Female maladies, medical and literary culture in the long 19th century
We will look at how writers of fiction portrayed deviant and/or difficult women and how society, including the medical profession, punished, chastised or managed these transgressive characters. Texts will be Mary Wollstonecraft’s unfinished novel Maria, Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s The Yellow … More details …
Villanelles, Sonnets and Sestinas
Certain poetic forms have an enduring appeal for poets and readers alike. We shall read and discuss a variety of these, exploring the ways in which metre, rhyme and repetition contribute to a poem’s overall effect.
North and South: Elizabeth Gaskell
Share your responses to this classic novel. At one time, it was classified only as a ‘condition of England’ novel. More recently the story of Margaret Hale, and her movements between the rural south and the newly industrialised north has … More details …
Landscapes in Literature
An exploration of British landscape writing through selected texts of poetry and prose, from 19th century industrial and post-industrial landscapes, to the ‘new nature writing’ of the 21st century.
Americans in Paris
Paris has been a catalyst for some of America ’s finest thinkers and creators. From Thomas Jefferson to Gene Kelly, this course explores their reasons for going there and the work they produced. The main focus will be art (Sargent, … More details …