Do the Right Thing (English 100Y)

Prof. Ben Parker (benjamin_parker@brown.edu)

Class meetings: 2-2:50 Monday, Wednesday, Friday in List Art Center 110
Office hours: 10 to 12, Thursdays
Office: 70 Brown St, Room 336

Course Description: An examination of literary works as developing our modern framework of

moral values, along the way taking up questions of temptation, corruption, punishment,
redemption, and responsibility. We will start with Christian allegorical texts, complicate the
picture with 19th century psychological fiction, and conclude with some masterpieces of art
cinema.

Further Introductory Comment: Being a good person is not a prerequisite for the class. Neither
does this class pretend we can learn morality from books. But someone who does not “see” the
moral dimension of life will just be confused, as if the most important information is being left
out somehow. Meanwhile, being able to follow the moral dimension of these works will lead us
back into the historical development of literary forms which accommodate moral thought. The
basic idea is that modern morality is a problem of vocabulary, of articulation, and of
representation. Literary works do not simply present “case studies” of good or bad actions.
Rather, the shape of literary meaning as it changes over time is connected to important moral
questions, which can hardly be posed without the problems that literature allows us to see.

Books:
Shakespeare, Hamlet
Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress (Oxford)
Balzac, Père Goriot (Norton)
Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment (Vintage)
Wharton, Age of Innocence (Oxford)

Films on Course Reserve:

Curtiz, Casablanca
Farhadi, A Separation

Schedule of class meetings:

Week 1: Course introduction
Weeks 2, 3: Hamlet
Week 4: The Pilgrim’s Progress
Weeks 5, 6: Père Goriot
Weeks 7, 8, 9: Crime and Punishment
Weeks 10, 11: The Age of Innocence
Week 12: Casablanca / A Separation

Assignments and grading:

Two 4-5 page papers (50%)
Final exam (30%) May 8, 9 a.m.
Discussion section—participation and response papers (20%)

Course objectives:
• To situate major authors, genres, and individual works in the historical trajectory of
modern moral thought, as worked out in literature.
• To introduce the specific methods of studying literature, e.g. close reading, what counts
as literary argument and evidence; as well as the specific vocabulary of scholars and
critics.
• Specifically, we will learn the features of and issues around tragedy, allegory, closet
drama, the novel of manners, realism, the psychological novel, and the art film.

Policies:
• No computers in class without accommodation letter.
• No phones ever.
• You are expected to attend every class.
• Penalties for late papers are a mark down (A to B, B to C) the first day it’s late, and
another mark for every week after. But! You can and should ask for an extension (at
least five days before), to avoid this whole mess. Papers are due in hard-copy on the
assigned date, in class.
• Please come by my office hours to discuss your paper ideas or any other questions you
might have. For questions/complaints about the grade on your paper, please wait 48
hours before emailing or lodging a protest. I have never changed a grade on a paper, but
I look forward to talking about your ideas and your writing with you.
• Plagiarized work will be failed. What a waste of everyone’s time! Don’t do it.

Course commitments:
All courses at Brown require a time commitment of ~180 hours. The expectation is that
students will spend 3 hours per week in class (39 total); the reading is about 100-160 pages a
week, or ~8 hours (96 total); responses and preparation for discussion section is another hour
(13 total); the papers should require 8 hours each (24 total); studying for the exam should take
about 5 hours; and the exam itself will take about 4 hours.