Great Books

• • Medea - love and marriage, revenge, gender roles, alienation, otherness
  • Heart of Darkness - the nature of evil, alienation, race and colonisation
  • Metamorphosis - humanity, hierarchy, postmodernism, vulnerability
  • Jane Eyre - gender roles, alienation, love and marriage, class, vulnerability
  • Frankenstein - medicalisation and science, the monstrous, parenthood, creation

No eligibility requirements

Additional requirements

No additional requirements

Great Books examines the allure of the literary. For centuries humans have recited poetry, enacted drama and, more recently, written novels that all speak to the human condition in ways that exceed the everyday even as they somehow capture it. In thematic terms this subjects asks: what does it mean to be human? What are the immortal themes that recur in any genre of great literature? In terms of readers' experiences of literature, what is it that makes a work 'literary'? How have people managed to express themselves in way that outlast the span of a single lifetime? What formal approaches have been taken to understanding and promoting 'the literary'. Perhaps most importantly of all, though, what does literature offer in a world full of images, a world apparently driven by economic issues. Join us to ponder upon such issues as you discover, or revisit, a fine range of literary texts.

• Essay 1 - 1000 words (20%)
• Essay 2 - 2000 words (40%)
• Online Discussion (40%)

Current study term: 06 Nov 22 to 15 Jan 23