Tracing the novel in two continents and its trans-Atlantic and trans-global connections, this class aims to review and re-view the form and contexts that have shaped it into the commonplace and exciting phenomenon it is today. You will encounter Defoe, Richardson, Austen, Dickens, Joyce, Woolf, Cooper, Hawthorne, Melville, Twain, Faulkner, among others.

Class Time: M 1-3, W 9-10

There will be 6 (no more than 1 page) reading responses, a final paper (7-10 pages), a midterm and a final exam, also occasional screenings and presentations.

Required Texts:

Conrad, Joseph.  Heart of Darkness.  1898, 1902.
Hurston, Zora Neale.  Their Eyes Were Watching God.  1937.  New York: Perennial, 1990.
Ghosh, Amitav.  The Hungry Tide.  2004.  Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2005.
Course Packet

• The History of the Novel

• An Introduction to the Novel

• The Cambridge History of English and American Literature

• The Novel: Timeline

• Brief Timeline of American Literature and Events, 1850-1859

• The American Novel: Literary Timeline

• Bibliography

• Early Manuscripts at Oxford University ("Digital facsimiles of complete manuscripts, scanned directly from the originals.")

• University of Virginia Library's Digital Text Collections (check also the EText Center)

• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

• Early Modern Languages and Literature to c. 1800 (links)

• Modern Languages and Literature from c. 1800 (links)

• Klarer, Mario.  An Introduction to Literary Studies.  2nd ed.  London: Routledge, 2004. (CL  820.9 K63I)

• Brooks, Cleanth, and Robert Penn Warren.  Understanding Fiction.  3rd ed.  Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1998. (library has 2nd ed.)

• Undergraduate Guide for Studying Literature (How well do you understand what you have read?, keeping a reading journal, critical terms for discussing literature, guidelines for writing essays, what the grade on your essay means, what to do with your marked essay, marking symbols and abbreviations; also has downloadable pdf file)

• Literary Resources on the Net

• What Is Plagiarism? (friendly explanation of plagiarism with examples from Georgetown University; make sure you read the entire article; you  will be severely penalized for plagiarism in this course)

• The UVic Writer's Guide (well-organized, easy to follow guide with examples)

• The OWL at Purdue (Online Writing Lab, includes the writing process, grammar and mechanics, literary analysis and criticism, writing about poetry)

• How to Evaluate the Information Sources You Find

• Basic Steps in Writing a Literature Paper

• Citation Styles Handbook: MLA

• MLA Style FAQ

• Paper Guidelines 1 and 2

• Literary Criticism: Principles

• Model Criticism (some essays by F. R. Leavis; a couple of obsolete links)

• English Help