English – Contemporary Literature MA Welcome Pack

​​Introduction to the Autumn Modules and Reading Lists

Please see below for a brief introduction to the modules which will be running in the autumn semester and some reading to get you started. If you are a full-time student you will be studying both of these modules, if you are part time and in year 1 you will be studying LITM033 only. If you are part time and in year 2 you will be studying LITM037 only

LITM033 Critical Theory and Methodologies

• Module Leader: Dr Claire Allen
• Module Tutors: Dr Claire Allen, Dr Richard Chamberlain, Dr Michael Starr

Introduction

‘Theory’ has become an inevitable part of English Studies, a standard ingredient over the last thirty years in undergraduate degrees and in the discourse of criticism. In the process it has also altered the relation of ‘English’ to other areas in the humanities and beyond. Nevertheless, there have been persistent questions about theory’s relevance to what is deemed to be the central activity of reading and interpretation of literary and cultural texts. How should we read and use theory? Why is it so ‘difficult’? What do we gain from it? Should we think not of ‘Theory’ but of ‘theories’ in lower case and in the plural? Is there a realm of pre-theory or non-theory, or have we now entered a world of post-theory?

We shall be raising such questions directly at the outset of the module and throughout the sessions.

We have chosen to examine a range of especially influential sets of ideas or theoretical ‘movements’, including the Frankfurt School, structuralism, post- structuralism and reader-response theory, deconstruction, psychoanalysis, postmodernism, postcolonialism, feminism and queer theory. These enable us to consider questions of textuality, history, gender and sexuality, and the broad, changing relation of cultural forms to contemporary society. Throughout the module, we will be exploring the helpfulness of these ideas in performing critical readings of Angela Carter’s novel, The Magic Toyshop, amongst other texts and media.

Those teaching on the module do not take identical positions on these themes or the questions sketched above. Nor do we expect students necessarily to agree with ourselves or each other. What we do share, however, is a commitment to a clear understanding of challenging ideas and to the value of informed and critical dialogue. This will govern the pedagogic aims, structure and style of the module. We hope and assume, finally, that you will gain from an acquaintance with the ideas and agendas introduced in the module, a sense of how these can shape or reshape your reading, and, above all, help develop a confident critical practice of your own.

The module will also explore the importance of methodologies in postgraduate study and research, and the interconnections between theory and methodology.

Primary Text

• Angela Carter, The Magic Toy Shop (please make sure you have read this before the module begins. Please bring your copy of the novel every week)

Core Secondary Reading

• Andrew Bennett and Nicholas Royal, An Introduction to Literature, Criticism and Theory. Sixth Edition. Routledge, 2023.

In each seminar we will be discussing the theoretical ideas/ themes for that week, based on your reading of the relevant chapter/s of Bennett and Royal’s text (as dictated by your tutor in advance of each session), as well as a selection of online resources, which will be posted on Nile.

Angela Carter’s The Magic Toyshop (1967) will frequently (but not always!) be used as the basis of theoretical explications and discussion. Please bring your copy of the novel every week and a copy of Bennett and Royal’s text.

You will be required to read one or two critical/theoretical essays and/or chapters in preparation for each week. You will need to make sure that you have access to these, either in print or online. There is no need to read the modules posted on Nile or Bennett and Royal’s text before you start the course.

If you are new to literary theory, you might find the below a useful starting point:

• Peter Barry, Beginning Theory. Manchester University Press, 2009 (any edition)

LITM037 Pulp Visions

• Module Leader: David Simmons
• Module Tutors: Prof Lorna Jowett, Dr David Simmons, Associate Prof Mike Starr

Introduction

Drawing on and developing skills in textual analysis and theoretical understanding, LITM037 Pulp Visions examines how popular narratives (including popular fiction, film and comics) employ generic conventions to engage with complex cultural, social and philosophical issues. It considers the effects of the commercial constraints placed on popular forms, engages with debates about cultural value, and introduces and evaluates the ways in which ‘high theory’ and ‘low culture’ can be used to interrogate and illuminate one another.

Reading List

• Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep. Any Edition.
• Mickey Spillane, “I, The Jury” and “My Gun is Quick”. These are available in numerous collections including The Mike Hammer Omnibus Volume 1. Alison and Busby, 2006.
• Moore, Alan and Dave Gibbons. Watchmen. London: Titan Books, 1987
• Wonder Woman (Dir. Patty Jenkins, 2017). Available on Box of Broadcasts at: https://learningonscreen.ac.uk/ondemand/index.php/prog/0F8309BC?bcast=138090243
• Blackwood, Algernon. “The Willows”. Lovecraft, H.P. The Call of Cthulhu. and Machen, Arthur. The Great God Pan.
• These are available in several collections and quite widely online. Specific volumes that contain each of these stories include: Lovecraft, H.P. The Call of Cthulhu and Other Weird Stories. Ed. S.T. Joshi. London and New York: Penguin, 2002. Machen, Arthur. The Great God Pan and The Hill of Dreams. New York: Dover, 2006. Blackwood, Algernon. Ancient Sorceries and Other Weird Stories. Ed. S.T. Joshi. London and New York: Penguin, 2002.
• Lovecraft: H.P. “The Horror at Red Hook” Available at: http://www.hplovecraft.com/writings/texts/fiction/hrh.aspx
• LaValle, Victor: The Ballad of Black Tom. New York: Tor, 2016.
• Kiernan, Caitlin. “Houses Under the Sea.” In Lovecraft Unbound. Ed. Ellen Datlow. Milwaukie, OR, Dark Horse Books, 2009. 161-194.
• LeFanu, Sheridan, Carmilla (1872), available at: http://www.english.upenn.edu/~nauerbac/crml.html
• Stephenie Meyer. Twilight. Any Edition.
• Stephen King. Misery. Any Edition.
• Bret Easton Ellis. Lunar Park. Any Edition.

Spring Semester Modules and Sample Reading Lists

The full reading lists for Spring semester modules will be posted on Nile in due course. However, please find below a selected sample reading list (more texts will be added nearer the time) and short description of each module. If you are a full-time student you will take both of these modules, if you are a part-time student you will only take one module of your choice.

The modules which are running in the spring semester are:

• LITM034 Twenty-First Century Storytelling
• LITM038 Gender, Sexuality & Writing the Body

LITM034 Twenty-First Century Storytelling

• Module Leader: Dr Claire Allen

Introduction

In studying a range of texts, from experimental fiction to performance poetry, from autobiography to the graphic novel, from authors identifying as Scottish, Irish, English, Welsh, American and Nigerian – this module focuses on the single question:  what new stories can be told in the twenty-first century, and what do different approaches to storytelling tell us about ourselves and our age?

Other considerations will include:

• Theoretical considerations for narrative techniques in the late twentieth and early twenty-first century
• The diversity of late twentieth and early twenty-first century literary techniques in terms of storytelling
• Graduate employability: changing real world ethical considerations and socio-political sensitivities throughout the late twentieth and early twenty-first century and how such study can build emotional intelligence and empathy.

Sample Reading List (you may use any edition)

• Alasdair Gray Poor Things (1992)
• Patti Smith Just Kids (2010)
• Jonathan Coe Bournville (2022)
• Paul Lynch, The Prophet Song (2023)

LITM038 Gender, Sexuality & Writing the Body

• Module Leader: Dr Sonya Andermahr

Introduction

Theories of sex, gender and sexuality have occupied an important place in the development of English studies, Women’s Studies and LGBTQ (Lesbian/Gay and/or Queer) Studies since 1960. In this module we study a diverse range of 20th- and 21st-century texts by female and male writers, primarily from Britain and the United States of America, but all Anglophone. They range from examples of literary fiction, utopian writing and the post-modern novel to shorter fiction, poetry and drama. Throughout the module, we will be placing our reading of the texts in the context of feminist, gay/lesbian and/or “queer” literary criticism. These are diverse fields of theory, with their origins in works such as Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own – an example of first-wave feminism – and subsequently in second- and third-wave feminist writing, as well as in psychoanalytic theory, deconstruction and social liberation theories. Many of the sessions require you to a read both a creative work and a piece of literary criticism or theory. Seminar discussion may then consider either one particular theoretical approach, or a range of different theoretical approaches that may be applied to the text under discussion. In each case, there will be a tutor-led, and sometimes a student-led, introduction to the critical materials studied. A particular emphasis may fall on the representation of the physical body and bodily behaviour, appearance and identity more generally. Equally, examples of non-mainstream gendered and sexual representations will feature, since these provide the best illustration of socio-cultural and political tendencies or norms as well as distinctive artistic and cultural traditions and innovations.

Across the course, a diverse range of Anglophone texts in a variety of genres, from the period 1960-present will be studied to illustrate a breadth of representations of sex, gender, sexuality and the body. Transgressive modes of behaviour will feature, particularly by way of narratives which flout conventions of gendered or sexualised behaviour, ethnic and cultural tradition, and class affiliation.

Sample Reading List

• James Dickey, Deliverance (any edition)
• James Tiptree Jr., Her Smoke Rose Up Forever (Gollancz, short story collection)
• Michael Cunningham, The Hours (any edition)
• Tony Kushner, Angels in America (any edition)