31146 - English Literature 2 (M-Z)

Learning outcomes

At the end of the course students will be acquainted with the lineaments of English literary history. They will be able to read, understand and translate texts from English into Italian, and to deal with some basic critical methods and tools, in order to elaborate comments and critical opinions on the literary texts read during the course.

Course contents

Romantic Sympathy & Sensibility

In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, sympathy and sensibility figured prominently in British cultural life. Sensibility materialised in literary works as extravagant emotion delivered through rhetorically intense and narratively complex textual episodes. The preoccupation with sensibility started to emerge long before what we now call the Romantic period. Its roots lie in the religious and political conflicts of seventeenth-century England: the Civil War, the Interregnum, the Restoration, and the Glorious Revolution of 1688. Through the first third of the nineteenth century, sensibility continued to flourish. And sensibility was not just an affair of the arts. It was something that philosophers, scientists, historians, and political commentators investigated as an element of mind, matter, and society. During the 1790's the culture of sensibility became associated in the opinion of many with the French Revolution, partly through English Jacobin interest in subjectivity as the site of ideological struggle. As a particularly acute kind of emotional intelligence, sensibility was experienced in many cultural and social arenas. It was pertinent to norms of politeness and mourning. It reinforced the impulses of transformation, social distinction, and political reform. Sympathy and sensibility were matter of obsessive interest in the nations, colonies, and former colonies of Britain and Europe. Sentiment, sympathy and sensibility were the power to feel along with or to intuit the moods and predicaments of the other people. The phenomenon of sensibility was understood as connecting people, things, and texts through the emotions of tender, often painful, relatedness. For the most part, sensibility mattered because it provided a way to feel toward other across distances of place, time, race and social class.

The course is divided in two parts:

A) English History, Literature and Culture from the Eighteenth to the Nineteenth century.

B) The philosophical debate on Sympathy and Sensibility by E. Burke; D. Hume and A. Smith. Close reading of some major writers of the Romantic period, such as H. Mackenzie and  J. Austen for the novel; W. Blake, H. M. Williams; A. Opie; C. Smith; W. Wordsworth and E.B. Browning for the poetry; E. Inchabld and P. B. Shelley for the theatre.

Readings/Bibliography

A) Primary sources:

Prose:

English debate on  Sympathy and Sensibility (J.Locke; E.Burke; D.Hume; A.Smith; M.Wollstonecraft - extracts on-line)

Extracts from "A Philosophical Enquiry" by E. Burke

The role of the poet and the aesthetic of the Romantic poetry (extracts on-line)

Poetry: (choose one of the two groups - the poems are in Materiale Didattico on-line)

Slavery Poems (W. Blake; H.M. Williams; A.Opie)

The Sonnet (C. Smith; W. Wordsworth; E. Barrett Browning)

Novels: (choose one novel)

H. Mackaenzie, The Man of Feeling (1771)

J. Austen, Sense and Sensibility (1811)

Drama : (choose one drama)

E.Inchbald, Lovers' Vows (1798)

P.B. Shelley, The Cenci (1819)

B) Literary History and Anthologies:

History of English Literature:

L. M. Crisafulli e K. Elam (a cura di), Manuale di letteratura e cultura inglese, Bologna, BUP, 2009 ( Il Settecento; Romanticismo e I Vittoriani) 

L. M. Crisafulli (a cura di), Antologia delle Poetesse Romantiche Inglesi, 2 vols., Carocci 2003. (Biblioteca LLSM, scaffale Baiesi) - schede bio-bibliografiche solo delle potesse incluse nel corso

English Editions :

The Norton Anthology of English Literature, vol.  II.  

The Broadview Anthology of British Literature, "The Age of Romanticism", second ed., Broadview Press 2010. 

The Cambridge History of English Literature, ed. J.Chandler, Cambridge UP 2009. 

C) Secondary reading:

Sympathy & Sensibility - (select one of the following articles):

J.Todd, Sensibility. An Introduction, Methuen 1986. (CH. I e II Introduction and Historical background; CH. VI "The Man of Feeling")

J. Ellison, "Sensibility", in A Handbook of Romanticism Studies, eds. by J. Faflack and J. M. Wright, Blackweell, 2012.

S. Manning, "Sensibility" in Keymer and Mee, eds, The Cambridge Companion to English Literature, 1740-1830, Cambridge UP, 2004.

A.W. Rowland, "Sentimental Fiction" in Trumpener and Maxwell, eds, The Cambridge Companion to Fiction of the Romantic Period, Cambrdige UP, 2008.

John Brewer, “Sentiment and Sensibility” in James Chandler (ed.), The Cambridge History of English Romantic Literature, Cambridge UP 2009.

Novels (select one article for the novel of your choice):

Ellis Markman, The Politics of Sensibility: Race, Gender and Commerce in the Sentimental Novel, Cambridge UP 1996.

Ildiko Csengei, Sympathy, Sensibility and the Literature of Feeling in the Eighteenth Century, Ashgate 2012 (Cap. su H.Mackenzie)

Laura Bandiera, L'illusione Sentimentale: Saggio sulla Narrativa di Henry Mackenzie, CLUEB 1987.

B. Battaglia, La zitella illetterata. Parodia e ironia nei romanzi di Jane Austen, II ed., Liguori, 2009  (cap. su Sense and Sensibility)

J.Todd, The Cambridge Introduction to Jane Austen 2006 (Cap. 4: "Sense and Sensibility)

Poetry (select the critical references for the poetry of your choice):

Serena Baiesi, "Romantic Women Writers and the Abolitionist Movement: The Economics of Freedom" in La Questione Romantica, n. 18/19 "Imperialismo/Colonialismo", Liguori 2009.

Brycchan Carey, British Abolitionism and the Rhetoric of Sensibility, Palgrage 2005.

Paula R. Feldman, Daniel Robinson (eds.). A Century of Sonnets: the Romantic Era Revival, 1750-1850, Oxford UP, 2002.

L.M. Crisafulli and C. Pietropoli (eds.), Romantic Women Poets. Genre and Gender, Amsterdam , Rodopi 2007.

Theatre:

L.M. Crisafulli and C. Pietropoli (eds), The Languages of Performance in British Romanticism,  Peter Lang, 2009 (saggio di C.Farese su E.Inchabald) 

C.Farese, Elizabeth Inchbald: Scandalo e Convenzione, Pensa 2012 (Cap. 3).

F.Dellarosa (ed.), Poetic and Dramatic Forms in British Romanticism, Laterza 2006 (saggio di L. M. Crisafulli su "Shelley's The Cenci").

S. Curran, Shelley's Cenci Scorpions Ringed With Fire, 1970  (cap. sui Characters)

D) General Reference on Romanticism:

S. Curran, ed., The Cambridge Companion to Romanticism, Cambridge University Press 1993.

Fredrick Burwick, gen. ed., The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Romanticism (3 vols.), Blackwell 2012.

M. Ferber, ed., The Cambridge Introduction to British Romantic Poetry, Cambridge UP 2012.

J. Moore, J.Strachan, eds., Key Concepts in Romantic Literature, Palgrave 2010.

J.M. Labbe, ed., The History of British Women's Writing, 1750-1830, Vol. V, Palgrave 2010.

PLEASE DOWNLOAD "MATERIALE DIDATTICO ON-LINE" AS MANDATORY READING

Teaching methods

Frontal lessons in Italian and in English: introduction of the literary period from the eighteenth century to the Victorian age; reading and analysis of the primary sources by English writers.

Assessment methods

The evaluation of the students' competencies and abilities acquired during the course consists in a written work at the end of the course for those students who attended classes regularly. For those who do not attend classes, the exam consists in an oral examination.

The written test is divided into two parts: the first will be made of multiple choice and short open questions concerning the literary history of the period from the Eighteenth century to the Victorian period; the second part will refer to the specific reading list of the syllabus.

For those students who will not take the written test, the exam will consist in an oral interview. This oral interview has the aim of evaluating the critical and methodological ability of the students in relating literary history, critical approach to texts and authors analysed during classes. The student must demonstrate an appropriate knowledge of the literary history from the Eighteenth century to the Victorian period in order to carry out the exam with the second part, which consists in the analysis of a given text and its critical contextualization.

Those students,who are able to demonstrate a wide and systematic understanding of the issues covered during classes, are able to use these critically and who master the field-specific language of the discipline will be given a mark of excellence. Those students who demonstrate a mnemonic knowledge of the subject with a more superficial analytical ability and ability to synthesize, a correct command of the language but not always appropriate, will be given a satisfactory mark. A superficial knowledge and understanding of the material, a scarce analytical and expressive ability that is not always appropriate will be rewarded with a ‘pass' mark. Students who demonstrate gaps in their knowledge of the subject matter, inappropriate language use, lack of familiarity with the literature in the program bibliography will not be given a pass mark.

Teaching tools

Frontal lectures with power point projections and dvd.

Office hours

See the website of Serena Baiesi