We will consider the novel as responding to a network of interrelated problems – of the self and its imaginative politics – at the representational crossroads of medieval epic, courtly romance, spiritual autobiography, picaresque satire, colonialist adventure, gallant intrigue, baroque casuistry, bourgeois conduct book, sentimental love story, moral treatise, psychological realism, and mock-heroic “comic epic in prose.” As the emerging literary “form of forms,” the early modern novel vibrantly juxtaposes and interweaves all these different generic strands. Our readings and discussion will refer to the European context of the evolution of this narrative form in England. ![]() Texts: Specific texts, and a course-pack of collected texts, will be available at the McGill BookstoreĮvaluation: Midterm essay (25%) final essay (35%) final exam (30%) course participation (10%)ĭescription: This course will canvas some of the “origins” of the English novel and trace its development (particularly as anti-romance satire and realism) up to the mid-eighteenth century. ![]() Our literary study of the decade will also regularly cast an eye to other examples of popular print culture, including contemporary news from home and abroad, tales of piracy on lawless seas, and accounts of witchcraft and other strange crimes. We will follow the decade’s prose as it ranges broadly from proto-novelistic romances to satirical pamphleteering, from underworld documentary to exotic travel narratives. ![]() We will also keep an eye on the theatrical context, studying works by popular playwrights such as Christopher Marlowe, Thomas Kyd, William Shakespeare and Thomas Dekker. We will read and discuss examples from popular contemporary poetic genres such as the sonnet sequence, the epyllion, and the pastoral. Description: In this course we will survey the 1590s, one of the most remarkable decades in English literary history, one which saw the initial publication of major works by Spenser, Sidney, Shakespeare, Marlowe, Lodge, Greene, Nashe, Deloney, Drayton, Daniel, and Bacon, among others.
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