Shakespeare’s Sonnets: Crash Course Literature 304

This week, we’re learning about sonnets, and English Literature’s best-known purveyor of those fourteen-line paeans, William Shakespeare. We’ll look at a few of Willy Shakes’s biggest hits, including Sonnet 18, “Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day,” Sonnet 116, “Let me not to the marriage of true minds admit impediment,” and Sonnet 130, “My

The Poetry of Sylvia Plath: Crash Course Literature 216

In which John Green teaches you about the poetry of Sylvia Plath. When a lot of people think about Sylvia Plath, they think about her struggles with mental illness and her eventual suicide. Her actual work can get lost in the shuffle a bit, so this video really tries to focus on the poetry. You’ll

Langston Hughes and the Harlem Renaissance: Crash Course Literature 215

In which John Green teaches you about the poetry of Langston Hughes. Langston Hughes was a poet and playwright in the first half of the 20th century, and he was involved in the Harlem Renaissance, which was a cultural movement among African Americans of the time that produced all kinds of great works in literature,

Phillis Wheatley: Crash Course Black American History #7

Despite all the hardship of being a Black person in Colonial America, some Black people were able to defy the harsh conditions and create art. Today we’re learning about a teenager who attained literacy and wrote poems that reached a large slice of the population and helped changed the ways that white Colonists thought about

Ghosts, Murder, and More Murder – Hamlet Part 1: Crash Course Literature 203

In which John Green teaches you about Hamlet, William Shakespeare’s longest and most-performed play. People love Hamlet. The play that is, not necessarily the character. Hamlet is a Tragedy with a capital T (I guess I don’t have to point that out, since you can see clearly in the text that the T was capitalized).

A Long and Difficult Journey, or The Odyssey: Crash Course Literature 201

In which John Green teaches you about Homer’s Odyssey. If it was Homer’s. If Homer was even real. Anyway, that stuff doesn’t really matter. John teaches you the classic, by which I mean classical, epic poem, the Odyssey. The Journey of Odysseus as he made his way home after the conclusion of the Trojan War

Before I Got My Eye Put Out – The Poetry of Emily Dickinson: Crash Course English Lit #8

In which John Green concludes the Crash Course Literature mini-series with an examination of the poetry of Emily Dickinson. Sure, John explores the creepy biographical details of Dickinson’s life, but he also gets into why her poems have remained relevant over the decades. John discusses Dickinson’s language, the structure of her work, her cake recipes.