BBC production of the Merchant of Venice

Here are a few links to the BBC television adaptation of the Merchant of Venice. In order to watch the video online, you need to either use a campus computer or have your PC set up so that you can enter your Calnet ID for university online access. (for help with this step, see: http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/Help/connecting_off_campus.html)

Acts I and II: http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/videodir/asx/d438a.asx
Act III: http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/videodir/asx/d438b.asx
Acts IV and V: http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/videodir/asx/d438c.asx



Directed by Jack Gold

Taping dates: May 15–21, 1980

First transmitted in the UK: December 17, 1980

First transmitted in the US: February 23, 1981

John Franklyn-Robbins as Antonio

John Rhys-Davies as Salerio

Alan David as Solanio

John Nettles as Bassiano

Richard Morant as Lorenzo

Kenneth Cranham as Gratiano

Gemma Jones as Portia

Susan Jameson as Nerissa

Daniel Mitchell as Balthasar

Warren Mitchell as Shylock

Marc Zuber as the Prince of Morocco

Enn Reitel as Lancelot Gobbo

Joe Gladwin as Old Gobbo

Roger Martin as Leonardo

Leslee Udwin as Jessica

Peter Gale as the Prince of Arragon

Arnold Diamond as Tubal

Douglas Wilmer as the Duke of Venice

Shaun Scott as Stephano

Schedule of Readings and Assignments

Schedule of Readings


Week One Introduction to the Course

8/30-9/1 3 page Diagnostic Assignment due Wednesday

Handout: “The Culture of the Market”



Week Two

9/6 Holiday – No class

9/8 Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice – Acts 1-3 pg.3-54

Oxford English Dictionary, entries for “Market” and “Theatre”

Writing Analytically pg.42-61 (“The Method”)



Week Three

9/13 Agnew, Worlds Apart pg.17-56 (“The Threshold of Exchange”)

2 page close reading of Shakespeare due Tuesday

9/15 Merchant of Venice – Acts 3-5 pg.54-75



Week Four

9/20 Worlds Apart pg.57-100 (“Another Nature”)

Writing Analytically pg.12-34, 300-308 (“Thesis”)

9/22 Thesis for Paper One due Thursday

Worlds Apart pg.101-148 (“Artificial Persons”)





Week Five

9/27 Franklin, Autobiography pg.3-56

Writing Analytically pg.197-217 (“Revising the Thesis”)

9/29 Paper One due Thursday



Week Six

10/4 Franklin, Autobiography pg.56-93

10/6 Worlds Apart pg.149-194 (“The Spectacle of the Market”)



Week Seven

10/11 finish discussing Franklin

10/13 Thesis and Draft of Paper Two due Thursday

Melville, The Confidence-Man



Week Eight

10/18 The Confidence-Man

Writing Analytically pg.275-294

Peer Workshop

10/20 The Confidence-Man



Week Nine

10/25 Paper Two due Tuesday

The Confidence-Man

10/27



Week Ten

11/1 Style exercises

finish discussing Melville

11/3 Marx, “The Fetishism of Commodities and the Secret Thereof”



Week Eleven

11/8 Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction”

11/10



Week Twelve

11/15 Horkheimer and Adorno, “The Culture Industry”

11/17 Thesis and Draft of Paper Three due Thursday



Week Thirteen

11/22 Style exercises

Peer Workshop

11/24 film: Double Indemnity (screening time TBA)



Week Fourteen

11/29 discuss film

12/1 Paper Three due Thursday

Course summary and conclusions

Four Habits of Argumentative Writing

In this course you will be producing argumentative writing based on close textual readings. As a first approximation of what I mean I offer you these four general guidelines I will want you to apply to your writing this term. If you can incorporate these four writing practices into your future work you will have mastered the task of producing a competent argumentative paper for just about any discipline that would ask you for one.




A First Habit



An argumentative paper will have a thesis. A thesis is a claim. It is a statement of the thing your paper is trying to show. Very often, the claim will be straightforward enough to express in a single sentence or so, and it will usually appear early on in the paper to give your readers a clear sense of the project of the paper. A thesis is a claim that is strong. A strong claim is a claim for which you can imagine an intelligent opposition. It is a claim that you feel a need to argue for. Remember, when you are producing a reading about a complex literary text like a novel, a poem, or a film the object of your argument will be to illuminate the text, to draw attention to some aspect of the wider work the text is accomplishing. Once you have determined the dimension or element in a text that you want to argue about, your opposition might consist of those who would focus elsewhere or who would draw different conclusions from your own focus. Your thesis is your paper's spine, your paper's task. As you write your papers, it is a good idea to ask yourself the question, from time to time, Does this quotation, does this argument, does this paragraph support my thesis in some way? If it doesn’t, delete it. If you are drawn repeatedly away from what you have chosen as your thesis, ask yourself whether or not this signals that you really want to argue for some different thesis.



A Second Habit



You should define your central terms, especially the ones you may be using in an idiosyncratic way. Your definitions can be casual ones, they don’t have to sound like dictionary definitions. But it is crucial that once you have defined a term you will stick to the meaning you have assigned it yourself. Never simply assume that your readers know what you mean or what you are talking about. Never hesitate to explain yourself for fear of belaboring the obvious. Clarity never appears unintelligent.



A Third Habit



You should support your claims about the text with actual quotations from the text itself. In this course you will always be analyzing texts (broadly defined) and whatever text you are working on should probably be a major presence on nearly every page of your papers. A page without quotations is often a page that has lost track of its point, or one that is stuck in abstract generalizations. This doesn't mean that your paper should consist of mostly huge block quotes. On the contrary, a block quote is usually a quote that needs to be broken up and read more closely and carefully. If you see fit to include a lengthy quotation filled with provocative details, I will expect you to contextualize and discuss all of those details. If you are unprepared to do this, or fear that doing so will introduce digressions from your argument, this signals that you should be more selective about the quotations to which you are calling attention.



A Fourth Habit



You should anticipate objections to your thesis. In some ways this is the most difficult habit to master. Remember that even the most solid case for a viewpoint is vulnerable to dismissal by the suggestion of an apparently powerful counterexample. That is why you should anticipate problems, criticisms, counterexamples, and deal with them before they arise, and deal with them on your own terms. If you cannot imagine a sensible and relevant objection to your line of argument it means either that you are not looking hard enough or that your claim is not strong enough.