To help you feel prepared for your BA (Hons) English Literature studies, we’ve gathered together a range of course related activities including suggested reading, useful websites and some great things to do right now. Read on to find out more.
Suggested reading
You’ll be given lots of information about which textbooks to read and introduced to the University Library, as well as the many ebooks we have for you to access, when you begin your studies in September.
In the meantime, there are a some suggested texts you might like to read, if you can, before starting your degree. We don’t recommend rushing out to buy texts before you arrive. But if you can pick some up second hand, borrow from a library, or access online, we suggest:
Ready, set, READ.
Reading enhances your imagination, increases your vocabulary and strengthens your writing ability, but reading can also reduce stress levels and help improve overall focus.
These are three pieces of literature that we think you should read and they’re all set texts on first year modules, so you’ll get a great head start.
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Some poetry. Choose from: Derek Walcott (‘Love After Love’), Christina Rossetti (‘Goblin Market’), Grace Nichols (The Fat Black Woman’s Poems), and Robert Browning (‘Porphyria’s Lover’).
If you’d like to get a head start in reading for your individual modules, here are the set reading lists:
Clarke, Arthur C, The City and the Stars (London: Gollancz, 1956)
Ende, Michael, The Neverending Story (London: Puffin, 2009)
Livingstone, Ian, The Warlock of Firetop Mountain (London, Icon Books, 1984)
We will also be studying various contemporary comics by Marvel, DC and Rebellion
Secondary texts
There is no need to go out and purchase your own copies of any of the following secondary texts, but they will all provide some useful introductory reading if you can find them in libraries:
Abbott, H.P., Cambridge Introduction to Narrative (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008)
Chatman, S., Coming to Terms; The Rhetoric of Narrative in Fiction and Film (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1990)
Eisner, W., Graphic Storytelling and Visual Narrative (Tamarac, FL: Poorhouse Press, 2002)
Fludernik, M., An Introduction to Narratology (London and New York: Routledge, 2009)
Herman, D., Basic Elements of Narrative (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009)
Herman, D, ed., Cambridge Companion to Narrative (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007)
Madden, M., 99 Ways to Tell a Story (London: Jonathan Cape, 2006)
McCloud, S., Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art (London: HarperCollins Publishers, 1994)
Rimmon-Kenan, S., Narrative Fiction: Contemporary Poetics (London and New York: Routledge, 2002)
LIT1020: Ways of Reading
Set Texts:
Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre (Penguin or Oxford edition)
Arthur Conan Doyle, select stories from The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. For class we read: ‘A Scandal in Bohemia’, ‘The Man With the Twisted Lip’, and ‘The Copper Beeches’
Henrik Ibsen, ‘A Doll’s House’ in Four Major Plays (Oxford, 2008)
Indicative secondary reading. There is no need to go out and purchase your own copies of any of the following texts, but they will all provide some useful introductory reading if you can find them in libraries:
Andrew Bennett and Nicholas Royle, This Thing Called Literature (London: Routledge, 2015)
Andrew Bennett and Nicholas Royle, An Introduction to Literature, Criticism and Theory, 5th edition (London: Routledge, 2016)
Rhian Williams, The Poetry Toolkit (London: Bloomsbury, 2013)
LIT1024: Literary History
Set Texts:
Carson, Anne, If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho (London: Virago, 2003)
Homer, The Odyssey, transl. Robert Fagles (London: Penguin, 2000) – we look at books 1-4 and 9-12 in class
Sophocles, Oedipus Rex (online text available at start of module)
William Shakespeare, Richard II (available online)
Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses (London: Penguin, 1988)
Indicative secondary reading. There is no need to go out and purchase your own copies of any of the following texts, but they will all provide some useful introductory reading if you can find them in libraries
Alexander, Michael, A History of English Literature. 2nd ed. (Houndmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007)
Sanders, Andrew, The Short Oxford History of English Literature. 3rd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2004)
Widdowson, Peter, The Palgrave Guide to English Literature and its Contexts 1500-2000. (Houndmills, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004)
LIT1025: Form
Set Texts:
Poetry. Read a selection of the following poems from different writers and time periods. Most are available online:
Grace Nichols, The Fat Black Woman’s Poems (1984)
Robert Browning ‘Porphyria’s Lover’
Tennyson, ‘Ulysses’
Carol Ann Duffy, ‘Salome’, ‘Havisham’
Vicky Feaver ‘Judith’
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, ‘The Runaway Slave at Pilgrim’s Point’
Derek Walcott, ‘Love After Love’
Later in the module we study some short stories and much longer novels, so you may wish to make a start on:
Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe
Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (1818 edition)
Alasdair Gray, Poor Things (London: Bloomsbury, 1992)
Octavia Butler, ‘Blood Child’ (short story)
If you’re feeling brave enough, you might want to watch:
Alien (1979) dir. Ridley Scott.
Indicative secondary reading. There is no need to go out and purchase your own copies of any of the following texts, but they will all provide some useful introductory reading if you can find them in libraries
Bennett, Andrew and Nicholas Royle, Introduction to Literature, Criticism and Theory, 5th edition (London: Routledge, 2016)
Eagleton, Terry, The English Novel: An Introduction (Oxford: Blackwell, 2005)
Watt, Ian, The Rise of the Novel: Studies in Defoe, Richardson and Fielding (London: Pimlico, 2000)
Williams, Rhian, The Poetry Toolkit (London: Bloomsbury, 2013)
Read Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
Read Charlotte Brontë as a pre-arrival task. You can pick up cheap editions online. Even if you have studied this text before, please reread over the summer and think about the following questions:
To what extent does Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre draw on themes and figures from fairy tales and the Gothic to tell the story of Jane’s development from a child into a young woman?
To what extent is Jane Eyre a politically engaged novel? Find out what you can about what events were going on in Britain and the world in the 1840s.
How does Brontë represent Jane’s psychological development in the novel?
How does Brontë represent masculinity through the different characters of Mr Rochester and St John Rivers, among others?
To what extent is Jane a reliable narrator of her own story?
Useful websites
If you’re looking for something to read, have a look at the Poetry Foundation website.
Make sure to visit the Prospects website if you’re thinking about a future career in English.