Modern British Literature and Culture 1.
The purpose of this seminar course is to introduce students to some aspects and features of 20th-century British literature and culture. Since the fundamental cultural institutions are dealt with in a following course in the second term, besides discussing classic 20th-century literary texts from a cultural studies point of view, the course will focus on investigating issues like Englishness, colonization, gender, the impact of the two world wars, the mid-war period, the Angry generation and gender in culture. Whereas the course will primarily rely on written literary texts, it will have visual components as well, in the form of film viewing (Love Actually) and shorter sections of television programs (Downton Abbey). Literary texts will include Joseph Conrad’s The Heart of Darkness, Pat Barker’s Regeneration, Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway, William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, Dodie Smith’s I Capture the Castle, the War Poets, and John Osborne’s play Look Back in Anger.
Modern British Literature and Culture 2.
The purpose of this seminar course is to introduce students to some aspects and features of 20th century British literature and culture. Since the fundamental cultural institutions are dealt with in a previous course, in the second term, besides discussing classic twentieth-century literary texts from a cultural studies point of view, the course will focus on investigating issues like the 60s, Thatcherism and the 1980s, postmodernism, multiculturalism, lad lit, and heritage culture. Whereas the course will primarily rely on written texts, it will also have visual components, both in the form of film viewing, and by introducing complementary visual material as well. Literary texts will include Samuel Beckett’s Endgame, Ian McEwan’s Atonement, Sue Townsend’s The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 3/4, films like Bend it Like Beckham, In the Name of the Father and Belle, TV series like The Crown, and the poems of Philip Larkin.