Required Texts
Altick, Richard. Victorian People and Ideas. (Norton)
Braddon, Mary Elizabeth. Lady Audley's Secret. (Dover)
Brontë, Anne. The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. (Penguin)
Brontë, Charlotte. Villette. (Penguin)
Brontë, Emily. Wuthering Heights. (Penguin)
Dickens, Charles. Great Expectations. (Bedford/St. Martin's)
Eliot, George. The Mill on the Floss. (Penguin)
Stoker, Bram. Dracula. (Norton)
Recommended:
Hamilton, Susan. Criminals, Idiots, Women and Minors. (Broadview)
All texts are available in the NCSU bookstore or Addams' bookstore. Please purchase the editions I have listed above. Unless otherwise noted, "xeroxed readings" will be available (in a manila envelope) outside my office for copying (please buy a Wolfcopy card -- there's a copy machine on the second floor of Tompkins).
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COURSE REQUIREMENTS:
Each student will be required to:
A) prepare an oral presentation on:
1. a set of secondary readings providing socio-historical background to the works we will be discussing (10%). These will be group efforts (2-3 people for each report), and will involve summarizing the key issues of the subject in question. Reports must be accompanied by a brief handout, and should take approximately fifteen minutes total, and
2. a criticual crux on one of the assigned novels (see below for details)(10%);
B) write two papers:
1. a short paper (7-8pp.) based on the critical crux oral report, to be turned in no later than a week after the in-class presentation (20%), and
2. a research paper (15pp.) on a topic of your choice, to be preceded by a written proposal and bibliography (35%);
C) participate in a weekly team journal (15%; see below for details);
D) take a final exam (15%).
[Note: Plus/minus grades will be given in this course.]
EXPECTATIONS:
As this course will be run in large part collectively, with each of you responsible for giving two oral reports, your regular attendance is of paramount importance. You will be expected to have completed the reading assignment for each day before the class meets.
CRITICAL CRUX PRESENTATION AND PAPER:
In the first week of classes, each of you will select a novel on which to focus. (Though I can't make any promises, I'll do my best to give you one of your top choices.) You will select a "critical crux" -- i.e., a point over which there has been a significant amount of critical contention -- and prepare a presentation in which you organize and summarize the debates over that issue and take your own stance. Within a week of your presentation, you will be expected to turn in a paper (7-8pp.) based on your discussion of the controversy.
FINAL PAPER:
Your final paper (15 pp.) will be preceded by a proposal and annotated bibliography. It should be typewritten (word-processed), double-spaced, and must have ample margins on both sides of the page to allow room for comments. Be certain to number your pages and put your name at the top of each page. You will be responsible for retaining one copy for yourself (either xeroxed or on disk). Late papers will be penalized, and incompletes will be issued only in dire emergencies.
TEAM Journals:
You will each be assigned to a "team" by the second week of classes, and every week you will write one entry that consists of two parts: 1) ruminations on that week's reading, class discussion, or a response to a specific question that I have raised for you to investigate; 2) a response to at least one other person's entry. Ideally, the journals should give you the opportunity to explore more fully and informally your ideas about the reading (or class discussions) which you find particularly interesting or problematical, and to engage in a sustained dialogue with other members of the class. The journals will be on a shelf outside my office and should not be taken off campus.
RESERVE READINGS:
I have put supplementary readings on three-day reserve in the library (see the bibliography page on this web site). I will also be putting some of the articles for reports and which we will all be reading together into a manila envelope outside my office (276 Tompkins). There is a copy machine on the second floor of Tompkins, and you should plan to purchase a WOLFCOPY CARD in order to xerox these readings (which should borrow only long enough to xerox and return).
