English Literary History at Stanford

Abstract

JN THE ACADEMIC YEAR 1895-96, ten years after Stanford was founded, there were these five offerings in what was called the Seminary or, as we would say, these graduate seminars: Alfred and His Circle, English Entymology [sic] and WordHistory, Tennyson and Browning, Shakspere, and The catalogue does not tell which or how many were required. All we learn is that they and other graduate courses lead to the Doctor's degree, but the specific requirements for the degree must vary with every individual. And then: no case will the degree be conferred except upon the completion of a thesis embodying the results of original work of a high order. It is a little surprising. Weren't we nourished on the belief that a Ph.D. in in the nineteenth century meant, above all, massive infusions of philological learning? Granted, there were graduate courses in 1895-96 on Beowulf and History of Metres and English Palaeography-all of these, like Alfred and His Circle and English Etymology, the domain of Professor Ewald Fliigel-but then again, the catalogue says: A very large proportion of the undergraduate courses.., are recommended to candidates for advanced degrees. Have we been nourished on a fiction? In any case, the range of concern was almost as wide then as now: all the way, that is, from King Alfred to James Russell Lowell. The description of the seminar on Lowell is especially nice--overstuffed, comfortable, and with a good deal of musty charm: