The module aims to introduce students to two key genres and their forms. The poetry unit looks at a range of poems in English from different historical periods, and is concerned with the ways in which language and form work in poetry and the kinds of readings we can employ in looking at poems.

The parallel novel unit traces the development of the modern novel through the close examination of four major examples of the genre from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Concentrating on works by Charlotte Brontë, Charles Dickens, James Joyce and Toni Morrison, the unit will ask what is unique about the novel form, and explore why it became the most dominant form of literary expression over the course of these two centuries. We will pay attention to the specific period contexts of each novel, and introduce a variety of critical and theoretical approaches to reading novels.

Demonstrate their knowledge of some of the issues involved in the criticism of poetry across its various forms and be able to apply their knowledge to a number of texts through the central practice of close reading.

On completion of the novel section, students should have an enriched understanding of the history of the modern novel. They should be able to undertake close readings of the set texts whilst displaying an awareness of relevant literary, historical, and critical contexts.

The module will be taught by two lectures per week for one semester, plus one seminar a week covering both units.

The key skill for both units is the development of analytic skills that will inform critical writing and result in an assured essay style, paying close attention to form and meaning.

The module is assessed by an essay on the novel and by a 2.5 hour exam on poetry.

The main readings for this module are texts and journal articles. Students should contact the module leaders as early as possible if they will require the provided readings in an alternative format. Timetabled sessions include lectures and discussion sessions where students may have the opportunity to make presentations and/or lead discussion. Lectures are usually supplemented with handouts or slides summarising content at a reasonable level of detail. These are usually made available to students on Learning Central at least 24 hours before the session. There are no academic or competence standards which limit the availability of adjustments or alternative assessments for students with disabilities.

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The module is assessed by an essay on the novel and by a 2.5 hour exam on poetry.

The main readings for this module are texts and journal articles. Students should contact the module leaders as early as possible if they will require the provided readings in an alternative format. Timetabled sessions include lectures and discussion sessions where students may have the opportunity to make presentations and/or lead discussion. Lectures are usually supplemented with handouts or slides summarising content at a reasonable level of detail. These are usually made available to students on Learning Central at least 24 hours before the session. There are no academic or competence standards which limit the availability of adjustments or alternative assessments for students with disabilities.

For poetry:

The nature of the different forms of poetry, including ballad, sonnet, elegy, modern poetry and the main topics of poetry (love, death, religion) as well as such ideas as wit, intertexuality and modernism.

For the novel:

Week 1: Introduction to the Novel

Week 2: Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

Week 3: Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

Week 4: Charles Dickens, Great Expectations

Week 5: Charles Dickens, Great Expectations

Week 6: Reading Week

Week 7: James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

Week 8: James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

Week 9: Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye (1970; London: Vintage, 1994)

Week 10: Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye

Week 11. Conclusion

For Poetry:

Set Text: The Norton Anthology of Poetry, fifth edition, ed. Margaret Ferguson, Mary Jo Salter and Jon Stallworthy, (New York and London: Norton, 2005)

Secondary Reading (Poetry)

M.H. Abrams, A Glossary of Literary Terms, sixth edition (New York: Holt, Reinhart & Winston, 1993)

Catherine Belsey, Critical Practice (London: Methuen, 1980)

Richard Bradford, Poetry: The Ultimate Guide (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010)

Scott Brewster, Lyric (Abingdon: Routledge, 2009)

Thomas Carper and Derek Attridge, Meter and Meaning (Abingdon: Routledge, 2003)

A. D. Cousins and Peter Howarth (eds), The Cambridge Companion to the Sonnet (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011)

Terry Eagleton, How To Read a Poem (Oxford: Blackwell, 2007)

Tom Furniss and Michael Bath, Reading Poetry: An Introduction (Harlow: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1996)

David Kennedy, Elegy (Abingdon: Routledge, 2007)

X.J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia, An Introduction to Poetry (London: Longman, 1998)

John Lennard, The Poetry Handbook (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996)

Richard Machin and Christopher Norris (eds), Post-Structuralist Readings of English Poetry (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987)

Stephen Matterson and Darryl Jones, Studying Poetry (London: Arnold, 2000)

John Peck and Martin Coyle, Practical Criticism, (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1995)

Claude Rawson (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to English Poets (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011)

John Strachan and Richard Terry, Poetry (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2011)

Jeremy Tambling, RE: Verse: Turning Towards Poetry (Harlow: Pearson Education, 2007)

Rhian Williams, The Poetry Toolkit (London: Bloomsbury, 2013)

For The Novel:

Set texts:

Charlotte Bronte. Jane Eyre, ed. Beth Newman. Case Studies in Contemporary Criticism (Boston: Bedford Books of St Martin's Press, 1996) [other editions are also acceptable]

Charles Dickens. Great Expectations, ed. Janice Carlisle. Case Studies in Contemporary Criticism (Boston: Bedford Books of St, Martin's Press, 1996) [other editions are also acceptable]

James Joyce, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, ed. Jeri Johnson (Oxford World’s Classics, 2008).

Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye (1970; London: Vintage, 1994)

Secondary Reading (the Novel)

Armstrong, Nancy. Desire and Domestic Fiction: A Political History of the Novel. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987.

Armstrong, Tim. Modernism: A Cultural History. Cambridge: Polity, 2005.

Bradbury, Malcolm. The Modern British Novel. London: Secker and Warburg, 1993.

Bradshaw, David. A Concise Companion to Modernism. Oxford: Blackwell, 2003.

Brantlinger, Patrick and William B. Thesing, eds. A Companion to the Victorian Novel. Oxford: Blackwell, 2002.

Brooker, Peter, ed. Modernism/Postmodernism. London: Longman: 1992.

Childs, Peter. Modernism. London: Routledge, 2000.

Connor, Steven. Postmodernist Culture: An Introduction to Theories of the Contemporary. Oxford: Blackwell, 1989.

David, Deirdre, ed. The Cambridge Companion to the Victorian Novel. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001.

Eagleton, Terry. Literary Theory: An Introduction. 2nd edition. Oxford: Blackwell, 1996.

-----. The English Novel. Oxford: Blackwell, 2005.

Gilmour, Robin. The Novel in the Victorian Age: A Modern Introduction. London: Edward Arnold, 1986.

Hutcheon, Linda. A Poetics of Postmodernism: History, Theory, Fiction. London: Routledge, 1988.

Jameson, Fredric. Postmodernism, or, The Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism. London: Verso, 1991.

Levenson, Michael, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Modernism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999.

Lukacs, Georg. Theory of the Novel, trans. Anna Bostock. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1990.

-----, ed., Theory of the Novel: A Historical Approach. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000.

Nicol, Brian, ed. Postmodernism and the Contemporary Novel: A Reader. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2002.

Nicholls, Peter. Modernisms: A Literary Guide. Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1995.

O’Gorman, Francis, ed. A Concise Companion to the Victorian Novel. Oxford: Blackwell, 2005.

Stevenson, Randall. Modernist Fiction. New York: Prentice Hall, 1998.

Waugh, Patricia. Practising Postmodernism, Reading Modernism. London: Edward Arnold, 1992.

Williams, Raymond. Culture and Society 1780-1950. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1961.