ENH2030

Rewriting Victorian narratives: origins and oblivion

H Scutter

8 points
* 3 hours per week
* Second semester
* Clayton

Objectives On the successful completion of this subject students should have gained a familiarity with a range of contrasting Victorian narratives, an understanding of the ways in which texts are produced from dynamic historic and cultural contexts, and a grasp of the relevant theoretical approaches to nineteenth century studies.

Synopsis This subject explores, through a variety of mainstream and marginalised texts, some of the major intellectual and social issues of the nineteenth century, including Darwinian narratives of origins and oblivion, notions of history and historicity, the progress myth, industrialisation and urbanisation, changing political paradigms, social unrest and dissent, class mobility, the rights of women, redefinitions of childhood, the rise of science and the decline of religious faith. We will ask, as texts are situated within specific historic and cultural contexts, what lies beyond the pale, excluded from text and context. The subject engages with such theoretical approaches as discourse analysis, new historicism, feminism and cultural studies.

Assessment Seminar paper (1500 words): 25%
* Short essay (1500 words): 25%
* Long essay (3000 words): 50%

Prescribed texts

Auerbach N and U C Knoepflmacher Forbidden journeys U Chicago P
Bront` E Wuthering Heights Penguin
Carroll L Alice's adventures in Wonderland Puffin
Collins W The woman in white Penguin
Dickens C Bleak House OUP
Eliot G Daniel Deronda Penguin
Hardy T Tess of the d'Urbervilles OUP
Richardson H H The fortunes of Richard Mahony Angus and Robertson
Stowe H B Uncle Tom's cabin Signet
Departmental handbook of further readings

Recommended reading

Armstrong N Desire and domestic fiction OUP
Azim F The colonial rise of the novel Routledge
Dusinberre J Alice to the lighthouse Macmillan
Michie E Outside the pale: Cultural exclusion, gender difference and the Victorian woman writer Cornell U P
Shires L Rewriting the Victorians Routledge