Winter in St. Petersburg, Russia.  A good or a bad time to launch a revolution?  The Decembrists found out in 1825 that it was a bad time.

• Read chapter 20 in Coffin/Stacey.
• Read my remarks on Tsar Alexander I and the Decembrists.
• Study the Questions to Consider and the Key Terms for the unit.
• Post (or respond) your thoughts/ideas about this unit's reading and assignment in the Blackboard online discussion forum. Do not post your assignment there.

• Read the material on the Russian Decembrists (if you are going to submit the optional Decembrists paragraph).
• Submit the Optional Decembrists paragraph.
• Read my notes on Romanticism.
  
• There is also some information about Romanticism, mp3 file or txt.

• See the videos dealing with the Decembrists in the HIS 241 course.
• For extra credit please suggest to your instructor a relevant video for this unit of the course. Send the title of the video, the url and a brief explanation of why you find the video interesting and applicable to the material that is being studied in this unit.

• Take the short 5-point quiz for chapter 20. Log into Blackboard and look under "Chapter Quizzes." You have five minutes to complete each quiz (multiple-choice questions).
• For a maximum of 50 points extra credit, read some selections of Romantic Poems and write a one-page paper in which you examine some of the main characteristics of the Romantic era.  Please be sure to include quoted material.
• For a maximum of 50 points extra credit, read Samuel Taylor Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and in a one-page paper note some of the main characteristics of the Romantic movement that were apparent in the poem.
• For 25 points maximum extra credit, write a paragraph in which you compare and contrast the start of Napoleon's invasion of Russia with its finish.
• It is no wonder that the talented Russian poet Aleksandr Pushkin could get himself into trouble as a result of his connections to the Decembrists.  Read his short, To the Emperor Nicholas I (1826) and comment, in a paragraph, for 25 points maximum extra credit.
• For a maximum of 10 points extra credit, answer the Romanticism study sheet questions.
• For extra credit, please suggest a relevant website for this unit of the course.  Send the title of the site, the url and a brief explanation why you find the information interesting and applicable to the material being studied this unit.