Hauptseminar Beyond Hardy's Wessex History Literature and Culture of Southwest England 3st

HS / M.A.Sem / M.A.Ü Beyond Hardy's Wessex: History, Literature and Culture of Southwest England 3st. Do 12 – 14.15, 154 RG [Blockseminar mit Exkursion nach Devon und Cornwall im Juni 2015] The seminar is meant to introduce students both to an exciting region of Britain and to the regional and historical fiction related to it. While we will read and discuss Tess of the D'Urbervilles (1891), the most famous of Thomas Hardy's 'Wessex Novels', it is the purpose of the seminar also to look beyond Hardy's fictional 'Wessex', and beyond the literary analysis of novels only. At the end of the seminar, participants should be familiar with the historical, political and cultural context of life and literature in Cornwall and in Southwest England. The basic corpus of texts chosen to be analysed and discussed in the seminar sessions comprises also popular, best-selling novels and historical romances from the last two centuries that were focused on the region. Lorna Doone: A Romance of Exmoor has attracted readers ever since its publication in 1869, as has Daphne Du Maurier's exciting tale of smuggling, Jamaica Inn (1936). Winston Graham's Ross Poldark (1945) is the first book in the Poldark family saga that was made into a successful TV series. In Alice Oswald's book-length poem Dart (2002), for which she won the prestigious T.S. Eliot Prize, the River Dart in Devon comes alive through an alternation of memories and voices. This basic corpus will be enlarged by shorter passages from further texts which are related to presentations by participants. These presentations deal with aspects of history and culture, or with the depiction of Cornwall and Southwest England in other regional and historical novels, in tales of mining, shipwreck or smuggling, in crime fiction (such as The Hound of the Baskervilles) or in stories of the supernatural. After a number of preparatory sessions, a seven-day excursion to Devon and Cornwall (between 17 and 23 June 2015, dates yet to be confirmed) will deal with the texts and with their contexts in historically pertinent 'sites of memory'. The seminar is limited to 20 participants. A funding of 200 EUR each with regard to the expenses of travel and accommodation has been secured. Texts: participants are free to choose their edition, for example those: Blackmore, R[ichard]. D. Lorna Doone: A Romance of Exmoor. 1869. Ed. Sally Shuttleworth. 1989. Oxford World's Classics. Oxford: OUP, 1999. Thomas Hardy, Tess of the D'Urbervilles. 1891. Ed. Juliet Grindle and Simon Gatrell. Oxford: OUP (World's Classics), 1988. Du Maurier, Daphne. Jamaica Inn. 1936. London: Virago Press, 2003. Graham, Winston. Ross Poldark: A Novel of Cornwall, 1783-1787. 1945. London: Pan Books, 1996. Oswald, Alice. Dart. London: Faber, 2002. Prüfungsform: Hausarbeit (15-20 Seiten) Department III - Anglistik und Amerikanistik LMU München SoSe 2015 Prof.Dr. Nowak Helge