Department of English

This course offers an introduction to British fiction of the nineteenth century—an era when Great Britain reached the height of its global power, and the novel reached the height of its cultural influence. We will examine how Victorian novels invited their rapidly expanding mass audience to grapple with the sweeping transformations that shaped their time: industrial capitalism, the growth of large cities, imperial expansion, political reform, secularization, new scientific paradigms, technological development, class struggle, debates on the “Woman Question,” and theories of race and of sexuality whose consequences still confront us today. As we explore this prolific period in the history of the novel, we will also consider how a variety of genres (including the Gothic, the novel of manners, the Bildungsroman, realism, sensation fiction, detective fiction, and naturalism) defined the relationship between literature and modern social life. Readings may include works of fiction by Jane Austen, Charlotte Brontë, Charles Dickens, George Eliot, Mary Braddon, Wilkie Collins, and Thomas Hardy. Non-majors are welcome, and no prior knowledge is required.