Alfred, Lord Tennyson / Engraving by G. J. Stodart (1897)

Alfred, Lord Tennyson
(1809 - 1892)
British Poet Laureate
(1850 - 1892)
Idylls of the King
In Memoriam A. H. H.

Joseph E. Becker, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of English
University of Maine at Fort Kent

Joseph E. Becker (photo: May Shieh, 2003)
"And gladly wolde he lerne,
and gladly teche
."
The Canterbury Tales
"General Prologue," l. 310
(written c. 1380s - 1390s)

Current Date & Time
E-mail
Phone
207-834-7588

Office
226 Nadeau Hall

Fax
207-834-7577
Curriculum Vita
(academic resumé)
Locus Eclecticus
(personal website)

Foundation for Mythological Studies
American Comparative Literature Association
Comparative Literature (Journal of the ACLA)

NEW-CUE (Environmental Writers & Educators)
Romantic Circles
(Scholarly website on Romanticism)
Association for the Study of Literature and Environment

Office Hours / Summer 2008
(effective 5 May 2008 - 2 September 2008)
Dr. Becker does not hold office hours during the summer.
Please e-mail if you need to contact him.

quill and parchment

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Teaching Schedule Fall 2008

Further information will be available in late August 2008
Course offerings are subject to change

CRN
COURSE
SECTION
TITLE
TIME
DAY
LOCATION
17018
ENG 100
003
English Composition I
9.30 - 10.50 AM
TuF
Gym 118
17016
ENG 100
002
English Composition I
2.00 - 3.20 PM
TuF
Cyr 207
32076
ENG 202
001
English Literature I
Medieval to 18th Century
9.30 - 10.50 AM
MTh
Powell 120
32074
ENG 331
001
Wisdom Literature
2.00 - 3.20 PM
MTh
Cyr 207
35027
ENG 459
001
American Renaissance
Asynchronous
N/A
Online

The White Tower, or Tower of London adapted from Francis Grose, 'The Antiquities of England and Wales (Vol III)'(1783) (image in public domain)

UMFK English Program
English is one of the most versatile majors at UMFK, and it can lead to many different career opportunities after college.
Because of its flexibility and adaptability, English is an excellent major, second major, or minor.

Geraldine Cannon Becker
Assistant Professor of English and Creative Writing

The Aroostook Review
UMFK's Online Literary Journal

If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts; but if he will be content to begin with doubts he shall end in certainties.
Sir Francis Bacon
English author, courtier, & philosopher (1561 - 1626)
William Wordsworth
William Wordsworth

(1770 - 1850)
English Poet Laureate
(1843 - 1850)

Geoffrey Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer
(c. 1320 - 1400)
English poet

Sir Walter Scott
Sir Walter Scott
(1771-1832)
Scottish poet, novelist
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
(1772 - 1834)
British Poet & Critic
William Shakespeare by Edward Scriven (1775 - 1841) -- based on the Chandos Portrait attributed to John Taylor c. 1610.
William Shakespeare
(1564 - 1616)
English Poet & Dramatist
Lord Byron
George Gordon, Lord Byron
(1788 - 1824)
British Poet
William Blake
William Blake
(1757-1827)
British Poet & Engraver
John Milton
John Milton

(1608 - 1674)
English Poet
Jane Austen
Jane Austen
(1775 -1817)
British Novelist
John Keats
John Keats
(1795 - 1821)
British Poet
Alexander Pope
Alexander Pope
(1688 - 1744)
English Poet & Translator
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Percy Bysshe Shelley
(1792 - 1822)
British Poet

Little by little one travels far.
J.R.R. Tolkien
British professor & novelist (1892-1973)


The Domesday Book (Source: William Andrews: 'Historic Byways and Highways of Old England', p. 33, (1900), image in public domain)

There are worse crimes than burning books. One of them is not reading them.
Joseph Brodsky

Russian-American poet, essayist, and Nobel laureate (1940 - 1996)


Nova Scotia
Prince Edward Island
Québec
New Brunswick
Upper St. John Valley
New England
Acadia
Maine
New Hampshire
Vermont
Massachusetts

News and Public Affairs
The following links represent a wide range of viewpoints on a variety of matters

Bangor Daily News

Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram

Breaking News

ABC / AP / BBC / CBC / CBS / CNN / Fox News / Google / MSNBC / NPR / Reuters / CBSMarkets


Newspapers

L'Acadie Nouvelle (New Brunswick) | Alternet.org | The Australian | Beirut Daily Star | Boston Globe | CS Monitor | C-SPAN | Chicago Tribune | Congress.org | Le Figaro | Financial Times | Globe & Mail | Guardian / Observer | Ha'aretz | The Hindu | The Independent | Independent Media Center | Jerusalem Post | London Telegraph | London Times | Los Angeles Times | Le Monde | Moscow Times | National Catholic Reporter | The National Post | New York Times | New Zealand Herald | La Presse (Montréal) | SMH | Telegraph-Journal (New Brunswick) | USA Today | Washington Post

Magazines

American Conservative | American Enterprise | American Heritage | American Journal Rev | American Prospect | American Scientist | American Spectator | Art News Online | Artforum | Boston Globe Ideas | Boston Review | The Bulletin | Chronicle of Higher Education | Chronicle of Philanthropy | CIA Studies | City Journal | Columbia Journal Rev | Commentary | Common-place | Cross Currents | Discover | Dissent | The Economist | First Things | Foreign Affairs | Foreign Policy | The Gramophone | Granta | Hoover Digest | Hudson Review | In Character | Independent Review | In These Times | Le Monde Diplo | Legal Affairs | Monthly Review | Mother Jones | Ms. Magazine | The Nation. | National Journal | National Review | New Criterion | New Humanist | New Left Review | New Republic | New Scientist | New York Magazine | New York Observer | New York Press | NY Times Magazine | New Yorker | Newsweek | Philosophers' Mag | Philosophy & Literature | Philosophy Now | Physics Today | Poets & Writers | Policy | Policy Review | The Progressive | Prospect | Reason | Salon | Scientific American | Sign and Sight | Skeptical Inquirer | Slate | The Spectator | Der Spiegel | Threepenny Review | Tikkun | Time Magazine | US News & World Report | Utne Reader | Village Voice | WSJ Opinion | The Walrus | Washington Monthly | Weekly Standard | Wilson Quarterly | Wired

Book Reviews

BBC Books | Books & Culture | Bookforum | Boston Globe Books | Chicago Trib Books | Chronicle Review | Claremont Review | Common Review | Complete Review | CS Monitor Books | Globe & Mail Books | Guardian Lit News | Guardian Books | The Hindu Books | Independent Books | January Magazine | Kirkus Reviews | Literary Review | London Review | London Times Books | Los Angeles Times | Melbourne Age | New Republic Books | NYRB | NY Times Books | Newsday Books | Philly Inquirer Books | Salon Books | SF Chronicle Books | Spectator Books | Telegraph Books | The TLS | Village Voice | Washington Post | Washington Times | Wilson Quarterly | Yale Book Review

Columnists

Eric Alterman | Anne Applebaum | Timothy Garton Ash | Bruce Bawer | Alex Beam | James Bowman | Robert Boynton | Samuel Brittan | David Brooks | Art Buchwald | William F. Buckley | Jon Carroll | Noam Chomsky | Alexander Cockburn | Joe Conason | Miranda Devine | E. J. Dionne Jr. | Michael Dirda | Maureen Dowd | Roger Ebert | Michael Elliott | Robert Fisk | Thomas Friedman | Robert Fulford | Frank Furedi | Malcolm Gladwell | Ellen Goodman | Victor Davis Hanson | Johann Hari | Jeet Heer | Nat Hentoff | Jan Herman | Jim Hightower | Christopher Hitchens | David Horowitz | Molly Ivins | Jeff Jacoby | Leon Jaroff | Robert Kagan | Tony Karon | Mickey Kaus | Michael Kinsley | Joe Klein | Martin Kramer | Morton Kondracke | Chas Krauthammer | Paul Krugman | Howard Kurtz | Norman Lebrecht | John Leo | James Lileks | Kevin Maney | Salim Mansour | Paddy McGuinness | Mark Morford | Robert Novak | Brendan O'Neill | Daniel Pipes | Katha Pollitt | Virginia Postrel | William Powers | Dorothy Rabinowitz | Jonathan Rauch | Roger Sandall | William Shawcross | Sam Smith | Thomas Sowell | Mark Steyn | Andrew Sullivan | Tunku Varadarajan | David Warren | George Will | Keith Windschuttle | Jonathan Yardley | J. Peder Zane


Cosmology

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A legitimate conflict between science and religion cannot exist. Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind.
Albert Einstein
German-American theoretical physicist (1879 - 1955)

The Planetary Society

Science cannot tell theology how to construct a doctrine of creation, but you can't construct a doctrine of creation
without taking account of the age of the universe and the evolutionary character of cosmic history.
John Polkinghorne
British particle physicist & Anglican theologian (b. 1930)

Space.com



Charles Darwin
Charles Darwin
(1809 - 1882)
British Naturalist, Author
The Origin of Species
Right Click to download a
PDF copy (600 kb)

Evolution
The following websites describe and discuss evolutionary theory and address challenges to it.

Evolution: The Basics | PBS: Evolution | Understanding Evolution | BBC: Evolution | Becoming Human | Evolution Happens! | TalkOrigins. Archive | Antievolution | Creation and Intelligent Design Watch | Evolution Evidence Page | The Panda's Thumb | National Academy of Sciences: Science and Creationism | TalkDesign.org | TalkReason.org | Questionable Credentials of Creation "Scientists" | Defender's Guide to Science and Creationism | Carl Zimmer | Stephen Jay Gould Archive | Tree of Life Web Project | The Writings of Charles Darwin | About Darwin | Fr. George V. Coyne | Pope John Paul II on Evolution | Darwinia Books | Theistic Evolution | A Theological Argument for Evolution | Index to Creationist Claims | Theistic Evolution

Does the evolutionary doctrine clash with religious faith? It does not. It is a blunder to mistake the Holy Scriptures for elementary textbooks of astronomy, geology, biology, and anthropology. Only if symbols are construed to mean what they are not intended to mean can there arise imaginary, insoluble conflicts . . . the blunder leads to blasphemy: the Creator is accused of systematic deceitfulness.

Theodosius Dobzhansky
Ukranian geneticist & evolutionary biologist (1900 - 1975)
from
"Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution" (1973)

Read this FREE online!
Full Book

Expelled Exposed

I cannot teach anybody anything, I can only make them think.
Socrates
Greek philosopher (470 - 399 BCE)

Website Disclaimer
All documents, files or other data accessible on or through this "website" (this term includes, but is not limited to, this page, linked pages and sub-pages) are provided solely as a courtesy to facilitate public access to information. The content of the web site may change from time to time and without notice. Dr. Becker provides such documents, files or other data "as is" without any warranty of any kind, either expressed or implied, including, but not limited to, accuracy, reliability, omissions, completeness and currency. Dr. Becker and the University of Maine at Fort Kent shall not be liable for any claim for damages, including lost profits or other consequential, exemplary, incidental, indirect or special damages, relating in any way to the documents, files or other data accessible on or through this web site, including, but not limited to, claims arising out of or related to electronic accessor transmission of data or viruses. Any text, listing or link referring to other web pages or sites does not constitute an endorsement of or support for that web page or site, its organization, products, services or information; and, no representation is made concerning such web page as to its content, suitability or any other warranty as disclaimed above. The use of the data contained on this website is for information and personal use only. No weather predictions or forecasts should be made based on the data presented. Content ratings are for this website only and do not indicate the suitability of content on other websites to which this website links. This website does not accept solicitations for placement of any third-party content.

Any opinions and statements provided on this site do not reflect the views or opinions of the University of Maine at Fort Kent and are strictly those of the author.

All original content on this website is
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This webpage was last updated on Tuesday, July 15, 2008 10:54 AM

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