ENGLISH.
The courses outlined, in accordance with the program of most high schools,
take into account English, (1) as a language, (2) as a means of expression,
(3) as a literature—all so intimately connected, however, that the proper study
of each will bear indirectly on the other two.
English A. Grammar and Grammatical Analysis.—The parts of speech
with inflections and uses of each; syntax, especially of nouns, verbs, and conjunctions;
detailed study of sentence-structure, including capitalization and
punctuation. Textbook recommended: Bakerville and Sewell's English
Grammar. Grammar and analysis might well be taught through two years of
the high school. (One unit.)
English B. Composition and Rhetoric.—The choice, arrangement, and
connection of words, with exercises on synonyms, antonyms, and degrees and
shades of meaning; fundamental qualities of style, with selected and original
examples; the sentence in detail as to unity, coherence, and proportion, with
ample exercises in constructing sentences of varied types and emphasis; the
paragraph with reference to the placing of the topic and to the attainment of
unity, continuity, and emphasis, with abundant exercises in composing good
paragraphs; much practice in planning and writing simple compositions on
familiar subjects under the heads of narration, description, exposition, and
argumentation. Textbook recommended: Brooks and Hubbard's Composition-Rhetoric.
Practice in composition should continue through the entire high-school
course, though formal rhetoric may be studied but one year. (One unit.)
English C. Critical Study of Selected Specimens of English Literature.—The
specimens for reading and study designated for college entrance
requirements by the joint committee of colleges and secondary schools. These
required books or their equivalents should be studied throughout the high-school
course under the guidance of the instructor. Parallel reading should
be encouraged and intelligent conversation about books directed. (One unit.)
The college entrance requirements in English for 1913-1919, inclusive, are:
A. Reading.
The aim of this part of the requirement is to foster in the student the
habit of intelligent reading and to develop a taste for good literature by giving
him a first-hand knowledge of some of its best specimens. He should read
the books carefully, but his attention should not be so fixed upon details that
he fails to appreciate the main purpose and charm of what he reads.
With a view to large freedom of choice, the books provided for reading
are arranged in the following groups, from each of which at least two selections
are to be made, except as otherwise provided under Group 1:
Classics in Translation.
Group 1: The Old Testament, comprising at least the chief narrative episodes
in Genesis, Exodus, Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, and Daniel, together
with the books of Ruth and Esther; The Odyssey, with the omission, if desired,
of Books I, II, III, IV, V, XV, XVI, XVII; The Iliad, with the omission, if
desired, of Books XI, XIII, XIV, XV, XVII, XXI; The Æneid. The Odyssey,
Iliad, and Æneid should be read in English translations of recognized literary
excellence.
For any selection from this group, a selection from any other group may be
substituted.
Shakespeare.
Group 2: Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Merchant of
Venice, As You Like It, Twelfth Night, The Tempest, Romeo and Juliet, King
John, Richard II, Richard III, Henry V, Coriolanus, Julius Caesar, Macbeth,
Hamlet (if chosen for study under B).
Prose Fiction.
Group 3: Malory's Morte d'Arthur (about 100 pages); Bunyan's Pilgrim's
Progress, Part I; Swift's Gulliver's Travels (voyages to Lilliput and to Brobdingnag);
Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, Part I; Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield;
Frances Burney's Evelina; any one of Scott's Novels; any one of Jane Austen's
Novels; Maria Edgeworth's Castle Rackrent or The Absentee; any one of
Dickens' Novels; any one of Thackeray's Novels; any one of George Eliot's
Novels; Mrs. Gaskell's Cranford; Kingsley's Westward Ho! or Hereward,
the Wake; Reade's The Cloister and the Hearth; Blackmore's Lorna Doone;
Hughes' Tom Brown's Schooldays; Stevenson's Treasure Island or Kidnapped
or Master of Ballantrae; any one of Cooper's Novels; a selection of Poe's
Tales; Hawthorne's The House of the Seven Gables or Twice-Told Tales or
Mosses from an Old Manse: a collection of Short Stories by various standard
writers.
Essays, Biography, Etc.
Group 4: Addison and Steele's The Sir Roger de Coverley Papers or
selections from the Tatler and the Spectator (about 200 pages); selections from
Boswell's Life of Johnson (about 200 pages); Franklin's Autobiography;
selections from Irving's Sketch Book (about 200 pages) or his Life of Goldsmith;
Southey's Life of Nelson; selections from Lamb's Essays of Elia
(about 100 pages); selections from Lockhart's Life of Scott (about 200 pages);
Thackeray's lectures on Swift, Addison, and Steele, in the English Humorists;
any one of the following essays of Macaulay: Lord Clive, Warren Hastings,
Milton, Addison, Goldsmith, Frederick the Great, Madame d'Arblay; selections
from Trevelyan's Life of Macaulay (about 200 pages); Ruskin's Sesame and
Lilies or selections from Ruskin's works (about 150 pages); Dana's Two
Years Before the Mast; selections from Lincoln's works, including at least the
two Inaugurals, the speeches in Independence Hall and at Gettysburg, the Last
Public Address, the Letter to Horace Greeley, together with a brief memoir
or estimate of Lincoln; Parkman's
The Oregon Trail; Thoreau's
Walden;
selections from Lowell's essays (about 150 pages); Holmes'
The Autocrat of
the Breakfast Table; Stevenson's
An Inland Voyage and
Travels with a
Donkey; Huxley's
Autobiography and selections from
Lay Sermons, including
the addresses
On Improving Natural Knowledge, A Liberal Education, and
A
Piece of Chalk; a collection of Essays by Bacon, Lamb, DeQuincey, Hazlitt,
Emerson and later writers; a collection of Letters by various standard writers.
Poetry.
Group 5: Palgrave's Golden Treasury (First Series), Books II and III,
with special attention to Dryden, Collins, Cowper, and Burns; Palgrave's
Golden Treasury (First Series), Book IV, with special attention to Wordsworth,
Keats, and Shelley (if not chosen for study under B); Goldsmith's
The Traveller and The Deserted Village; Pope's The Rape of the Lock; a collection
of English and Scottish Ballads, as, for example, some Robin Hood
ballads, The Battle of Otterburn, King Estmere, Young Beichan, Bewick and
Grahame, Sir Patrick Spens, and a selection from later ballads; Coleridge's
The Ancient Mariner, Christabel, and Kubla Khan; Byron's Childe Harold,
Canto III or IV, and The Prisoner of Chillon; Scott's The Lady of the Lake
or Marmion; Macaulay's The Lays of Ancient Rome, The Battle of Naseby,
The Armada, Ivry; Tennyson's The Princess or Gareth and Lynette, Lancelot
and Elaine, and The Passing of Arthur; Browning's Cavalier Tunes, The Lost
Leader, How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix, Home
Thoughts from Abroad, Home Thoughts from the Sea, Incident of the French
Camp, Hervé Riel, Pheidippides, My Last Duchess, Up at a Villa—Down in the
City, The Italian in England, The Patriot, The Pied Piper, "De Gustibus,"
Instans Tyrannus; Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum and The Forsaken Merman;
selections from American poetry, with special attention to Poe, Lowell, Longfellow,
and Whittier.
B. Study.
This part of the requirement is intended as a natural and logical continuation
of the student's earlier reading, with greater stress laid upon form and
style, the exact meaning of words and phrases, and the understanding of allusions.
The books provided for study are arranged in four groups, from each
of which one selection is to be made:
Drama.
Group 1: Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, Macbeth, Hamlet.
Poetry.
Group 2: Milton's L'Allegro, Il Penseroso, and either Comus or Lycidus;
Tennyson's The Coming of Arthur, The Holy Grail, and The Passing of
Arthur; the selections from Wordsworth, Keats, and Shelley, in Book IV of
Palgrave's
Golden Treasury (
First Series).
Oratory.
Group 3: Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America; Macaulay's Speech
on Copyright and Lincoln's Speech at Cooper Union; Washington's Farewell
Address, and Webster's First Bunker Hill Oration.
Essays.
Group 4: Carlyle's Essay on Burns, with a selection from Burns' Poems;
Macaulay's Life of Johnson; Emerson's Essay on Manners.
English D. A fourth unit in English will be granted to those students
only who at least in four full years have successfully completed an additional
amount of work equal to one-third of the above uniform English requirements
A, B and C.
