Semester 1 Assessment:
A Critical Commentary (1500 words) 20% [Learning Outcomes 1,5,6];
A Group Presentation 20% [Learning Outcomes 1,4,6]

Semester 2 Assessment:
A Coursework Essay 60% (4000 words) [Learning Outcomes 1,2,3,5,6]

Key Information Set Data:
80% Coursework
20% Practical Exam

In this module we will study the Realist novel of the Victorian period from early Dickens to mature Hardy and beyond. The investigation is directed towards imbedding literary text in the wider cultural contexts of the period and relating the developing new literary style of Realism, as a form of continued response, to the processes of accelerating social and political modernisation of the time. In a number of exemplary texts we will trace the development of the ‘the modern novel’ from the points of inception down to late manifestations of the genre. The module is set to investigate and evaluate main positions and narrative strategies adopted by the novel as interventions in the debate on modernity as it was led during that time, and as it is ongoing to the present day.

Teaching will be through lectures and seminars. You will work independently (on research, preparation of lectures, seminars and seminar presentations) and in pairs or small groups (on seminar assignments and presentations).

Key Information Set Data:
16% Sheduled Learning and Teaching Activity
84% Guided Independent Learning

Texts may include Dickens Oliver Twist, Great Expectations; Charlotte Bronte Jane Eyre; George Eliot Middlemarch; Hardy Return of the Native, The Mayor of Casterbridge; Gissing In the Year of Jubilee.

Benevolo Leonardo, The European City, Oxford: Blackwell, 1995.
David Deirdre (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to the Victorian Novel, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012
Giddens Anthony, Modernity and Self Identity - Self and Society in the Late Modern Age, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1991.
James Louis, The Victorian Novel, Oxford: Blackwell 2006
Moretti Franco, Atlas of the European Novel 1800-1900, London: Verso, 1998
Williams Raymond The Country and the City, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1973.

Library
Word-processing facilities

1. DEMONSTRATE KNOWLEDGE OF THEMES AND FORMS OF THE VICTORIAN NOVEL AND SHOW AN UNDERSTANDING OF THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THIS NEW GENRE IN THE CONTEXT OF CULTURAL DEVELOPMENTS OF THE PERIOD
Knowledge & Understanding

2. IDENTIFY IN WHICH WAY THE VICTORIAN NOVEL, IN THE ISSUES IT PROJECTS AND THE FORMS IT IS CONSTRUCTED, INTERVENES IN THE CONTEMPORARY DEBATES ON MODERNITY IN CRISIS
Learning

3. COMPREHEND REALISM OF THE VICTORIAN NOVEL AS A NEW STYLE OF ARTISTIC REPRESENTATION IN ITS INGREDIENT ELEMENTS, EPISTEMOLOGICAL MAKE-UP AND AESTHETIC POTENTIAL
Analysis

4. DEMONSTRATE ASSURANCE IN PRESENTING COMPLEX IDEAS IN A SMALL GROUP FORMAT Communication

5. CARRY OUT INDEPENDENT RESEARCH AND APPLY TECHNIQUES AND METHODS OF LITERARY ANALYSIS AND CRITICISM IN YOUR OWN ACADEMIC WRITING
Application

6. DEMONSTRATE AN AWARENESS OF METHODOLOGIES IN YOUR WRITTEN AND ORAL WORK Reflection