In order to encourage you to reflect on the reading we’ll be doing this semester and in order to encourage communication and discussion between weekly class meetings, I am asking that you do some informal writing on a fairly regular basis. Since writing is a primary tool for thinking, this informal writing should allow you both the motive and the opportunity to think about our reading outside of class as well as in class.

Reading Journal: Many of you have probably kept reading journals in other classes--and this assignment probably resembles in many ways what you have done elsewhere. I will be grading the assignment on the basis of consistent quantity: an average of two substantial entries per week as of each collection date will earn you a 4.0; one per week will earn you a 2.8. I am defining a “substantial entry” as a writing of at least one paragraph or about 150 words which expresses some original thought while also demonstrating an attentive reading of some of the week’s material. You need not write on everything you read in the course of the week--and you probably shouldn’t; instead, you should choose a scene, a character, a relationship, a plot development, a theme, a soliloquy, a dialogue, or a bit of the previous class discussion that you would particularly like to spend a bit more time reflecting on. (I will usually put some journal prompts on the board at the beginning of each of our class meetings, but you are free to invent your own topics as well.) Journal collection dates are included on the syllabus; when I average your journal grade for the semester, I will weight the grades according to the number of weeks between collections.

Please keep your journal on loose paper; submit the journal in a folder, not in a ring-binder or spiral notebook.

Email Discussion List (Shakespeare-L & Shakespeare2-L): If you wish, you may keep your writing to yourself, submitting the collection of entries at each due date for grading. I urge you, however, to make use instead of the e-mail discussion list. By posting your thoughts to the list, you will allow all of us more opportunities to think about and discuss the reading. You will also receive feedback on your ideas and answers to your questions much more quickly.

The discussion list would be a good place to offer your personal reactions to a reading (with an explanation of the source, in the text, of that reaction), to attempt a character analysis, to formulate a thesis about the theme of a work, to continue discussion of a topic raised in a previous class meeting, or to ask questions pertinent to the week’s reading.

Whether you’re writing for yourself in the journal or sharing your ideas on the discussion list, consider this writing as exploratory. (This should be kept in mind by people reading the discussion list as well: we should all be grateful to those who are willing to share their thoughts rather than being hyper-critical of any lapses in acuity that any of us should exhibit in our offerings.) This writing is an attempt to begin to think things through. You might think of both the journal and the discussion list as appropriate places for half-baked ideas.

If you use the discussion list, please make a hard copy of the posts to the list that you want counted towards your journal grade and turn them in with the rest of your journal on the journal collection dates.

The discussion list is also an appropriate space in which to ask questions (substantive or logistical) or to relay information to me or to your fellows. I am asking that all students sign onto the list by Tuesday, September 9 whether you intend to keep your journal privately or not. Those who do not sign on can expect to be penalized. To sign on, send an e-mail from your personal email account to majordomo@oakland.edu; leave the subject line blank, and don’t append any signature. In the message space, write “subscribe shakespeare-L" (without the quotation marks) followed by a space and then by your e-mail address. (Afternoon class: send the message "subscribe Shakespeare2-L", minus the quotation marks.) You should receive a message saying that your application has been forwarded for approval; then you’ll get a message saying that you’ve been added to the list. If you have any difficulties, e-mail me at connery@oakland.edu.

To send messages to the list, address your email from your personal email account to shakespeare-L@oakland.edu. (Afternoon students: shakespeare2-L@oakland.edu.) Your message should automatically be re-sent to everybody in the class who is on the discussion list. Only those who are subscribed to the list may send messages to the list or receive messages from the list; thus, the list is not likely to be a source of spam.

Commonplace Book: Keeping a commonplace book was widely practiced from the Renaissance to the nineteenth century and remains a common practice among writers. A commonplace book is a book into which one copies passages from one’s reading that one would like to keep on hand for reference, passages that are striking for their insight, their style, their beauty, or their embodiment of something significant within the larger text. I am asking you to keep a commonplace book this semester. I think you’ll find that copying the work of another writer gives you a particular intimacy with it and makes it more memorable. If you keep your commonplace book in something durable, you’ll also find that you have produced, by semester’s end, a collection of writing that is both particularly meaningful to you and offers a good record of your dabbling in Shakespeare for fifteen weeks. A commonplace book can also come in handy when you’re doing your own writing and looking for a good line from elsewhere to add humor, erudition, sophistication, or wisdom. Many students have also found it an invaluable study aid.

Like the journal, your commonplace book will be graded upon consistent quantity. An average of twenty lines per week will earn you a 4.0; ten lines, a 2.0. (You may choose to transcribe 20 one-line passages or one 20-line passage, or any combination in between.) As you transcribe, be sure to reproduce the passage exactly, including spelling and punctuation and, if the passage is in verse, line breaks. Close each transcription with the name of the character, the title of the play, and act, scene, and line numbers, to allow you to find your original source if you need to.

I would like you to organize your commonplace book by topics. Choose six to ten topics that you think Shakespeare is likely to have something to say about in the plays we read and divide your commonplace book accordingly. You may also have one section for Miscellaneous passages. Look particularly carefully for passages that address your topics and transcribe those passages which you like best into the appropriate section of your commonplace book. You may find that some of these sections will be useful as you prepare to write the essays on the midterm and final examinations. Some topics that you might consider including in your commonplace book are Love, Courtship, Marriage, Jealousy, Age and Aging, Ambition, Gender Equity and Women’s Roles, Honor, Virtue, Justice, Mercy and Forgiveness, Fate, Nature, Errors, Youth, Human Nature, Deceit, Lies, Identity, Family, and Parenthood.

You may keep your commonplace book on looseleaf in a folder or in a blank book.

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