The main aims of the module are to provide intensive study of a wide range of writing between 1837 and 1901, including the development of the realist novel, the problematic status of poetry, the rise of women writers, the role of Empire and to provide a context for such study in the light of the social, political, religious changes of the period.

(LO1) Students will acquire analytical skills and vocabulary appropriate to university-level work and be able to use them appropriately in relation to a range of sources from different historical periods and social contexts.

(LO2) Students will gain the ability to construct and support argument in written or spoken forms suitable for academic work and be able to participate constructively in group discussions.

(LO3) Students will gain awareness of cultural, theoretical and historical contexts of literature and language use.

(LO4) Students will have the ability to write well-constructed prose, reflecting appropriate scholarly knowledge and independent response within a sustained argument.

(LO5) Students will have knowledge of one or more specific literary historical periods and the language and genres associated with it/them.

(LO6) Students will have the ability to demonstrate research and evaluative skills that support wider literary or linguistic analysis, criticism, and/or data collection.

(LO7) Students will have the ability to discuss in an agile and knowledgeable way the relation of Victorian texts to contextual problems of belief, identity, and social order, as well as the personal, family, sexual and public relations which lie behind Victorian questioning.

(S1) Students will gain the ability to analyse and interpret sophisticated texts closely and critically.

(S2) Students will gain the ability to construct and support argument in both written and spoken forms.

(S3) Students will gain the ability to write with appropriate subject knowledge, using appropriate approaches and terminology.

(S4) Students will gain the ability to identify and assess relevant information and data, and argue independently in response.

(S5) Students will gain the ability to critically evaluate research materials.

(S6) Students will gain the ability to undertake independent research, and to develop a sense of research attitude.

(S7) Students will gain an ability to relate close-reading work in literary texts to broader cultural currents in the nineteenth century.

Authors studied on the module may include Alfred Lord Tennyson, Charles Dickens, George Eliot, the Brownings, Thomas Hardy, Elizabeth Gaskell, Anthony Trollope, Matthew Arnold, Christina Rossetti, Wilkie Collins, Lewis Carroll, Oscar Wilde, the Brontes, George Meredith, Margaret Oliphant, Thomas Carlyle, and John Ruskin. Topics covered could include the Woman Question, realism, society and politics, science and religion, the ghost story, the sensation novel, imperialism, art and literature, the body, gender and sexuality, and the Victorian reading public.

This module will be taught by 1 x weekly 1-hour tutorial with small group and 2 x weekly 1-hour workshops with whole cohort (F2F or online, as appropriate).