Poetry Analysis Ages 15-18: Tolkien, the Romantics, & Poetry of the Sea
Rebecca Baumgarten, MA
Average rating:5.0Number of reviews:(28)
In this ongoing course, high schoolers will read and analyze poems describing imaginative or maritime journeys to enchanted lands. Taught by a teacher who wrote her masters thesis on Tolkien.
Class experience
US Grade 9 - 12
Imram is an Irish word for an ancient genre where a hero goes on a sea voyage, experiences various trials, and returns home to tell his or her tale. Often, such heroes journey to a mythic or spiritual otherworld, full of fantastic surroundings and creatures. This genre has a long association with myth, mystery, and mysticism. Its emphasis on the natural world appealed to the romantic poets, who prized emotional experience and saw nature as its gateway. In the context of this class, the terms...
Students will learn to • Describe genre characteristics • Explain the key features of romanticism • Understand intertextuality • Describe the key features of otherworld • Explain the role of the sea in the poetic imagination • Conduct close readings of poetry • Identify a poem’s rhyme scheme and meter • Analyze poetic devices, images, and themes
I am an adjunct professor of English composition at Collin College in northern Texas. I have a bachelors and masters in English and graduate certificate in Digital Humanities from Texas A&M University, where I worked for two years as a graduate assistant teacher and researcher. I have also worked as a freelance tutor for learners from elementary through college level, and I have many years of volunteer experience working with and teaching children in extracurricular activities.
Homework Offered
Before class, students will: • Read the poem listed for that week • Write a response to that week's discussion question and post it as a reply to the question in the classroom • Write down their observations and questions on imagery, themes, characters, etc. This should take up to 1 hour per week.1 - 2 hours per week outside of class
Assessments Offered
Grades Offered
Almost all poems in this class can be found online. This is where students will go for poems not by Tolkien. Most of Tolkien’s poems can be found online as well, but they are published in the following books: The Adventures of Tom Bombadil and Other Verses from the Red Book, ISBN 978-0-00-755727-1 We will use this book throughout the semester. You might think of it as the primary textbook. The edition is crucial, as we will be reading certain parts of the commentary. "Bilbo's Last Song" This is a poster as well as a picture book. The latter may be easiest to find. The text is also available online at Tolkien Gateway. The rest, we will use for only a few poems, so I suggest borrowing them from the library or finding the poems online. Any edition is fine: The Hobbit The Fellowship of the Ring The Two Towers The Return of the King Sauron Defeated: The History of Middle-earth Volume 9 Beowulf, translated by JRR Tolkien, edited by Christopher Tolkien
The personal beliefs of the poets in this class colored their imaginations and therefore their writing, so it is necessary to discuss these beliefs at the broadest level. This is not proselytism, but a tool for understanding the myths (as defined above) behind the poetry. I am not discussing my own beliefs, but the beliefs of the poets. Many of the poems in this class deal with themes of loss, mortality, guilt, or disillusionment. In particular, some learners may find the psychological imagery of “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” and “The Sea-Bell” disturbing, though not to the point of distress. I will be available at any time (within reason) to answer questions and give support.
The following texts provide either source material or intellectual background for this course. I will not reference most of them explicitly in class, and students do not need to be familiar with them. Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (text of 1834).” Poetry Foundation, 2022. www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43997/the-rime-of-the-ancient-mariner-text-of-1834. Keats, John. “Ode to a Nightingale.” Poetry Foundation, 2022. www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44479/ode-to-a-nightingale. Tolkien, J.R.R. The Adventures of Tom Bombadil and Other Verses from the Red Book. HarperCollins, 2014. ---. The Fellowship of the Ring. Ballantine Books, 1983. ---. The Monsters and the Critics: And Other Essays, edited by Christopher Tolkien. HarperCollins, 2006. ---. Sauron Defeated: the End of the Third Age: the History of the Lord of the Rings, Part Four, edited by Christopher Tolkien. Houghton Mifflin, 1992. ---. The Silmarillion, edited by Christopher Tolkien, Houghton Mifflin, 2004. “William Butler Yeats.” Poetry Foundation, 2022. www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/william-butler-yeats Yeats, William Butler. “The Man Who Dreamed of Faeryland.” Poetry Verse. www.poetryverse.com/william-butler-yeats-poems/the-man-who-dreamed-faeryland.
Average rating:5.0Number of reviews:(28)
My name is Rebecca Baumgarten. I have a bachelor’s and master’s in English from Texas A&M University, focusing on the fiction and scholarship of J.R.R. Tolkien (hence my headline). I am an adjunct professor of English at Collin College in...
Group Class
$20
weekly1x per week
55 min
Completed by 9 learners
Live video meetings
Ages: 15-18
1-6 learners per class
