Teaching code

4S002910

Teacher

Emanuel Stelzer

Coordinatore

Emanuel Stelzer

Credits

9

Also offered in courses:

• English literature and culture 2 [Tur] of the course Bachelor's degree in Languages and Cultures for Tourism and International Commerce

Language

English

Scientific Disciplinary Sector (SSD)

L-LIN/10 - ENGLISH LITERATURE

Period

I semestre (Lingue e letterature straniere) dal Sep 26, 2022 al Dec 23, 2022.

Lessons timetable Moodle Seminars

Learning objectives

The course, taught in English, aims to provide students with an introduction to British literature from the Renaissance to late Romanticism, focusing on some of the most representative works. The course also aims to introduce the main critical approaches and the main features of literary genres. The overall goal of the course is to provide students with a good level of knowledge of literary history (in terms of historical context, texts, genres, movements and authors) and to develop their critical skills for analysis, argumentation and exposition in English, in relation to various typologies of literary texts in their historical-cultural context. At the end of the course, students will be able to: - analyse the set texts and place them in their respective historical-cultural contexts; - describe the texts in a structured and informed way, taking into account literary conventions and applying an informed critical approach; - discuss literary topics in English in a clear and consistent way.

Prerequisites and basic notions

The exam can be taken only after having passed the English Literature and Language courses of the first year.

Program

Questions of Time and Place in Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale and The Tempest
The course will analyse two of Shakespeare’s late plays: The Winter’s Tale and The Tempest. We will tackle issues such as journeys in literature and drama, textual migrations and intertextuality, representations of ‘otherness’, gender and genre discourses, metatheatricality. Such themes will be dealt with by exploring the Jacobean historical and cultural context, but also through modern and contemporary adaptations of those two romances.
There are no differences between the programme for attending students and the one for non-attending students. Attending and non-attending students alike are required to do all the readings indicated below.
All texts in the syllabus are compulsory.
If a text is signalled as “optional”, this means that the text can be used to further or facilitate one’s study, but that text is not compulsory.
Further teaching material will be available for download from the Moodle repository.
Further bibliographical instructions and clarifications about the exam will be provided at the beginning of the lectures.
Language: the course will be entirely in English.
Exclusively the editions of the primary texts indicated below will be admitted; please bring the texts in class.
Reference texts:
a. Primary texts (compulsory):
- William Shakespeare, The Winter’s Tale, ed. by John Pitcher, London: Arden Shakespeare (Bloomsbury), 2010.
- William Shakespeare, The Tempest, ed. by Virginia Mason Vaughan and Alden T. Vaughan, revised edition, London: Arden Shakespeare (Bloomsbury), 2011.
b. Secondary texts (compulsory):
- Michael D. Bristol, “In Search of the Bear: Spatiotemporal Form and the Heterogeneity of Economies in The Winter's Tale”, Shakespeare Quarterly, Vol. 42, No. 2, 1991, pp. 145-67.
- Jerry Brotton, “'This Tunis, sir, was Carthage': Contesting Colonialism in The Tempest”. In Post-Colonial Shakespeares, edited by Ania Loomba and Martin Orkin, New York: Routledge, 1998, pp. 23-42.
- Mary Ellen Lamb, “Virtual Audiences and Virtual Authors: The Winter's Tale, The Tempest, and Old Wives' Tales”. In Staging Early Modern Romance: Prose Fiction, Dramatic Romance, and Shakespeare, ed. by Mary Ellen Lamb and Valerie Wayne, New York: Routledge, 2009, pp. 122-42.
- Virginia Mason Vaughan, “The Critical Backstory: ‘What’s Past is Prologue’”. In The Tempest: A Critical Reader ed. by Virginia Mason Vaughan and Alden T. Vaughan, Arden Shakespeare (Bloomsbury), 2014, pp. 13-38.
b1. Optional secondary texts:
- Catherine Belsey, “Parenthood: Hermione’s Statue”. In Catherine Belsey, Shakespeare and the Loss of Eden, Houndmills, Macmillan, 1999, pp. 85-128.
- Silvia Bigliazzi and Lisanna Calvi (eds), Revisiting The Tempest: The Capacity to Signify. Houndmills, Palgrave, 2014.
- Richard Proudfoot, “Verbal Reminiscence and the Two-Part structure of The Winter’s Tale”, Shakespeare Survey Vol. 29, 1976, pp. 67-78.
c. Handbook (obligatory):
For the section on the history of literature (from the sixteenth century to the Enlightenment), students are expected to study:
- Andrew Sanders, The Short Oxford History of English Literature (Oxford University Press, 2004 - third edition): chapters 3 (“Renaissance and Reformation: Literature 1510-1620”), 4 (“Revolution and Restoration: Literature 1620-1690) and 5 (“Eighteenth-Century Literature 1690-1780”).
TEACHING MATERIAL
Students will be able to download additional teaching material (such as handouts, texts, pictures, etc) provided in class from the MOODLE platform by the end of the course. This additional teaching material does not replace, but supplements the compulsory reading and study of the primary and secondary texts (to be read in their entirety), of the handbook for the history of literature section, as listed under the section REFERENCE TEXTS.

Bibliography

Didactic methods

The course consists of a series of lectures which foresee the active involvement of the students. A written calendar of the topics that will be dealt with will be circulated in class at the beginning of the course. Lectures will be held in English.
If you need to isolate because you test positive for Covid, please contact the teacher to arrange for supplementary material.

Learning assessment procedures

Knowledge acquisition will be evaluated through an oral exam, which will consist in a discussion of the topics dealt with during the course. There will not be differences between the exam of attending students and the one of non-attending students.

Evaluation criteria

Knowledge acquisition wishes to assess the student’s:
1) knowledge of the history of English literature from the Renaissance to the eighteenth century;
2) understanding of the primary texts in the syllabus, setting them in their historical and cultural context;
3) acquisition of a suitable critical methodology for the analysis of texts and contexts;
4) skills in analysing texts and ability to discuss and argue one’s thesis in English.

Criteria for the composition of the final grade

The final mark will result from the average of the grades assigned according to the four criteria described above.

Exam language

English