Graduate-level seminar assignment on Walker Percy

The following is an information sheet and assignment for a graduate-level English seminar involving a comparative study of the works of Walker Percy, Flannery O'Connor, and John Updike held at LSU in the Spring of 1997 (John R. May). The students' annotative work as described in part 3 is forthcoming in the Percy Project. It represents one way formal educational activities may be involved in the Percy Project.


1. Description of Percy Project



2. Description of Percy-L

ANNOUNCING PERCY-L
Percy-L is an electronic mailing list dedicated to the work and thought of the late American novelist and philosopher Walker Percy.

WHAT IS A MAILING LIST?
Mailing lists allow e-mail users to post questions and responses to an "on-line" discussion group with all postings automatically being distributed to all members of the list. Some lists have as many as several hundred members. Such a medium allows the possibility for scholars around the world to be in regular community with one another about issues significant to their scholarship and studies.

HOW TO JOIN PERCY-L
Send an e-mail to LISTSERV@LISTSERV.LSU.EDU with the following line in the body:

Further information will automatically forwarded to you. All messages are archived at this WWW address: http://sunsite.unc.edu/wpercy/hypermail

--For information on getting an e-mail account and personal dial-up Internet access, contact the LSU ITS Helpdesk at 33HDESK (4-3375).



3. Walker Percy Project-Seminar Assignment

As a part of this seminar's requirements, we are going to gain some first-hand critical studies exposure by doing a brief analysis and written overview of the major scholastic works on Percy. Not only will this give you an opportunity to look closely at key topics in Percy criticism, but it will also give you a chance to reflect upon the current structure of formal literary activity insofar as it has been manifest in book-length works. Perhaps the most exciting aspect of this assignment is that your review/annotation will have the chance to be featured as a lasting part of The Percy Project, where it will, by special arrangement, be added on-line to the project's bibliographic resources.

To complete this assignment, choose one of the books listed below to read and analyze, and then write a short review/overview (500-word maximum) of it addressing the following questions/topics:

The structure of the paper should follow the order of the questions and should be written as if another member in the course might be using your annotation as a resource. Final version to be turned in on paper and on diskette (IBM or MAC).

The books to choose from are as follows, all of which are available through Middleton Library:

SURVEY STUDIES

COMPARATIVE WORKS

ALTERNATE