Aims

This module is designed to unpack the phrase, ‘Victorian values’, which nowadays invokes ideas of sexual repression, stifling middle-class morality, an unbending religious code, and jingoistic insularity. Yet the Victorians saw themselves as living in an age of unprecedented social change, engaging in passionate and controversial debates about the values of the world in which they lived. The module will explore five key debates – questions of gender/sexuality; religion; nature/science; class; race and empire – as they appeared in a range of different genres across the early, mid and late Victorian periods. In the course of the module students will:

Explore some of the most controversial debates of the Victorian period and their articulation in a range of Victorian literary texts.
Consider the formal expression of these debates in a range of different and developing literary genres.
Consider the discursive relationship between text and context in the Victorian novel.
Consider the relationship between literature, history and ideology.
Practise appropriate skills of critical analysis.

Outline Of Syllabus

Each of the topics - gender/sexuality; religion; nature/science; class; race and empire - will be explored in a range of literary genres. Indicative texts and authors may include Wilkie Collins, The Moonstone; Christina Rossetti, Goblin Market; Rudyard Kipling, The Jungle Books; George Bernard Shaw, Mrs Warren's Profession; Douglas Jerrold, The Rent Day; H. Rider Haggard, She; and queer poetry.

Keywords: femininity and masculinity; queer and transgressive sexualities; class conflict; race and empire; faith and doubt; ecocriticism and history of science; fantasy and realism; drama and theatre; poetry; novel; children’s literature.

Teaching Rationale And Relationship

The lectures are designed to introduce students to the texts to be studied, providing as much information about the period as possible and demonstrating strategies of reading which link texts to their context. The scheduled online contact time and workshops encourage students to incorporate this knowledge and develop these strategies in their own reading practice.

Assessment Rationale And Relationship

The commentary tests close reading skills and awareness of the relationship between text and context. The longer essay tests the more complex strategies of reading which take into account the wider Victorian context and competing ideologies of the period.

The formative assessment prepares students for the final essay by asking them to develop a preliminary argument and outline primary and/or secondary research on their topic.