Honors Literature 11

This course will enable the student to:

• Become familiar with the main examples of literature of the Middle Ages
• Identify & examine the inter-relationship between the Greek epic (The Iliad & The Odyssey), the Roman epic (The Aeneid) & the Catholic epic (The Divine Comedy)
• Identify the Christian virtue of chivalry & its role in Medieval society
• Identify the Christian virtue of courtesy & its role in Medieval society
• Identify the Christian metaphor of the spiritual quest to attain salvation
• Further the study & imitation of these genres: epic, tragedy, comedy, & rhetoric
• Learn to interpret & distinguish the fourfold senses of theological writings: the literal, the allegorical, the moral, & the eschatological
• Trace the effect of the Christian world on the development of the literature of the Middle Ages

Students taking this course for Kolbe Honors (H) credit will have eight papers, a mid-term, and final exam each semester.  Additionally, honors students should expect to have daily reading and minor weekly written assignments or quizzes.

Assignment due-dates and some grades are established by the parent.  To receive honors credit with Kolbe Academy, students must submit a number of designated assignments to Kolbe Academy for grading, usually exams and select papers.  The parent- and Kolbe-established grades are averaged to produce the final grade for the honors course.

Alternatively, a student may enroll in the Self-Paced Plus© grading assistance program to receive additional grading assistance by a Kolbe Academy faculty or staff member on designated assignments in the course.  In this case, parents may still submit grades for the student to be averaged in with the required Kolbe-graded honors assignments, or they may use the teacher-graded materials only to receive credit.

• Beowulf, anonymous, translated by David Wright
• Song of Roland, anonymous, translated by Dorothy Sayers
• Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, anonymous, translated by J.R.R. Tolkien
• The Divine Comedy: Hell, Dante Alighieri, translated by Dorothy Sayers
• The Divine Comedy: Purgatory, Dante Alighieri, translated by Dorothy Sayers
• The Divine Comedy: Paradise, Dante Alighieri, translated by Dorothy Sayers
• The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer, Geoffrey. translated by Nevill Coghill
• Richard III, William Shakespeare, edited by Barbara A. Mowat & Paul Werstine
• Macbeth, William Shakespeare, edited by Barbara A. Mowat & Paul Werstine
• The Tempest, William Shakespeare, edited by Peter Holland
• Hamlet, William Shakespeare, edited by A.R. Braunmuller
• A Midsummer Night’s Dream, William Shakespeare, edited by Russ McDonald
• Paradise Lost & Paradise Regained, John Milton, edited by Christopher Ricks
• Literature of Christendom Lecture Series & Notes
• MLA Handbook Eighth Edition

Optional Materials

Digital copies are provided in the Parent Group of the Self-Paced course.  Physical copies are available for purchase in the Kolbe Bookstore.

• Literature of Christendom Course Plan & Tests
• The Dream of the Rood Poem & Study Guide, Kolbe Academy Publishing
• Beowulf Study Guide, Kolbe Academy Publishing
• Song of Roland Study Guide, Kolbe Academy Publishing
• Sir Gawain & the Green Knight Study Guide, Kolbe Academy Publishing
• The Divine Comedy Study Guide, Kolbe Academy Publishing
• The Canterbury Tales Study Guide, Kolbe Academy Publishing
• Medieval Shakespeare Study Guide, Kolbe Academy Publishing
• Paradise Lost Study Guide, Kolbe Academy Publishing  (Physical copy is not available.)

Self-Paced Plus courses include the following:

• Grading by a highly qualified teacher for selected assignments (listed below) in the course.
• Access to teacher through the course’s discussion board.
• Option to report grade given by the teacher, or to report a grade assigned by parent.
• The pacing is still established by the parent in conjunction with the student’s goals and academic calendar. 
• Assignments will be graded within 1-2 weeks of the submission date, excluding holiday breaks.  (For the quickest grading, students should turn assignments in incrementally throughout the year.  If a student turns in multiple assignments to be graded at once, expect a response time of 1-2 weeks per assignment submitted.)

Self-Paced Plus Assignment List:

*We developed a rubric to assist in grading the paper assignments.  Each paper assignment will have the rubric available for the student in the course.