Are you looking for a class...

...about a songwriter who’s

“outrageous, alarming, courageous, and charming”?

(Have we got a class for you!)

SPRING 2015

 

 

Eng 213 Studies in American Literature –

Randy Newman’s American Voice(s)

M/W 10:50-12:05

Starting with his first album in 1968 and continuing through his most recent release in 2011

 (as well as many of his very popular film soundtracks), Randy Newman has populated his music with a series of characters that reflect the complexities and contradictions of the late-20^th-century and early 21^st-century United States.

Often misunderstood because of his preference for dramatic monologues (as opposed to the more personal/confessional approach of the rock/pop/folk singer-songwriter), Newman – steeped in our national, musical and cinematic history – offers his audience unflinching portraits of an array of outcasts, patriots, bigots, dreamers, simpletons, loners, and lovers struggling to understand our world, even as its very foundation seems to be shifting beneath them.

For more info:

 Dr. Gilbert L. Gigliotti

Department of English

Emma Hart Willard Hall 329

Central Connecticut State University

New Britain, CT 06050

 

860/832-2759     gigliotti@ccsu.edu

 

Top Eight Things I Learned from Student Comments on My Spring '13 Wesley Stace John Wesley Harding Course at CCSU

8. Some students don't read course descriptions (or even pay attention prior to the end of the drop/add period) since one student admitted to not realizing the course was focusing on one writer/musician.

7. The students liked having a choice of topics for the in-class writings.

6. The students really liked having the reading quizzes on Misfortune and even recommended having more of them for the the other two novels.

5. The students LOVED Misfortune. (So I should have listened to Wes when he encouraged me to "Read them in order of publication.")

4. The students really liked By George.

3. The students were not fond of Charles Jessold Considered as a Murderer. (I blame this mostly on my not preparing them for, and then drawing. the Dylan parallels more clearly.)

2. The students wanted more time for the three Stace books and less time for the song-literature parallels. (This point is the most problematic because such connections are not a small point of the course, AND I love Wes's own summation of the course as a "gateway drug to great literature.")

1. The students LOVED Wes's appearances, and so we must somehow get him back to CCSU!

From last night's "An Evening with Wesley Stace/John Wesley Harding"

 

 

 

From l to r: Gil Gigliotti, Charles Menoche, Stephanie White, Tom Hazuka, Wesley Stace

Photo: Christine Perkins

Dad Loves His Work (18 Nov 2011 edition)

8:25-9:15 AM
More discussion of Antigone in Eng 110 ( Freshman Comp) in preparation for a performance at CCSU the class will attend on 30 Nov

9:25-10:15 AM
Introduction to the perfect tenses (active and passive) in Lat 111 (Elementary Latin I) together with some translation of a reading adapted from Pliny the Younger's description of the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius

10:50-11:40 AM
Finishing up of Hannah Webster Foster's The Coquette in Eng 340 (Early Am Lit) and a whole bunch of poetry recitations by students, completing the assignment on the very last day

Noon-1:15 PM
Various Department Evaluation Committee duties (for English and Theatre)

1:30-5:15 PM
Bridge on the River Kwai reception/screening/lecture (N.B., Alec Guinness can convey more in the simple act of walking than most actors can in a lifetime!)

5:30-8:30 PM
Stealing Rembrandts lecture by Anthony Amore / reception for Friends of CCSU Burritt Library

A trio of tributes from my swell colleagues

1) In song and dance (from L to R: Phyllis, Darlene, Min, and Chris):

2) On-line:

http://chronicle.com/blogPost/Weekend-Reading-His/26352/




3) In verse:

"A Classic Act"
Anthony R. Cannella


We sing the man:
his wine-dark eyes, his ties not shy,
for his blue-booked stacks, never a "Fie!"
"Bring them on," shouts he, by George.
"Of my erstwhile trade I'm naught afraid."
(Perhaps the shock is just delayed.)
Red plume in hand, brain untaxed,
he girds himself
(tho' quite relaxed)
for class upon class.
Therein work's more gruntish,
sometimes also fraught,
verily, with mighty labors bought,
in classrooms stark,
at times too light, at times too dark,
too hot or cold
for Learning's spark.
Yet will he prosper
and flourish there,
as when he ruled
from purpled chair


O, son of Cincinnati,
Of Cincinnatus too,
you led us well.
('tis true, 'tis true.)
O, chuckling Ciceronian
who, as Rumor told,
oft spake in perfect Babylonian,
(In Greek
And Roman, too.)
Classical or
Ecclesiastical?
'Tis no matter,
We cannot tell,
our words, our idioms scatter,
for like the Bard,
we've small Latine,
on trots, or ponies, must we lean;
yet our hearts be large
for the man who was
till now in charge.
Gil Thorpe? Gil Gamesh?
Nay, Gil Gigliotti!
With soft and silent g's,
not Gig-lee-otti.


Our wry philosophizer,
benevolent democratizer.
factions' synthesizer,
kindest sympathizer!
Heard you he has Greek?
Much he owes to Catholic U.
And much to
Cincy's Xavier, too.
But most he owes
to a sacred store,
Where, before we knew him,
before he kenned
Connecticut wit
or made his home
with his winsome three
(all four tight-knit),
a Clan of Rats he did detect,
in unformed form, of course:
just Young Blue Eyes,
no Dino, no Sammy,
no rascals choice,
but, oh,
that Voice, that Voice.
Rejoice! Rejoice!
Sweet notes galore
From sacred record store.


But what of the Mob?
"Part of the job," says
our philosopher king.
"Gonna make something of it?
Ba-da-ba, ba-da-bing.
Frank, well, he soars above it.
Why so many
pick that nit?
Why not 'stead extoll
the best of men,
e'er to spin
at 33 rpm?"
But what of Virgil,
Ovid and Horace?
"Good stuff," says Gil,
"but for Frank
just chorus."


And now the summer
bows to fall,
Sybil recedes,
cruel syllabi call.
(Had I but world enough
and time,
for both the scansion
and the rhyme,
this poem, dear people,
would be no crime.)
And now on stage,
the valiant Cohen,
our noble Steve.
We'll let him know
He's not alone.
But soft:
Look ye our man,
from limelight away,
O, humble hero,
Would you might stay.
Yet still he goes,
Yet now returns
with golden throat
and silver sword,
with whiteboard marker
and wit-dressed word.
Hush. He speaks:
"Shall I fear class --after class,
after class. after class?
Nay! I utter no alas!
And no alack,
This too will pass,
this teaching track.
These classes but be dragons
For me, in sooth, to hack."


One feature persists
'mid Fate's ebb and flow:
our hero's worthy habit,
his weekly radio show.
No class will conflict
with that weekly fix;
107.7 and its
away to Heaven,
where, of course,
fair Ava dwells.
locked in all Eternity.
Gil just smiles.
"Someone to watch over me."


And now, his toga passed,
toward class his chin he casts,
No need for props, like silver sword.
He is no chairman
Of the bored.

Not to mention plenty of public and private emails saying very nice things.

Have I mentioned what great friends and colleagues comprise the Department of English at Central Connecticut State University?  You should be so lucky!