Parkes, Adam
TR 12:45 PM
Park Hall 0136
This course will provide an overview of fiction written in and about Britain in the modern era by considering works from across the twentieth century. Beginning with modernist texts by such authors as Joseph Conrad, D.H. Lawrence, and Virginia Woolf, and concluding with works by J.G. Ballard and Kazuo Ishiguro, we will consider some of the recurring issues of literary style, narrative form, and historical representation that preoccupied twentieth-century British fiction. Combining detailed textual analysis with discussion of relevant historical contexts, we will pay special attention to the question of what it meant to write fiction – especially fiction about history – at different junctures in modern British history.
Bearing in mind that the work-load for this course is far from light, reading ahead during the summer break is recommended. Start with Lawrence's The Rainbow and then try tackling Conrad's Heart of Darkness and Woolf's Mrs Dalloway.
Reading list:
Ballard, J.G. High Rise (Liveright, 2012. ISBN: 978-0871404022).
Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness, ed. Cedric Watts (Oxford UP, 2008. 978-0199536016).
Ishiguro, Kazuo. The Remains of the Day (Vintage, 1990. ISBN: 978-0679731726).
Lawrence, D.H. The Rainbow, ed. Mark Kinkead-Weekes (Penguin, 2007. 978-0141441382).
Naipaul, V.S. Miguel Street (Vintage, 2002. 978-0375713873).
Rhys, Jean. Wide Sargasso Sea (W.W. Norton, 2016. 978-0393352566).
Waugh, Evelyn. The Loved One (Back Bay Books, 2012. 978-0316216470).
Woolf, Virginia. Mrs Dalloway (Vintage, 2016. 978-1784870867).
Recommended: M.H. Abrams and Geoffrey Harpham, A Glossary of Literary Terms; James Wood, How Fiction Works