2008/09 Undergraduate Module Catalogue

ENGL3357 The Postmodern Victorian Novel

20 creditsClass Size: 10

School of English

Module manager: Dr Tracy Hargreaves
Email: T.Hargreaves@leeds.ac.uk

Taught: Semester 2 (Jan to Jun) View Timetable

Year running 2008/09

This module is not approved as an Elective

Objectives

This module will give students the opportunity to engage with questions of periodicity in the Victorian and Contemporary periods, and with historiography and intertextual revision through an engagement with postmodernism. The interplay between postmodernism and the Victorian novel enables students to engage with how historical fact is retrieved and invented, and with the relation between fiction and history in historiographic metafiction. Students will engage with close reading but also will critically engage with conceptual debates pertaining to postmodernism and literary form.

Learning outcomes
Students will have developed:
- the ability to use written and oral communication effectively;
- the capacity to analyse and critically examine diverse forms of discourse;
- the ability to manage quantities of complex information in a structured and systematic way;
- the capacity for independent thought and judgement;
- critical reasoning;
- research skills, including the retrieval of information, the organisation of material and the evaluation of its importance;
- IT skills;
- efficient time management and organisation skills;
- the ability to learn independently.

Skills outcomes
Skills for effective communication, oral and written.
Capacity to analyse and critically examine diverse forms of discourse.
Ability to acquire quantities of complex information of diverse kinds in a structured and systematic way.
Capacity for independent thought and judgement.
Critical reasoning.
Research skills, including information retrieval skills, the organisation of material, and the evaluation of its importance.
IT skills.
Time management and organisational skills.
Independent learning.

Syllabus

Contemporary literature's continuing fascination with Victorian fiction has led some critics to suggest that ours is really a post-Victorian rather than a contemporary or postmodern age, that, as Michel Foucault famously suggested 'We' are really 'Other Victorians'. Or, our fascination with the Victorians has also been seen as symptomatic of our own postmodernity where the postmodern, as Frederic Jameson suggests, might be grasped 'as an attempt to think the present historically'. This module will engage with a range of contemporary and postmodern fictions that re-engage with and re-imagine Victorian literature in a number of ways and to particular critical and aesthetic effect. You can expect to: explore forms of literary self-consciousness in examples of postmodern 'historiographic metafiction'; look at inter-textuality and the ways in which contemporary texts excavate 'classic' Victorian novels to re-inscribe alternative, once silenced voices or points of view; look at writers' self-conscious interrogations of the relationship between contemporary fiction and nineteenth century (colonial) history; engage with the nostalgic possibility (or postmodern impossibility) of ever retrieving 'true' historical facts; think about the unreliability (or fictionality) of certain historical recuperations. We'll also look at forms of detective fiction (as a means of piecing together, making sense of the past), at postmodern pastiche and parody and we'll consider nostalgia: a sentiment that, A S Byatt has suggested, can prompt our delight in neo- Victorian literature, for the retrieved pleasures of densely plotted narrative and characterisation.

One unassessed essay of 1,700 words is required. This does not form part of the assessment for this module, but is a requirement and MUST be submitted. Students who fail to submit the unassessed essay will be awarded a maximum mark of 40 for the module (a bare Pass).

Teaching methods

Delivery type	Number	Length hours	Student hours
Meetings	5	1.00	5.00
Seminar	10	1.00	10.00
Private study hours			185.00
Total Contact hours			15.00
Total hours (100hr per 10 credits)			200.00

Private study

Teaching will be through weekly seminars (10 x 1 hour) plus up to 5 additional hours (content to be determined by the module tutor). The 5 additional hours may include lectures, plenary sessions, film showings, or the return of unassessed/assessed essays.

Private Study: Reading, seminar preparation and essay writing.

Opportunities for Formative Feedback

Contribution to seminars
1 x 1,700 word unassessed essay (submitted in Week 7 of the semester)

Methods of assessment

Coursework

Assessment type	Notes	% of formal assessment
Essay	4,000 words	100.00
Essay	,	0.00
Total percentage (Assessment Coursework)		100.00

One unassessed essay of 1700 words is required. This does not form part of the assessment for this module, but is a requirement and MUST be submitted. Students who fail to submit the unassessed essay will be awarded a maximum mark of 40 for the module (a bare Pass).

Reading list

The reading list is available from the Library website

Last updated: 24/04/2008

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