| Unit name | Victorian Poetry: Doubt, Belief and Dissent. |
|---|---|
| Unit code | ENGLM3026 |
| Credit points | 20 |
| Level of study | M/7 |
| Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24) |
| Unit director | Dr. Wright |
| Open unit status | Not open |
| Pre-requisites |
None |
| Co-requisites |
None |
| School/department | Department of English |
| Faculty | Faculty of Arts |
This course explores the work of a wide range of Victorian poets grappling with issues of doubt and dissent, belief and non-belief, and reports of the death of God. Questions about belief during the nineteenth century came up against provocative and newly-defined divisions in knowledge $� divisions we recognise now, for example, as those between the sciences and the arts. This was an age of classification $� an age in which not only Biblical hermeneutics and evolutionary theory, but studies in psychology, philology, and anthropology developed apace. Coinciding with central concerns about class, race, and sexual expression, Victorian poets and critics found themselves wondering not only what they could or should believe, but what the nature of belief itself meant for human life. Through close analysis of formal innovations, we will explore the power of poetry as itself an invitation to self-awareness, productive confusion, retreat, challenge, and praise.
