Length: 2-4 pages, typed, double-spaced (12-point type).⁽¹⁾

Due: On or before Wednesday, 22 March.⁽²⁾

Preliminary report on your first project due on Wednesday, March 8 (Ash Wednesday). This preliminary report is not a hard-and-fast contract but a check to make certain you are more or less on the right track.

The goal of this first paper is to get you to consider and write about Chaucer's culture as it is reflected in his writings. To accomplish this goal you may proceed in one of two ways:

1. Compare a section of a Chaucer work with a known source (for example, the Ceyx and Alcyone story from Ovid with that same story in Chaucer's Book of the Duchess). Be sure to consult the Explanatory Notes in The Riverside Chaucer as you research and take notes on this project. You should also find the Miller anthrology (Chaucer: Sources & Backgrounds) to be a big help in this undertaking. Be sure to develop a main point (thesis) for this essay. That there are similarities and differences between Chaucer's work and a source is not a sufficient main point.

2. Use the Miller anthology or sources in the Introductions or the Explanatory Notes to The Riverside Chaucer to explore some cultural issue that arises in one or more of the works of Chaucer we have read so far. For example: use several examplars--the Knight, Theseus and/or Palamon and Arcite from the Knight's Tale--to explore some aspect of masculinity as constructed through Chaucer's writings. This is not only about Chaucer's intent to depict maleness but also, and more important, about Chaucer's culture and what Chaucer's writings reveal about that culture. You might also want to write about the depiction of women or about class constructs. Be certain that you have a main point that you develop through your essay.

Be sure to quote from the text in this paper and in your second paper in order to establish your evidence for your main points.

(1) My policy on lateness for assignments (other than quizzes, for which I have a separate policy):

(2) Papers are graded down 2/3 of a grade for each class day. If you turn in your paper on Friday rather than Wednesday and your paper is an A paper, the grade will be B+ for the advantage you gained over your classmates for the extra two days (regardless of excuse).

Unacceptable excuses for lateness: printer or computer problem (very common these days); changed topic at the last minute; undocumented problems.

Due: On or before Monday, 24 April 2000

Length: 2-4 pages (not counting Cover Page, Endnote Page, and/or Bibliography Page)

Essay kind: History essay or essay of persuasion, including research, organized around a main point

Assignment: Write a well-focused, original research paper relating in some way to one or more of the works of Geoffrey Chaucer. The topic must be selected no later than Monday, April 10 and approved by me. Changes in topics must be approved by April 17. Several sources both from books and periodicals should be consulted, and at least some sources should be relatively recent, i.e. from the eighties or nineties. I do not discourage Web research, but I do not consider it fully the equivalent of Morris Library research.⁽³⁾

For the topic selection, I want at least a paragraph proposal with as many specifics as you can provide. Like the previous proposals, these will be graded as the equivalent of a quiz and will be averaged in with the quiz grades.

This second essay will be graded on originality of topic, sophistication of treatment, and results from your research. Have you consulted the best sources to write this essay? How exhaustive has your research been? Is this a well-written, well-organized, and pleasing essay?

Some hints to the wise: don't forget the books I have put on Reserve for you. These resources can direct you to other books and articles that might be closer to your topic and treatment of the work(s) you are writing about.

1. This is a revision downward from my syllabus length of 5-6 pages. I revise downward because of the 37 students in the class--considerably more than I expected. Let your thesis and treatment dictate the length of the paper (hence the leeway in 2-4 pages: 2 full pages, 3 pages, or 4 pages).

2. This is the Wednesday before Spring Break, which begins at 5:00 p.m. on that Friday.Turn the paper in ahead of time if you have "quick getaway" ideas.

3. A couple of places to start for Web research: the Harvard Chaucer Page (http://icg.fas.harvard.edu/~chaucer) and http://www.wsu.edu:8080/~hanly/chaucer/chaucer.html.