Due May 20, 1997
1. Select a topic from the topic list and sign up for the topic on the sign-up sheet posted outside UH 301.40. If the topic you have selected has already been selected by another student, select a different topic.
2. Research the topic for which you have signed up.
3. Create a MLA-style bibliography of five sources on the topic that are available at Cal State, include call numbers/location information in brackets following each MLA-style citation. Sample Modified MLA-style Entry Colley, Linda. "John Wilkes and Englishness." Britons: Forging the Nation 1707-1837. New Haven: Yale UP, 1992. 105-17. [DA 485 C65 1992]
4. Read the sources on the topic and discover the `who, what, why, how, when' or basic facts about the topic.
5. Reflect on how your new knowledge of this event relates to your experiences reading and analyzing British literature of this period. Imagine what the impact of this event would be on people of that period, particularly writers and readers of literature.
6. Draft up a brief statement of two parts: (1) what this historical event is and (2) what impact the event might have had or did have on the literature of the period. Your statement should be about 250-500 words. Revise your statement so that it is clear, coherent, grammatically correct, and stylistically interesting. Convey the importance of the event and its possible or actual impact upon literature in your own words. If you feel an author or original source is worthy of citing, you may do so, but do not use more than two short quotations of forty words or less.
7. Photocopy one image that you feel is the most interesting one relevant to the topic.
8. Assemble the final report: your brief statement of importance, bibliography, and photocopy. Proofread your report for last minute errors.
9. Make a second copy of your report and turn both in on the assigned day, May 20th.
(A) Assorted Events
Imprisonment of John Bunyan,
1660-72 [see also this link]
Charles II marries Catherine of Braganza, 1662
Opening of the 1st turnpike at Wadesmill, Hertford, 1663
Great Plague of London, 1665
Fire of London, 1666
Charles II begins his affair with Nell Gwynne, 1668
John Dryden appointed poet laureate and royal histographer, 1670
Popish Plot, 1678
Henry Purcell named composer-in-ordinary to the King,
1680
Rye House plot to assassinate Charles II, 1683
Sir Isaac Newton states laws of
motion and theory of gravitation, 1687 [see also these links one, two]
beginning of England's national debt, 1693
Sir Isaac Newton publishes Opticks, 1704 [see Newton links above]
Thomas Newcomen invents the first practical steam engine, 1712
South Sea Bubble, 1720
John and Charles Wesley and the beginnings of Methodism, 1729
John Kay invents the flying shuttle or weaving machine, 1733
Porteous Riots, 1736
Founding of the Black
Watch, 1739 [see also this
site and this one too
and also this one]
the last official beheading in England, 1747 [see this site]
Horace Walpole builds Strawberry Hill, 1747
Encyclopedia, first encyclopedia by Diderot published, 1751-1772
Samuel Johnson's Dictionary, the first comprehensive English dictionary, 1755
The Black Hole of Calcutta, 1756
George III marries Charlotte, 1761
John Wilkes challenges General Warrants/Wilkes Riots 1763
Journeys of Captain James Cook, 1768-79
Invention of Sir Richard Arkwright's water frame or water-powered spinning machine,
1769
James Watt perfects the steam engine, 1769
Boston Tea Party, 1773 Suicide of Robert Clive, 1774
Antoine Lavoisier discovers the nature of combustion, 1777
James Hargreaves invents the spinning jenny, 1779
Gordon Riots, 1780
First hot-air balloon ascent, 1783
the Prince of Wales secretly marries Mrs. Maria Fitzherbert, 1785
Edmund Cartwright invents the power loom, 1785
(B) Political Events
Declaration of Breda, 1660
Restoration of Charles II, 1660
Cavalier Parliament, 1661-79
Test Act, 1673
Habeas Corpus Act, 1679 Death of Charles II, Coronation of James II, 1685
the Killing Times, 1684-5 Bloody Assizes, 1685 William and Mary crowned, 1689
Bill of Rights, 1689
Act of Settlement, 1701
Queen Anne crowned, 1702
Act of Union, 1707
George I becomes king, 1714
George II becomes king, 1727
Repeal of the Witchcraft Statutes, 1736
Hardwicke's Marriage Act, 1753
Stamp Act, 1765
Mansfield Judgement, 1772 (Abolition of Slavery)
(C) Military Events
Capture of New Amsterdam (the future state of New York) in the Dutch Wars, 1664
Monmouth's Rebellion, 1685
Battle of the Boyne, 1690 (Glorious Revolution)
Massacre of Glencoe, 1692 (unjust slaughter of large number of members of the MacDonald
clan)
Jacobite Rebellion of 1715
War of Jenkins' Ear, 1739-48
Battle of Culloden, 1746 (Jacobite `45' Rebellion)
Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, 1748 (War of the Austrian Succession)
Robert Clive seizes Arcot in India, 1751
Battle of Quebec, 1759 (Seven Years' War)
Battle of Yorktown, 1781 (American Revolution)