1) Choice of passage: importance to work/author/era/genre. (25 %)

        Before you read the passage, take time to tell us briefly why you chose the passage or short poem to represent the material we were assigned to read for the day. Why is it crucial or at least very helpful to our understanding of the work, itself, or of the author? Does the passage contain evidence which illustrates some essential issue or cultural value relevant to the era from which it comes? You also can draw relationship between the work in question and others of the same genre--is this pushing the generic definition to new levels, or is it a classical example of the form?

        Students in haste often neglect to justify their selections. Take your time and situate us solidly within the work, taking care to give us the page in the Norton, and act/scene/line or poetic line numbers, and give us time to turn to the starting page so that we can read along with you.  Provide context if you're excerpting--what has just happened and/or what is about to happen, and how does this excerpt connect to those things? Is that part of what makes this passage important?

        Above all, do not spend much time introducing "biographical background" of the author and plot summary of the work.  Get to the performance and your analysis of it.  Especially avoid recycling all of the Norton's introductory material on your author or work, or what you might find in non-scholarly sources like Encarta or paper encyclopedias, or in amateur Internet sites.  The Norton material is considered assigned work, so you do not have to tell your colleagues what it says, and the encyclopedic and amateur sources are not admissible for graded work in this class or any other required for the major.  If you want to silently fill in gaps in what your high school taught you, I recommend a reliable encyclopedia (like the Britannica) or a professional dictionary like The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 

        Do consult OLLI and the MLA Bibliography via the Library's web site and let us know what scholars have published on your author, the work, and/or the major topics you see as important to understanding the passage you will perform.  See me for help if you have not used the MLA bibliography before; it is an essential tool of the trade for English majors.  You should have learned how to use this tool in English 200, but if you have not taken that course yet, be sure to contact me so that I can teach you how to operate it.   If you discover relevant published research on your passage or or work or author, I will reward your use of it in the presentation with extra credit, but I will not expect every presentation to produce such support.  If you find something useful, even if you do not use it, consider preparing a web page or handout containing the bibliographic citations to aid your colleagues.  I also will reward that with additional credit.

2) Quality of performance: accuracy, pronunciation, accent, rhythm, observation of punctuation, voice/spirit. (25%)

        This is the core of your presentation.  Think about how the passage can be read as if you were an actor playing the part on a stage.  Get inside the "persona" or speaking character of the piece, even if it purports to be non-fiction in the author's own voice.  You certainly know by now, from your own experience acquiring an academic prose "voice," that most public writing involves the conscious or unconscious adoption and projection of personae (e.g., even the "ethical persona" I am trying to use here to convince you I offer wisdom for your own sake, as opposed to a more authoritarian persona I might adopt threatening doom to all who do not follow my orders).  Inhabit the situation in which the passage is set.  What emotional content does it carry and how can tone, rhythm, even body language be part of performing the text's emotional content? If you have a short passage, or if you can focus on a small part of it which seems ambiguous, you may perform it twice or even three times to help us understand the possibilities inherent within it.  Just make sure you explain what you are doing (part 3)!

        "accuracy . . . observation of punctuation": First, take care to figure out where the sentences are, and don't make the mistake of starting in the midst of an on-going sentence without explaining that you're excerpting. Generally it's not a good idea to violate sentence unity when quoting unless you've a good reason (i.e., it's a two-page Miltonic sentence and you've only got 10 minutes). Rehearse it until you can read it clearly without dropping or mis-reading words and phrases, and pay attention to the difference between a poetic "pause" (comma), a poetic "stop" (semi-colon or colon), or a poetic "full stop" (period). At this level, it's like reading music--make sure you know the lyrics. Don't be afraid to ask me for help.

        "pronunciation, accent": If punctuation and diction are the lyrics, pronunciation and accent are the "tune" of English.  Look up the words and be careful you know for sure what you're saying. In specific, make sure you have looked at pronunciation guides for the English of the era. The language we're reading in changes at certain points of the semester. After the first class reading in translated Old English, we'll be in Middle English for a while, that fusion of Norman French and Old English. Use that Harvard U. web site to practice your Middle English vowels, to practice sounding the Germanic "k" and "gh" (k-ni-gh-t actually requires all four of those consonant sounds to be heard!). The final "-e" also is sounded unless it is followed by an open vowel (a, e, i, o, or u). I'd welcome the chance to help you "sing" Middle English. Give me a call or make an appointment for a short conference.

        "voice/spirit": This is the passage's "soul."  Literature for this period nearly always was intended to be read, and much of it is dramatic, containing or implying a plot and one or more personae who populate it. Even short lyrics often manage this in miniature. (Wyatt's "The Flee from Me" is a wonderful example.) If something's going on, you have to take part in it emotionally and you have to make your reading match the events in speed, pitch, and other aspects of delivery. In the end, getting "in-character" is rather more like an act of "spirit possession" than anything one can rationally describe, though rational preparation is essential to getting one's self ready to do the job. Think about the character, the situation, what has just happened (if narrative or drama), and the intent of what is being said. Intent reveals the persona's emotional makeup. The more you think about intent, and how that would be revealed, the more you can infer (by use of other parallel instances) about the persona's deep structure, what s/he/it is made of. This is a place where talking to the instructor can reveal important information about the text, things that can lead to papers and good exam answers (hint!).