"Literary Imagination and Professional Knowledge: Using Literature in Teacher Education" establishes a foundation for expanding the use of literature in teacher education curricula. The contributors to this collection have a wide variety of education and experience, thus bringing a richness to the content of the volume. Literature can be…

"This country has been the basis of my being. And when it's no longer there, you know, it's unthinkable." Ueantabo Mackenzie's haunting words in the PBS NOW documentary "Paradise Lost" shook the author. He knew he wanted to teach a unit on global warming, especially after participating in the Portland-area Rethinking Schools…

Comparative literary studies characterize similarities and dissimilarities found in poetic works of two writers of different cultures. This study focuses on the use of allusions in poetry of John Milton particularly with reference to Paradise Lost and poetry of Persian Poet Hafiz Sherazi. Using allusions in poetry has been a common style of poets…

"Paradise Lost" explores the themes of human frailty, failure, and redemption following humanity's "original sin," eating of the tree of knowledge in the Garden of Eden. This original sin resulted in human beings being banished from an earthly paradise and compelled to wander eternally a world fraught with danger, despair,…

As an English professor specializing in American literature and possessing a passion for one nineteenth-century American novel in particular, Don Dingledine writes that one reason he loves to teach "Moby-Dick" is the seemingly limitless ways in which it speaks to human actions and events in our own time. Melville's timeless novel has…

This paper explores how university staff in Denmark, Germany, and England perceived higher education (HE) policy as impacting the experience of being a student in their respective countries. While, in each nation, different policy mechanisms were identified as having triggered transformations in the experience of being a student, the…

Describes the author's use of John Milton's "Paradise Lost" in a college freshman composition course. Argues that focusing on significant works of imaginative literature can revitalize and reinvigorate freshman writing courses. (MM)

Two methods of reading "Paradise Lost" aloud were used in a college course: (1) round robin reading observing the poet's own divisions of the material and spread over 10 days; and (2) round robin reading of the entire poem continuously taking up an entire day. Both approaches were effective in emphasizing the poem's oral dimension. (MSE)

Considers how in the fantasy series "The Chronicles of Narnia" and "His Dark Materials," by C.S. Lewis and Philip Pullman respectively, the authors use symbols and themes from "Paradise Lost." Notes that each author's narrative choice uses his view of cosmic order to persuade readers that obedience should be…

Presents an approach to teaching John Milton's "Paradise Lost" in conjunction with Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein." Notes that a study of these works stimulates vigorous discussions on theological and moral issues, human nature, and the cultural past and future. (MM)

Argues that humor is an invaluable teaching tool in English classes. Describes how the author and her students: found humor an important means of discovering profound truths in Shakespeare's dramas; enjoyed the epic "Paradise Lost"; worked with satire in Chaucer; and used humor in students' own creative activities. (SR)

Using Milton's "Paradise Lost" as metaphor, this article examines shifting positions of authority, and the role of technology, in higher education practice. As higher education becomes caught up in the performative agendas of globalised market rationalism, technology is mobilised in a specific way which sits uncomfortably with…

Considering the plethora of annotation which accompanies John Milton's poetry, a plan of the structure of "Paradise Lost" is offered as an aid to comprehension for undergraduate students and as a teaching guide for college teachers. The poem is divided into three parts of four books each for pedagogical purposes, and major themes and…

Using a custom-designed hypercard program, 26 University of Iowa students collaborated to create an interpreter's annotated edition of "Paradise Lost." Successful use of these technical resources required teachers to consider student computer skills, specific learning tasks, social dynamics of collaborative, creative work, and ways to…

Draws on Milton's "Paradise Lost" and on motifs found within Gnostic mythology and the poetry of William Blake to explore how Philip Pullman reworks the Judeo-Christian myth of the Fall in his trilogy, "His Dark Materials." Finds at its center "Dust": a conventional metaphor for human physicality in which good and evil, and spirit and matter…