits.

Gorboduc (Just to remind ourselves what we would Be doing without Marlowe , Jonson, and Shakespeare, even Ford and Webster).

Week IX

The Jonsonian Masque

Discussion: Music, Hierarchy ("untune that string and hark what disharmony follows"), and the Jonsonian masque.

The Jonsonian Masque

Discussion: Forces or order and disorder in the Jonsonian masque. Jonson, set design and Inigo Jones. The Jonsonian masque, Dryden's "Secular Masque" and the Ritualized Moment. The Wedding Masque Tradition to Comus.

Some of the Renaissance masques or masks:

The Duke of Buckingham's Mask(at court 1627); Henrietta Maria's Florimene(1635; Middleton's Inner-Temple Mask(1619); Heywood's Love's Mistress or The Queen's Mask(Beeston's 1639); Queen Henrietta's Mask(court 1626); Maynard's Mask at York House(1623); A Mask of Amazons(1579 court); Jonson's The Mask of Argurs(1622 court); A Mask of Foresters or Hunters(1574, court); A Mask of Knights(1579 court); A Mask of Ladies and Boys(1583 court); A Mask of Nine Passions(1598, Middle Temple); Jonson's The Mask of Owls(1623 court); A Mask of Seven Ladies(1574 court); A Mask of Seven Warriors(1574 court); A Mask of Six Pedlars(1574 court); A Mask of Six Sages(1574 court); A Mask of Six Seamen(1583 court);A Mask of Six Virtues, (1574 court); A Mask of the Middle Temple(1621 court); The Mask (1624 Palgraves).

Week X

Gallathea

Discussion: Humanisim and Gallathea; Gender issues, the boys of St. Paul's, Lyly's Euphuistic style and Gallathea

A Woman Killed With Kindness

Discussion: The pschology of misogenism and witch trials.

Week XI

Thomas Nashe's Summer's Last Will and Testament

Discussion: Nashe and the Generic Play

Discussion: Shakespeare and Love and John Webster.

Week XII

Webster, The Duchess of Malfi

Discussion: A question of sources in The Duchess of Malfi; The Duchess of Malfi and the Behavior of Women; Marriage and the Upper Class: Boccaccio and Webster.

Webster, The Duchess of Malfi

Discussion: Lycanthropy, Misogeny, and The Duchess of Malfi; Incest, Marriage, Domain, --and Necrophilia in The Duchess of Malfi.

Week XIII

Ben Jonson's Volpone

Discussion: Venice as Setting in Renaissance Drama. Hermaphrodites in Volpone. Cross-dressing in Volpone; Allegory in Volpone.

Monsters in Volpone; The Humours psychology in Volpone; Volpone and the congress of birds; Volpone and Animal Fabliaux; Volpone and Heresy.

Week XV

Practice for Group Project; Paper Due

May 1st. - Reading Days

May 15th. Grades available by web, www.uhd.edu, by telephone, 713-221-2222.