British Literature is an introductory course designed to give students a brief overview of English literature throughout the centuries with as special focus on the Regency Period and the Victorian Age and especially the novel in Britain during the period. Representative works of fiction from the period are studied and analysed in depth (Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen and Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte). The course examines areas such as literary devices and style, pragmatics, narrative and genre, as well as the socio-cultural and historical context of this era and the wider history of the development of the novel as a genre. 

On completing the course students will:

• Recognise and engage with the major literary form of the novel and its history in English Literature  
• Become familiar with key periods, authors and works of English Literature
• Explore, analyze, and reflect upon representative works of British novels of the early to late 19th century
• Demonstrate a strong knowledge of the key texts, and the different ways to approach them
• ‘Close read’ different kinds of texts, understanding the importance of rigorous analysis and close attention to detail
• Become sensitized to the literary effect particular linguistic choices may have
• Develop their critical thinking skills through textual analysis and construction of arguments 
• Demonstrate essay-writing, bibliographic and research skills
• Employ appropriate critical and theoretical terms in their own writing

1. Introduction and course overview
2. Defining the novel and the elements of fiction
3. History of the British Novel - Historical overview of the major periods and works of Anglo-American Literature
4. Introduction to the work of Jane Austen – Context and Language
5. Pride and Prejudice - Genre
6. Pride and Prejudice –  Character and Narrative / Setting and Description
7. Pride and Prejudice – Gender and critical heritage
8. Charlotte Brontë’s Work and the Brontë sisters 
9. Jane Eyre: Narrative Elements
10. Jane Eyre: Class and gender  
11. Jane Eyre: Themes and Genre
12. Jane Eyre: Narrative and Characterization
13. Course Review: The British Novel in the 19th Century
14. Course Review: The British Novel in the 19th Century

Required Reading

Austen, Jane.  Pride and Prejudice, ed. Donald Gray, Mary A. Favret, Norton Critical Editions. 4th edn. London: Norton, 2016.

Brontë, Charlotte.  Jane Eyre: an Authoritative Text, Contexts, Criticism. Ed. Deborah Lutz. Norton Critical Editions. 4th ed., 2016.

Or Brontë, Charlotte. Jane Eyre. Penguin Books, 2010.

Recommended Reading

Theory and Context:

Barry, Peter. Beginning Theory: An Introduction to Literary and Cultural Theory. 3rd  Ed. Manchester University Press, 2009.

Carter, Ronald, and John McRae. The Routledge History of Literature in English: Britain and Ireland. 3rd. ed., 2016.

Greenblatt, Stephen, gen. ed. The Norton Anthology of English Literature. 9th ed. Vol. 2. New York: Norton, 2012.

Peck, John and Martin Coyle. A Brief History of English Literature . 2nd  Ed. Palgrave Macmillan, 2013. 

Sampson, George. The Concise Cambridge History of English Literature. Cambridge University Press, 1945.

Toolan, Michael. Narrative; a critical linguistic introduction. Routledge. 2001

Wheeler, Michael. English Fiction of the Victorian Period. Longman, 1999.

Language and Style:

Eaglestone, Robert, Doing English: A Guide for Literature Students. Taylor & Francis, 2017.

Montgomery, M. et. al. Ways of Reading. 3rd Ed. London: Routledge, 2006.

Leech, Geoffrey and Michael Short. Style in Fiction. Longman, 1981.

Simpson, Paul, Language through Literature: An Introduction. Taylor & Francis, 2003.

Wright, Laura and Jonathan Hope. Stylistics: A Practical Coursebook. Routledge, 1996.

The Novel: 

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

Horsman, E. A. The Victorian Novel. Clarendon Press, 1990.

Rodensky, Lisa. The Oxford Handbook of the Victorian Novel. Oxford University Press. 2013.

Austen: 

Butler, Marilyn. Jane Austen and the War of Ideas. Clarendon Press, 1975. 

Copeland, Edward, and Juliet McMaster, eds. The Cambridge Companion to Jane Austen, 2011. (especially chapters: ‘The professional woman writer’ and ‘Gender’

Downie, J. A. ‘Who Says She's A Bourgeois Writer? Reconsidering the Social and Political Contexts of Jane Austen's Novels’. Eighteenth-Century Studies, Vol. 40, No. 1 (Fall, 2006), pp. 69-84.

Morini, Massimiliano, Jane Austen's Narrative Techniques: A Stylistic and Pragmatic Analysis. Taylor & Francis, 2016.

Todd, Janet, The Cambridge Companion to 'Pride and Prejudice' Cambridge University Press, 2013.

Brontë:

 Alexander, Christine; Sellars, Jane. The Art of the Brontës. Cambridge University Press. 1995.

Glen, Heather. The Cambridge Companion to the Brontës. Cambridge University Press, 2002.

Critical Essays on Jane Eyre included in the Norton Edition by: 

Virginia Woolf ‘Jane Eyre’ 

Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar from ‘A Dialogue of Self and Soul: Plain Jane’s Progress’

Carla Kaplan from Girl Talk: Jane Eyre and the Romance of Women’s Narration

The course is based on a hybrid model of interactive lecturing and close reading workshop. Dialogue and discussion with students is encouraged, and there will be short practical activities that students will complete in groups in class that practice elements of practical criticism and stylistic analysis. Visual material are used to introduce contextual elements and key passages. Class handouts with selected excerpts from primary, as well as secondary sources, will assist the lecturing and learning process.

The above mentioned resources (slides, class handouts and selected secondary readings) will be made available to students though the e-class platform.  PPT slildes are used for lecturing support. 

The course is assessed through a research paper that asks students to think about issues of culture and context, genre and stylistic issues, and how these inform the works we have studied.