67173 - English Literature / Literature of English-speaking Countries 1(LM)

Learning outcomes

The student has a deep knowledge of British and Postcolonial Modern Literatures in English, with particular regard to the relationships between literary texts and  history, language and the arts. She/he is able to use critical methodologies to read and analyze literary texts.  This course is intended for graduate students only. Erasmus and Overseas students are kindly requested to contact Prof. Albertazzi during her office hourse (NOT by e-mail) before the beginning of the course. Undergraduates and students who have never studied the new literatures in English at home and/or do not have a general knowledge of the principal authors and movements of English and/or North American literature are kindly requested not to choose this course.

Course contents

Loss and Recovery of Self in  Postcolonial Literature

The aim of the course is to deepen the students' knowledge of Literatures written in English all over the world, from the British Empire to the present day, from colonial and postcolonial authors to World Literature.

This is a post-graduate course. Undergraduates and students who have never studied the new literatures in English at home and/or do not have a general knowledge of the principal authors and movements of English and/or North American literature are kindly requested not to choose this course.

 

Readings/Bibliography

Novels:

All the students must read 5 (five) novels, one from each of the following groups:

1)  Sam Selvon, The Lonely Londoners; Hanif Kureishi, The Buddha of Suburbia; Andrea Levy, Fruit of the Lemon.

2)  Salman Rushdie, Satanic Verses; Bapsi Sidhwa, Ice-Candy Man; Shyam Selvadurai, Funny   Boy. 

3) Nadine Gordimer, A World of Strangers; Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart; Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Purple Ibiscus. 

4) David Malouf, An Imaginary Life; Peter Carey, Jack Maggs; Elizabeth Jolley, Foxybaby. 

5) Margaret Atwood, The Edible Woman; Jamaica Kincaid, Annie John; Michael Ondaatje, The Cat's Table.

Compulsory reading:

C. L. Innes, Cambridge Introduction to Postcolonial Literature in English, Cambridge U.P., 2007.

Critical Essays for Further Reading:

Elenco testi critici per studenti non frequentanti

Letteratura dei Paesi di Lingua Inglese LM 2014/2015

Prof.ssa Silvia Albertazzi

 

Salman Rushdie, Satanic Verses, - Klaus H. Börner, “Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses: Observations on Cultural Hybridity”¸ in Hans-Jürgen Diller, Stephan Kohl, Joachim Kornelius, Erwin Otto, Gerd Stratmann (eds.), A Decade of Discontent. British Fictions of the Eighties, Heidelberg: 1992, pp. 131-142.

 

Shyam Selvadurai, Funny Boy, - Sharanya Jayawickrama, "At Home in the Nation? Negotiating Identity in Shyam Selvadurai's Funny Boy", The Journal of Commonwealth Literature, vol. 40 no. 2, June 2005, pp. 123-139

 

Bapsi Sidhwa, Cracking India, - Jill Didur, "Cracking the Nation: Gender, Minority and Agency in Bapsi Sidhwa's 'Cracking India'", ARIEL: A Review of International English Literature, vol. 29 no. 3, July 1998, pp. 43-64

 

Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart, Robert  M. Wren, “The ‘Pacification' of Umuofia: Things Fall Apart”, in Achebe's World. The Historical and cultural Context of the Novels of Chinua Achebe, Harlow, Longman, 1981.

 

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Purple Hibiscus, - Heather Hewett, “Coming of Age: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and the Voice of the Third Generation”, English in Africa, vol. 32 n. 1, 2005

Available on jstor.org

 

Nadine Gordimer, A World of Strangers, - chapter “Social Commitment: A World of Strangers”, in Stephen Clingman, The Novels of Nadine Gordimer: History from the Inside, London: Allen & Unwin, 1986

 

Peter Carey, Jack Maggs, - John Thieme,  “Turned upside down? Dickens's Australia and Peter Carey's Jack Maggs”, in Postcolonial Con-Texts: Writing Back to the Canon, London, New York: Continuum, 2001, pp. 102-126

 

David Malouf, An Imaginary Life, - chapter on An Imaginary Life in Philip Neilsen, Imagined lives: a study of David Malouf, Queensland: University of Queensland Press, 1990, or

Matteo Baraldi, “L'ombra a quattro zampe”, in I bambini perduti. Il mito del ragazzo selvaggio da Kipling a Malouf, Roma: Quodlibet, 2006, pp. 139-157

 

Elizabeth Jolley, Foxybaby, - Brenda Walker, Review of Elizabeth Jolley's Foxybaby, in Westerly, Vol. 31, No. 1, 1986, pp. 91-94

Available: http://westerlymag.com.au/issue-content/elizabeth-jolley-foxybaby/

 

Sam Selvon, The Lonely Londoners, - Rebecca Dyer, “Immigration, Postwar London, and the Politics of Everyday Life in Sam Selvon's Fiction”, in  Cultural Critique, No. 52, Everyday Life (Autumn, 2002), pp. 108-144

Available via jstor.org

 

Hanif Kureishi, The Buddha of Suburbia, - chapter on The Buddha of Suburbia in Adriano Elia, Hanif Kureishi, Firenze: Le lettere, 2012 or

Kenneth C. Kaleta, Hanif Kureishi: Postcolonial Storyteller, Austin: University of Texas Press, 1998

 

Andrea Levy, Fruit of the Lemon, chapter on the novel in Francesca Giommi, Narrare la black Britain: Migrazioni, riscritture e ibridazioni nella letteratura inglese contemporanea, Firenze, Le Lettere, 2010

 

Margareth Atwood, The Edible Woman, - chapter on The Edible Woman in

Coral Ann Howells, Margaret Atwood, Basingstoke, London: Macmillan, 1996 or

Barbara Hill Rigney, Margaret Atwood, London: Macmillan, 1987

Micheal Ondaatje, The Cat's Table, - Laura Savu Walker, “Rites of Passage: Moving Hearts and Transforming Memories in Michael Ondaatje's The Cat's Table”, in Ariel, vol. 45, no. 1/2, 2014, pp. 35-57.

Jamaica Kincaid, Annie John, - H. Adlai Murdoch, “Severing the (M)Other Connection: The Representation of Cultural Identity in Jamaica Kincaid's Annie John”, in Callaloo, vol. 13, no. 2, Spring, 1990, pp. 325-340.

Available via jstor.org

All the texts are to be found either in the library of LILEC Dept. or in the library of study room n. 34 (Centro studi sulle letterature omeoglotte). 

Ask the librarians for the texts available on jstor.org.

 

  

Teaching methods

Seminar lessons, in English.  A series of videos  will be shown and discussed  during the course. During the course, the students will be invited to discuss the novels they are reading. For this reason, they are required to read at least one novel while the lessons are in progress.

Please note that the most difficult topics are to be dealt with also in Italian.

 Languages requested: English AND Italian.

 

Assessment methods

Oral exam, in two parts:

1)      Postcolonial theory; outline of postcolonial literary history (to be prepared on C.Innes' Cambridge Introduction to Postcolonial Literatures in English). Only those who pass this part will be admitted to the second one.

2)      Discussion and critical analysis of two or more of the five novels chosen by the students (as for programme 2014/2015).

The final mark will be averaged out between the two parts.   The students are warmly recommended to read as many novels as possible during the course: the discussion of their reading in class will be highly appreciated. The students must be able to contextualize the literary works. They must show a general knowledge of the outline of the history of British colonisation and decolonisation, and they must know the most important Postcolonial theorists and their ideas as well as the most important writers of Postcolonial literature in English. They must be able to use an appropriate critical language and must avoid impressionistic and/or superficial criticism.

Please note that this is an exam of English Literature: fluency in the English language is not enough to pass it.

Students are kindly requested to check the following URL for office hours and further information: http://www.unibo.it/SitoWebDocente/default.htm?upn=silvia.albertazzi%40unibo.it&TabControl1=TabContatti .

For any infomation on the programs, the exams and any further explanation, please do not write e-mails, but come to talk to the teacher during her office hours.

 

Teaching tools

Primary texts, critical books, reference books, journals and magazines, video and audio supports.

Office hours

See the website of Silvia Albertazzi