November 27, 2017

This Week In My Classes: Slouching Towards the End

November 27, 2017/ Rohan Maitzen

I was about to open this post by saying “it has been a tough week” when I realized it’s only Monday! On the other hand, it has been a challenging week if we start it back at last Monday, and since I haven’t posted here since then, I think that’s fair enough.

November 13, 2017

This Week In My Classes: After This, The Deluge!

November 13, 2017/ Rohan Maitzen

I was talking with some colleagues last night and we all agreed that it is going to be hard to regain the momentum we’ve lost in our classes after this unusually long fall break–it’s extended because today is a holiday “in lieu of Remembrance Day.”

October 19, 2017

This Week In My Classes: Erring Women

October 19, 2017/ Rohan Maitzen

In both of my classes this week we are focusing on young women making mistakes. It’s interesting for me (and I hope also for the students who are in both classes) to compare the very different ways their novels approach their rather different errors. Both of them do wrong things for right reasons.

October 12, 2017

This Week In My Classes: Politics and Moral Complicity

October 12, 2017/ Rohan Maitzen

The 2016 U. S. election has given some books I regularly teach new resonance–and not in a good way. In March 2016, Hard Times was indeed “for these times,” with Mr. Bounderby running for President: He was a rich man: banker, merchant, manufacturer, and what not. A big, loud man, with a stare, and a metallic laugh. […]

September 27, 2017

This Week In My Classes: Keeping Up

September 27, 2017/ Rohan Maitzen

The first couple of weeks of the new term are always deceptive: you anticipate them with so much anxiety after the slower pace of summer work, but then for a while, though the logistics are a bit hectic and there are more day-to-day deadlines, it doesn’t seem that bad. But then the first significant assignments […]