Unit information: Darkest London in 2010/11

Unit name	Darkest London
Unit code	ENGL29026
Credit points	20
Level of study	I/5
Teaching block(s)	Teaching Block 1 (weeks 1 - 12)
Unit director	Dr. Matthews
Open unit status	Not open
Pre-requisites	None.
Co-requisites	None.
School/department	Department of English
Faculty	Faculty of Arts

Description including Unit Aims

London has been visited by disaster many times, both in real and fictional forms. Plague, fire, war, crime, terrorism, hardship and homelessness are recurring motifs in representations of the city, whether as responses to historical events or fantasies of destruction and renewal. Yet perversely even when the city is prosperous, powerful and secure, it condemns and destroys many of its citizens. Ranging from Daniel Defoe's A Journal of the Plague Year (1722), one of the first works of 'docu-fiction', to the apocalyptic gangster film The Long Good Friday (dir. John Mackenzie, 1981), the course studies works by writers, film-makers, and artists who have created some of the most powerful and imaginative responses to life, death and disaster in the 'Great Wen' since the Plague (1665) and Great Fire of London (1666).

Aims:

• To give students knowledge of a range of works from different periods and in different genres which focus on London as infernal, apocalyptic or benighted;

• To equip students with appropriate literary, theoretical, socio-historical, topographical and other contexts to enable an informed understanding of the primary texts;

• To engage with the creative psychology of writings which represent London as plague-stricken, burning, bombed, or threatened by the secret agents of terrorism

• To practice skills of close analysis and critical argument informed by relevant contexts in oral and written forms.

Intended Learning Outcomes

By the end of the unit, students should be able to:

• demonstrate knowledge of a range of relevant London literature and film;

• apply appropriate contexts to enable an informed understanding of the primary texts;

• analyze these works using sophisticated critical methods including historical, theoretical, and aesthetic paradigms;

• articulate their views in discussion and on paper with the appropriate skills.

Teaching Information

One x 2 hour seminar per week, plus one-to-one discussion in consultation hours where desired.

Assessment Information

Two summative essays: one of up to 2000 words (one third of weighting 33.3%) and one of up to 4000 words (two thirds of weighting 66.7%).

Reading and References

• John Dryden, extract from Annus Mirabilis: A Year of Wonders (1666)

• Thomas De Quincey, Confessions of an English Opium-Eater (1821)

• George Gissing, The Nether World (1889)

• Graham Greene, The Ministry of Fear (1943)

• Performance (dir. Nic Roeg, 1970)

• Peter Ackroyd, Hawksmoor (1985)