Elizabeth Gaskell’s 'Gothic Tales'
Often regarded only as a writer of realist novels such as North and South, Elizabeth Gaskell’s
powerful short tales often use Gothic motifs and conventions – ghosts, bandits,
witches, murders, madness. This session
will explore how Gaskell’s Gothic tales relate to the literary traditions of
realism, the Gothic and historical fiction and consider how they are shaped by
cultural and contextual influences.
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'Jane Eyre', history and the Gothic
Written at a time of revolutions across Europe, Jane Eyre was also considered revolutionary for what it said about women and gender. This session will introduce the cultural and contextual influences within which Charlotte Brontë was writing and look at how she uses Gothic language and conventions (such as the supernatural) in the novel.
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Jane Austen: Love and Money
Two hundred years after her death, Jane Austen was chosen to feature on the new £10 note. Why does she have such popular appeal? And is what she says about love and money still relevant today? This session will look at the attitudes and values expressed in her texts and examine how she uses irony to offer social critique. It will focus on Sense and Sensibility, but a similar session may be available on another of Austen’s novels on request.
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Reading Mary Shelley’s 'Frankenstein'
‘I shall thus give a general answer to the question, so very frequently asked me – “How I, then a young girl, came to think of and dilate upon, so very hideous an idea?”’ (Mary Shelley, Introduction to Frankenstein).
How did a 19-year-old girl come to write one of the most famous Gothic novels? Starting from the conception of the novel, this session uses theories of the Gothic to explore Frankenstein as a novel about birth, parenthood and creation.
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Reading Christina Rossetti: hidden meanings
Is ‘Goblin Market’ just a children’s poem? Or can we read it as a poem about religion, addiction, sexuality or even capitalism? This session will look at some of the possible interpretations of Rossetti’s work and discuss how these relate to the cultural contexts within which she was writing. It will include a focus on close reading techniques in order to examine how Rossetti adapts structure, form and language for effect in her poetry.
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Poetry: Making Connections
How do poems relate to one another? How are meaning and form shaped by poets? This session will help students develop their confidence in analysing poetry and making connections across works by different poets. It will introduce literary concepts and terminology and consider how best to organise a comparative analysis of two poems.
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