Course syllabus

Course Information and Outline

Lecturer/Convenor: Dr. Claudia Marquis

Contact details: Room 206-637

E-mail: c.marquis@auckland.ac.nz

E-mail Policy:

I always respond to student emails, but you should not expect a response during weekends.  Please ensure that your email has a proper address and subject line as well as a proper signature.  We do like to know the name of the student to whom we are writing, firstly, but also that you know to whom your email note is addressed. It is also inappropriate to address staff with 'hello there' or 'hi there'  And please remember that an email is not a text message.

 Email is for quick, brief queries and responses. If your email message requires a lengthy reply – more than two or three sentences – you may be asked to discuss your query in person.

 

Summary of Course Description              

R. R. Tolkien is widely regarded as the father of modern fantasy literature. This course asks why, in offering students the opportunity to examine his major, seminal fantasy fictions, The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings trilogy, alongside the theories he himself developed of fantasy world-building. At the same time, we discuss Tolkien’s enduring popularity and ‘read’ some of the recent film adaptations of his texts by Peter Jackson.

The overall aim of this course is to give students an opportunity to analyse some of Tolkien’s most notable works of fantasy within an academic framework in light of his own ideas regarding fantasy world building, but also a variety of other accounts of how fantasy works as a genre.  To what extent does Tolkien exemplify these accounts?  Where and when are his works at odds with them?  Does it matter? 

In this regard, we also attend to Tolkien’s scholarly and critical writing on Celtic and Germanic myth and legend, but especially his work on early English epic and romance.  In particular we compare his own fantasies with his translation of the magnificent, early English epic poem Beowulf, recently published, but composed in the same period in which Tolkien was writing of heroic hobbits, fantastic elves and dragons.

 

Course outcomes

AIMS AND OUTCOMES:

This paper aims to improve the following skills you will have learnt in other English papers in the Department:

     Ability to think critically

     Ability to listen and form sound intellectual judgements

     Acquire sound reading skills

     Improve your skill in writing a coherent and lucid essay

     Gain a firm acquaintance with the Fantasy Genre and Tolkien's texts in particular

Details for Course Summary:

Class test 15% - 1000 words
Essay 25% - 2000 words
Tutorial discussion - 10%
Examination 50% (3 hours)

To earn your 10% tutorial grade, you are expected to bring a question to tutorials and participate in tutorial discussion.  These questions are to be uploaded to 'Discussion' on Canvas, before your tutorial.  A questions solely on Canvas, will not suffice to earn a tutorial mark.

Course delivery format:

3 hours of lectures and 1 hour of tutorial.

I DO NOT tape my lectures -- this is not a podcast class.  So you need to make every effort to attend lectures. I do, however, publish detailed power points from every lecture.

(Timetable and room details can be viewed on Student Services Online)

 Course outcomes:

This paper aims to improve the following skills you will have learnt in other English papers in the Department:

  •      Ability to think critically

         Ability to listen and form sound intellectual judgements

         Acquire sound reading skills

         Improve your skill in writing a coherent and lucid essay

         Gain a firm acquaintance with the Fantasy Genre and Tolkien's texts in particular

 

PRIMARY TEXTS

Any edition of Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy and The Hobbit is acceptable

J. R. R. Tolkien, Tree and Leaf

A small selection from the Beowulf text will be available under 'Modules'.

And, of course, Peter Jackson's films -- Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit.

Remember, though, this is not a film paper, so attention will be paid primarily to Tolkien's writing, both literary and theoretical. 

There will be no essay or examination questions which deal solely with Jackson's films.  Questions on film will necessarily be on adaptation; that is to say the effectiveness -- in their own terms -- of Jackson's film versions of Tolkien's literary texts.

Tolkien's texts -- available in the bookshop.

 

Lectures/Lecture timetable

There will be overlaps between lectures. In other words, a lecture will cover, primarily, the scheduled text, but I will refer to other Tolkien texts in all my lectures.

This is an indicative timetable – not a final one. So please check the timetable again on the Monday before the start of lectures.

Lectures are not taped, so you are expected to attend all lectures and tutorials.

Week 1      7 & 9 Jan

Introduction to Fantasy – Tree and Leaf, (primarily Tolkien's essay ‘On Fairy Stories’)

The Hobbit: Structure and Voice

Week 2      16 & 18 Jan

The Fellowship of the Ring: from Child Size to Darker Fantasy

Hero and Heroism

Week 3      23 & 25 Jan

Class Test -- Close reading exercise

Essay Plan

Week 4      30 Jan & 1 Feb

The Two Towers: Myth, Legend and Archetype

Beowulf

Week 5      6 Feb & 8 Feb

Waitangi Day (no lecture)

Peter Jackson's adaptation  (Essay due, 8 Feb)

Week 6     13 & 15 Feb

Return of the King: Nostalgia and the Ideal Society  (including a brief discussion of Tolkien and the Postcolonial)

Conclusion/overview

 

Course summary:

Date Details Due