FRS 001A - Sec. 001 - (1 unit) - CRN 75073 - W 4:10-6:00 pm - 111 Wellman
Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice

Instructor: Richard Levin, Department of English, College of Letters & Science

Description: Study of the play will help develop the awareness of the complexity of rich literary language and the subtlety of intellectual and artistic expression. As the play has been interpreted in vastly different ways-for example, as both a defense of prejudice and as a condemnation of it--it demands both the utmost care as we read and also reflection on the reading process.

Format: Our goal will be to read with as much precision and depth as possible, and to explore issues raised in a play central to western civilization's meditation on cultural inclusion, exclusion, marginalization, and prejudice. The seminar will meet for five two-hour sessions. We will discuss the play with great attention to detail. We will move through the play as we go from session to session. Grading: Short papers and e-mails throughout the five-week session, all focused on interpretation of specific aspects of the play (total: 2500 words). Grade: 60% written work; 40% contributions to discussion.

About the Instructor: Richard Levin is a member of the department of English. Many of the courses he teaches are on Shakespeare and on other writers of the early modern period; his publications are in these same areas. He is particularly interested in Shakespeare's career during the latter 1590s, when he wrote such plays as The Merchant of Venice, Twelfth Night, and King Henry IV, Part 1. Most of the Sonnets probably date from this period, and Professor Levin's current scholarly goal is to interpret the Sonnets in a way that sheds light on Shakespeare's dramatic career.