Unit information: Romanticism, History and Politics in 2013/14

Unit name	Romanticism, History and Politics
Unit code	ENGLM3010
Credit points	20
Level of study	M/7
Teaching block(s)	Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24)
Unit director	Professor. Punter
Open unit status	Not open
Pre-requisites	None
Co-requisites	None
School/department	Department of English
Faculty	Faculty of Arts

Description including Unit Aims

The unit will introduce students to primary and theoretical texts addressing central questions about political contexts of writing in the Romantic period. Issues that may be studied include: war, trials and imprisonment, censorship, poverty and charity, the city, gender politics, the politics of the gothic, women's writing of the period, revolution. Like other parts of this programme, this unit will be structured so as to combine the investigation of these wider issues with sharply focused readings of a wide range of canonical and less well-known texts and authors.

Intended Learning Outcomes

Students who complete this unit should have developed a heightened awareness of the significance of the political contexts of Romantic writing, which will illuminate their reading of individual texts and provide an enriching context for their reading of Romantic literature. Their reading for this unit will sharpen their understanding of the political dimensions of that writing while introducing them to a wide range of text and writers.

Teaching Information

7 x 2-hour seminar, 1 reading week, 11 Consultation Hours

Assessment Information

1 essay of 4,000 words

Reading and References

• Duncan Wu, ed., Romanticism: An Anthology 3rd edition (Oxford: Blackwell, 2005)
• Jeffrey Cox, Poetry and Politics in the Cockney School: Keats, Shelley, Hunt and their Circle (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998)
• James Chandler, England in 1819: The Politics of Literary Culture and the Case of Romantic Historicism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998)
• Elizabeth A. Fay, A Feminist Introduction to Romanticism (Oxford: Blackwell, 1998)
• Gary Kelly, Women, Writing and Revolution, 1790-1827 (Oxford, 1993)
• Robin Jarvis, The Romantic Period: The Intellectual and Cultural Context of English Literature, 1789-1830 (Harlow: Longman, 2004)