Course: British Literature 1800-1900

« Back
Course title British Literature 1800-1900
Course code KAA/BRL1
Organizational form of instruction Seminar
Level of course Bachelor
Year of study 2
Semester Winter and summer
Number of ECTS credits 4
Language of instruction English
Status of course Compulsory, Compulsory-optional
Form of instruction Face-to-face
Work placements This is not an internship
Recommended optional programme components None
Course availability The course is available to visiting students
Lecturer(s)
  • Jelínková Ema, Mgr. Ph.D.
  • Flajšarová Pavlína, doc. Mgr. Ph.D.
  • Livingstone David, Mgr. Ph.D.
Course content
The course focuses on the following topics: - British Pre-Romantics - First Generation British Romantics - Second Generation British Romantics - Romantic Criticism and Essay - Victorian Poetry - Victorian Fiction - Victorian Drama - Literary Avant-Garde Program and exam topics: 1. Pre-Romantic Literature a. Authors: Robert Burns, William Blake b. Reading: Burns: "To a Mouse" (1785), "A Red, Red Rose" (1794), Blake: Songs of Innocence (1789), Songs of Experience (1794) 2. First Generation Romantics a. Authors: William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Robert Southey b. Reading: Wordsworth: "Preface to Lyrical Ballads" (1798), "Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey" (1798), Coleridge: "Kubla Khan" (1797), "Frost at Midnight" (1798), Southey: "The Battle of Blenheim" (1796) 3. Second Generation Romantics a. Authors: George Gordon, Lord Byron, Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Keats b. Reading: Byron: "She Walks in Beauty" (1814), Shelley: "Hymn to Intellectual Beauty" (1817), "Ozymandias" (1818), "Ode to the West Wind" (1820), Keats: "La Belle Dame sans Merci" (1819), "To Autumn" 1820) 4. Novel in the Romantic Period a. Authors: Jane Austen, Walter Scott, Mary Shelley b. Reading: Austen: Pride and Prejudice (1813), or Scott: Ivanhoe (1820), or Shelley: Frankenstein (1818) 5. Early Victorian Poetry a. Authors: Alfred Tennyson, Robert Browning, Elizabeth Browning b. Reading: Tennyson: "The Lady of Shalott" (1833), "The Lotos-Eaters" (1832), Browning: "My Last Duchess" (1842), Elizabeth Browning: Sonnets from the Portuguese 21, 22, 32, 43 (1850) 6. Early Victorian Novel a. Authors: Emily Bronte, Charlotte Bronte, Anne Bronte b. Reading: Emily Bronte: Wuthering Heights (1847), or Charlotte Bronte: Jane Eyre (1847), or Anne Bronte: The Tennant of Wildfell Hall (1848) 7. The "Condition of England" Novel a. Authors: Charles Dickens, Elizabeth Gaskell, William Makepeace Thackeray b. Reading: Dickens: "A Christmas Carol" (1843), or Gaskell: North and South (1855), or Thackeray: Vanity Fair (1848) 8. Later Victorian Poetry a. Authors: George Meredith, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Christina Rossetti, Algernon Charles Swinburne, Matthew Arnold b. Reading: Meredith: "Modern Love" (1862), Rossetti: "The Blessed Damozel" (1850), Christina Rossetti: "Song" (When I am dead, 1862), Swinburne: "The Garden of Proserpine" (1866), Arnold: "Dover Beach" (1867), "The Scholar Gypsy" (1853) 9. Later Victorian Fiction a. Authors: George Eliot, Thomas Hardy b. Reading: Eliot: Silas Marner (1886), Hardy: Tess of d'Urbervilles 1891) 10. Victorian Drama a. Authors: Oscar Wilde, George Bernard Shaw (early plays) b. Reading: Wilde: The Importance of Being Earnest (1895), Shaw: Mrs. Warren's Profession (1895) 11. Victorian Gothic a. Authors: Robert Louis Stevenson, Bram Stoker, Oscar Wilde. Reading: Stevenson: The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886), Stoker: Dracula (1897), or Wilde: The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890) 12. The Dawn of the Victorian Era a. Authors: Walter Pater, Oscar Wilde, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Ernest Dowson b. Reading: Pater: The Renaissance - Preface, Conclusion (1873), Hopkins: "God's Grandeur" (1877), "Spring and Fall" (1918, Dowson: "Cynara" (1899), Wilde: The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)

Learning activities and teaching methods
Monologic Lecture(Interpretation, Training), Dialogic Lecture (Discussion, Dialog, Brainstorming), Work with Text (with Book, Textbook), Activating (Simulations, Games, Dramatization)
  • Preparation for the Course Credit - 40 hours per semester
  • Homework for Teaching - 34 hours per semester
  • Attendace - 26 hours per semester
Learning outcomes
The course focuses on major trends and influential authors in British literature of the 18th and 19th centuries. The course includes analyses of works from the Romantic period, the Victorian period and the Avant-Garde of the 1890s. All literary genres will be introduced, special attention will be devoted to poetry, essays and fiction. The course is complemented with audiovisual material.
Students will acquire: - an overview of the most significant developments in the 18th- and 19th-century British literature, - knowledge of primary and secondary sources relevant to the given period, - an understanding of the development of literature and of the main genres in relation to social and cultural changes, - an understanding of the specific character of literary representation, - an understanding of the connections between the past and the present, mediated by literature, - an appreciation for the value of cultural heritage, - knowledge of basic literary terminology and MLA bibliography norms, - greater competence in interpreting literary texts, - greater competence in structuring and writing essays, - improved ability to take part in a scholarly discussion.
Prerequisites
The prerequisite is the course in Introduction to Literature as taught at the Department of English and American studies.

Assessment methods and criteria
Essay, Student performance, Written exam

- a knowledge of assigned texts - analysis of assigned texts - literary analytical essay on a topic of the student's choice - knowledge of primary and secondary sources as assigned by the instructor - a successful written exam at the end of the semester
Recommended literature
  • Abrams, M.H. The Norton Anthology of English Literature.
  • Carter, Ronald, and John McRae. (2001). The Routledge History of Literature in English: Britain and Ireland. London.
  • Rogers, Pat. (2001). The Oxford Illustrated History of English Literature. Oxford.
  • Sanders, Andrew. (2004). The Short Oxford History of English Literature. Oxford.


Study plans that include the course
Faculty Study plan (Version) Category of Branch/Specialization Recommended year of study Recommended semester
Faculty: Faculty of Arts Study plan (Version): English Philology (2019) Category: Philological sciences 2 Recommended year of study:2, Recommended semester: -
Faculty: Faculty of Arts Study plan (Version): English Philology (2024) Category: Philological sciences 2 Recommended year of study:2, Recommended semester: -
Faculty: Faculty of Arts Study plan (Version): English Philology (2020) Category: Philological sciences 2 Recommended year of study:2, Recommended semester: -
Faculty: Faculty of Arts Study plan (Version): English Philology (2019) Category: Philological sciences 2 Recommended year of study:2, Recommended semester: -
Faculty: Faculty of Arts Study plan (Version): English Philology (2019) Category: Philological sciences 2 Recommended year of study:2, Recommended semester: -
Faculty: Faculty of Arts Study plan (Version): English Philology (2015) Category: Philological sciences 2 Recommended year of study:2, Recommended semester: -
Faculty: Faculty of Arts Study plan (Version): English Philology (2024) Category: Philological sciences 2 Recommended year of study:2, Recommended semester: -
Faculty: Faculty of Arts Study plan (Version): English for Translators and Interpreters (2019) Category: Philological sciences 2 Recommended year of study:2, Recommended semester: -
Faculty: Faculty of Arts Study plan (Version): English Philology (2015) Category: Philological sciences 2 Recommended year of study:2, Recommended semester: -
Faculty: Faculty of Arts Study plan (Version): English Philology (2024) Category: Philological sciences 2 Recommended year of study:2, Recommended semester: -