Charlotte Bronte's 'Villette' and George Eliot's 'Daniel Deronda'
Overview
Charlotte Bronte’s final novel, Villette, and George Eliot’s final novel, Daniel Deronda, present us with heroines who are difficult, complicated women, both pushed to psychological extremes. The plots are constantly surprising; experiments in non-rational states of mind jostle with the politics of religion; and the European scenes take these novels far beyond the standard Victorian novel of English society. Less well-known than Jane Eyre and Middlemarch, these two novels deserve as much attention. They will provoke argument and strong responses from surprised readers just as they did in the mid-nineteenth century.
Programme details
Session 1
Villette – The Reader
Session 2
Villette – The Traveller
Session 3
Villette - Gentlemen
Session 4
Villette - Argument
Session 5
Villette – The Park
Session 6
Daniel Deronda - Gambling
Session 7
Daniel Deronda - England
Session 8
Daniel Deronda - Jews
Session 9
Daniel Deronda - Guilt
Session 10
Daniel Deronda – Mothers
Session 11
Daniel Deronda – Release?
Session 12
Discussion of both novels
Course aims
This course aims to give students the opportunity to read two demanding and brilliant classical novels, Villette and Daniel Deronda.
Teaching methods
All summer school courses are taught through group seminars and individual tutorials. Students also conduct private study when not in class and there is a well stocked library at OUDCE to support individual research needs.
Learning outcomes
By the end of this course, students will be expected
- To have understood and enjoyed Villette and Daniel Deronda
- To have grappled with George Eliot’s version of Zionism
- To be able to think about conflicting moral schemes and values
- To have acquired much useful information about how to deceive spies, the aesthetics of a well-fed Cleopatra, why statues should avoid moveable panels, eloquent monomania and the life chances of a musical mountebank’s child
For more information click "LINK TO ORIGINAL" below.
This opportunity has expired. It was originally published here:
https://www.conted.ox.ac.uk/courses/charlotte-brontes-villette-and-george-eliots-daniel-deronda?code=O20I502SSR