ENGLISH LITERATURE

Single discipline educational activity

Course Sheet

Academic Year of enrolment:

2015/2016

Type of Course:

Related/Supplementary

Optional/Mandatory:

Optional

Degree:

Master's Degree Programme in FOREIGN LANGUAGES AND LITERATURES FOR CULTURAL MEDIATION AND LOCAL DEVELOPMENT

Disciplinary Sector:

ENGLISH LITERATURE

Credits:

Programme Year:

Professor and Collaborators:

SALIS Loredana

Hours of classroom activity:

Prerequisites:

English Language: same as per prerequisites to access the LM38 and LM 14 course degree or QCERT B1/B1+

AF code:

40X01334

Assessment Methods

Verification of learning:

Oral examination

Teaching period

First semester

Objectives

This course furthers students' awareness of literature and their ability to read diverse literary texts through the analysis of selected works from modern and contemporary Anglophone literatures. The focus is on the creative word and the notion of literature as a creative space. Students will consider the creative/revolutionary potential of historical drama and novel writing in the first part of the course. They will then concentrate on literary texts in which the condition of creativity is the transcendence of spatial boundaries and the exploration of other worlds which inspire the writing of literature.

Contents

The course focuses on creativity and the creative word (Bachtin, Panikkar) through a reading of a selection of modern and contemporary texts from Anglophone literatures. It follows a double path: the first part of the course aims to reflect on the notion of literary text as a creative space. More specifically, students will study a historical drama (Henry V, Shakespeare) and a historical novel (The Rising of Bella Casey, Mary Morrissy) in which the rewriting of History is crucial to our understanding of the present. The second part of the course explores texts in which the present can be accessed by transcending its boundaries and the spatial boundaries of reality (Kubla Khan, Coleridge, and The Lifted Veil, George Eliot).
WB Yeats' The Dreamimg of the Bones presents both these aspects: it revisits the past as well as transcending the present in order to make sense of the here and now. It combines myth and fact, dream and vision to recount a tale of universal appeal. This one-act play will be performed by students attending this year's University Theatre Lab in December 2015. Students attending this course of Literatures in English will have a chance to see the performance at the end of the semester.

Recommended Bibliography

Primary sources:

COLERIDGE, S.T. (1816), Kubla Khan (English/Italian versions, photocopied material)

ELIOT, George (1859), The Lifted Veil (either Oxford UP or Virago edition)

MORRISSY, Mary (2013), "The Rising of Bella Casey" (Dublin: Brandon Press, 2013)

SHAKESPEARE, William, (c.a. 1598) Henry V (English text with Italian translation, eg: Oscar Mondadori, I Meridiani or Garzanti edition)

YEATS, WB, (1919) The Dreaming of the Bones (photocopied material)

Secondary sources:

For the cultural and historical contexts, see Paolo Bertinetti, Breve storia della letteratura inglese (Einaudi), e di Lilla Crisafulli e Keir Elam, Manuale di letteratura e cultura inglese (BUP);

Bachtin, M. "La parola nella vita e nella poesia" (Meltemi, Roma), pp. 34-64 in Linguaggio e scrittura (dispense);

Breuer, R., (2015) "The definition of Literature", pp. 42-46, in The European English Messenger, 24.1 (dispensa)

Kenneally, B. (1996), "WB. Yeats, an experiment in living", pp. 11-33 in Yeats e l'autobiografismo, a cura di M. Cataldi (Tirrenia Stampatori);

Panikkar, R. (2007) Lo spirito della parola (Bollati Boringhieri);

Riem, A., (2013), "The Creative Word, the Birth of Sound and Imagination is Samuel Taylor Coleridge", pp. 47-60 in The Tapestry of the Creative Word in Anglophone Literatures, Udine: Forum (dispensa)

Teaching Methods

Frontal and interactive teaching

Contacts/More Information

For students who won't attend the course, the following additional list of bibliografical references is provided:

Cataldi, M. (1990), 'Introduzione', in Yeats. Il ciclo di Cuchulain, cinque drammi celtici (Milano: Garzanti) (dispense)

Robertson, F., (2015) "Walter Scott and the Restoration of Europe", pp. 46-57, in The European English Messenger, 24.1 (photocopied material);

Sekine, M., Murray, C. (1990), "What is Noh?", pp. 22-36; 40-46, in Yeats and the Noh, a comparative study (Gerrards Cross, Colin Smyth) (photocopied material);

Stephens, James, L'Insurrezione di Dublino, trad. italiana a cura di Enrico Terrinoni (Menthalia, 2015)

Please note that all photocopied material are available at Copisteria "110e Lode", Via Zanfarino, Sassari.

ENGLISH LITERATURE

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ENGLISH LITERATURE