【英史assignment #2】Primitive Encounters: Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness (deadline: 4/10)

In Heart of Darkness, Marlow recounts his adventures as a steamer captain in Congo. He hears rumors about Kurtz, becomes fascinated with this charismatic agent, and journeys to the interior of Africa to meet him. Later Marlow finds out that Kurtz has yielded to "savagery," living and ruling as a god, indulging in cannibalism and unspeakable rituals. The story ends with Marlow's return to lie to Kurtz's devoted fiancée (the Intended), in order to save Kurtz's reputation and give her something to live for.

For this assignment, you are asked to analyze the characters in the story. Please choose one from the following characters and analyze it with 200-250 words, cite pertinent texts if necessary.

1) the two women who "knitted black wool feverishly"
2) the doctor who is eager to measure Marlow's crania
3) the Company's chief accountant who is sartorially savvy and who has trained a native woman to do laundry for him
4) the manager who never ills
5) the savage woman who appears as Kurtz is being carried onto the steamboat
6) the Russian harlequin who is Kurtz's "last disciple"
7) the fiancée who "carried her sorrowful head as though she were proud of that sorrow, as though she would say, I--I alone know how to mourn for him as he deserves"

【文讀assignment #1】The Lure of the Object (deadline: 4/8)

A "lure" is something that tempts or attracts with the promise of pleasure or reward. An "object" is something perceptible by one or more of the senses, especially by vision or touch. In poems ranging from Keats' "Ode on a Grecian Urn" to Stevens' "Anecdote of the Jar" and Williams' "The Red Wheelbarrow," the lure of the object constitutes the major theme. For these poets, commonplace or ordinary objects have something attractive that needs to be teased out, expanded and amplified. This obsession with the ordinary objects runs against the conventional idea that everyday object is boring, quotidian, and anything but poetic.

Use 200-250 words to analyze these poems; you can either focus on one poem or do a comparative analysis: how do these poets bestow magical powers on an otherwise banal object? How does this fascination with and depiction of everyday objects help you re-see the world around you?

第十八屆女性影展 [歡慶38‧女影接力賽] + 3/9 選片指南座談會

2012/3/10(六)-3/11(日) 第18屆女性影展 [歡慶38‧女影接力賽]

◎ 放映時間: 3月10日(週六)~3月11日(週日) 1:30 pm 準時放映

◎ 放映地點: 國立東華大學人社一館第一講堂(文一講堂)

◎ 入場方式: 免費入場



3/9 (五) 18:30-20:30 pm

【身體、創傷與性別－選片指南座談會】

地點：國立東華大學人社一館 A207室 (文A207)

講師：諮商與臨床心理學系　劉志如教授

　　　　英美語文學系　　　許甄倚教授

　　　　英美語文學系　　　王君琦教授



3/10 (六) 13:30 pm 開始放映 / 人社一館第一講堂

【311-生生長流】

【 紅褲與我】

【 媽咪情懷總是濕 】

【危險假期】

【暴力毛線團】

【游擊女孩搞破壞】



3/11 (日) 13:30 pm 開始放映 / 人社一館第一講堂

【換我來說】

【在路上】

【媽呀!我有了!】

【一江春水向海流】

歡迎踴躍參加，一同歡慶38！

影展片單介紹

【英史assignment #1】D. H. Lawrence: the call of the wild & the urge to go back to nature (deadline: 3/21, 12 a.m.)

This Wednesday we talked about D. H. Lawrence's project of cultural regeneration, which involves a re-evaluation of our relationship with nature and with our own bodies. His attack on technological and industrial modernity works alongside his advocacy of organic ways of living which will help us to recapture a pre-modern, or even "primitive," relationship with nature and with sexuality. It is an awareness of a new self that stays away from the contamination of the cerebral-analytical-rational consciousness. Creative imagination and a sensual communion with the natural world can only be obtained when we trust the power of our instincts and reconnect with our primeval sources.

Questions for your assignment (choose one from the following questions and answer it with 200-250 words):

1) In "Why the Novel Matters," Lawrence argues that the novel is valuable because it can reveal "life" to us. What does he mean by the word "life"?

2)In "The Horse Dealer's Daughter," the pond is an ambiguous symbol which hovers between life and death, rebirth and destruction. What does this symbolism have to do with the changing relationship between Mabel and Dr. Fergusson?