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English Literature from the Renaissance to the Enlightenment

Code: 100249 ECTS Credits: 6
2024/2025
Degree Type Year
2504380 English and Catalan Studies OT 3
2504380 English and Catalan Studies OT 4
2504386 English and Spanish Studies OT 3
2504386 English and Spanish Studies OT 4
2504393 English and French Studies OT 0
2504393 English and French Studies OT 3
2504393 English and French Studies OT 4
2504394 English and Classics Studies OT 3
2504394 English and Classics Studies OT 4

Contact

Name:
Jordi Coral Escola
Email:
jordi.coral@uab.cat

Teaching groups languages

You can view this information at the end of this document.


Prerequisites

‘Orígens de la Literatura Anglesa’ (100245)  

‘Història i Cultura de les Illes Britàniques’ (100217)

The course requires an initial level of English between C1 (Advanced) and C2 (Proficiency) (Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching, Assessment). Students with C1 can understand a wide range of demanding, longer texts, and recognise implicit meaning; they can express themselves fluently and spontaneously without much obvious searching for expressions; they can use language flexibly and effectively for social, academic and professional purposes; they can produce clear, well-structured, detailed text on complex subjects, showing controlled use of organisational patterns, connectors and cohesive devices. With C2 students can understand almost everything they read or hear without effort; they can summarise information from different oral and written sources, reconstruct facts and arguments and present them in a coherent way; they can express themselves spontaneously, with fluency and precision, distinguishing subtle nuances of meaning even in the most complex situations.


Objectives and Contextualisation

 

  • This course provides an introduction to the principal authors of early modern English literature (16c. to 18c.) through the critical reading of some of the most representative poetic, dramatic and narrative texts.
  • This subject is indispensable to complete the undergraduate literary curriculum. 
  • The successful completion of this course will allow students to improve their academic, critical and linguistic skills by means of the following exercises: textual commentary, class presentations, use of library resources, and debates and class discussion. 

Competences

    English and Catalan Studies
  • Act in one's own field of knowledge evaluating inequalities based on sex/gender.
  • Act with ethical responsibility and respect for fundamental rights and duties, diversity and democratic values.
  • Apply scientific ethical principles to information processing.
  • Carry out effective written work or oral presentations adapted to the appropriate register in different languages.
  • Demonstrate knowledge of the rules of Catalan and mastery of its foundations and applications in the academic and professional fields.
  • Demonstrate the ability to work autonomously and in teams with the aim of attaining the planned objectives in multicultural and interdisciplinary contexts.
  • Students can apply the knowledge to their own work or vocation in a professional manner and have the powers generally demonstrated by preparing and defending arguments and solving problems within their area of study.
  • Students must be capable of collecting and interpreting relevant data (usually within their area of study) in order to make statements that reflect social, scientific or ethical relevant issues.
  • Students must be capable of communicating information, ideas, problems and solutions to both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
  • Students must have and understand knowledge of an area of study built on the basis of general secondary education, and while it relies on some advanced textbooks it also includes some aspects coming from the forefront of its field of study.
    English and Spanish Studies
  • Critically analyse linguistic, literary and cultural production in English and Spanish, applying the techniques and methods of critical editing and digital processing.
  • Demonstrate the ability to work autonomously and in teams in order to achieve the planned objectives in multicultural and interdisciplinary contexts.
  • Develop arguments applicable to the fields of literature, culture, literary theory, language and linguistics, in Spanish and English, and evaluate their academic relevance.
  • Students must be capable of collecting and interpreting relevant data (usually within their area of study) in order to make statements that reflect social, scientific or ethical relevant issues.
  • Students must be capable of communicating information, ideas, problems and solutions to both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
  • Students must have and understand knowledge of an area of study built on the basis of general secondary education, and while it relies on some advanced textbooks it also includes some aspects coming from the forefront of its field of study.
    English and French Studies
  • Apply scientific ethical principles to information processing.
  • Demonstrate the ability to work autonomously and in teams with the aim of attaining the planned objectives in multicultural and interdisciplinary contexts.
  • Students have the ability to gather and interpret relevant data (normally within their study area) to issue judgments that include reflection on important issues of social, scientific or ethical.
  • Students must be capable of communicating information, ideas, problems and solutions to both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
  • Students must have and understand knowledge of an area of study built on the basis of general secondary education, and while it relies on some advanced textbooks it also includes some aspects coming from the forefront of its field of study.
  • Take sex- or gender-based inequalities into consideration when operating within one's own area of knowledge.
  • Use digital tools and specific documentary sources to gather and organise information.
    English and Classics Studies
  • Apply scientific ethical principles to information processing.
  • Demonstrate the ability to work autonomously and in teams in order to achieve the planned objectives in multicultural and interdisciplinary contexts.
  • Develop arguments applicable to the fields of literature, culture and linguistics and evaluate their academic relevance.
  • Students must be capable of collecting and interpreting relevant data (usually within their area of study) in order to make statements that reflect social, scientific or ethical relevant issues.
  • Students must be capable of communicating information, ideas, problems and solutions to both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
  • Students must develop the necessary learning skills in order to undertake further training with a high degree of autonomy.
  • Students must have and understand knowledge of an area of study built on the basis of general secondary education, and while it relies on some advanced textbooks it also includes some aspects coming from the forefront of its field of study.
  • Take sex- or gender-based inequalities into consideration when operating within one's own area of knowledge. 
  • Understand and produce oral and written academic texts with appropriateness and fluency in distinct communicative contexts.
  • Use digital tools and specific documentary sources to gather and organise information.

Learning Outcomes

  1. Analyse sex/gender inequalities and gender bias in English literature.
  2. Apply the acquired work planning methodologies to individual and group professional tasks.
  3. Apply the work-organisation methodologies acquired to individual and group-based professional tasks.
  4. Applying the acquired scientific and work planning methodologies to the research in English.
  5. Commenting on literary texts, applying the acquired tools and taking into account the historical and sociocultural context.
  6. Critically interpret bibliography.
  7. Critically interpret literary works taking into account their historical and social context.
  8. Critically interpreting literary works taking into account the relationships between the different areas of literature and its relationships with human, artistic and social areas.
  9. Demonstrate a solid knowledge of subjects related to the study of Literature and Culture in general.
  10. Develop coherent discourses on literature and culture in English and apply these discourses to the analysis of social and academic reality.
  11. Develop effective written work and oral presentations and adapted to the appropriate register.
  12. Discern the sex/gender factor in the configuration of the literary canon.
  13. Distinguish the sex/gender factor in the configuration of the literary canon.
  14. Express oneself effectively by applying argumentative and textual procedures in formal and scientific texts, in the language studied.
  15. Identifying the main and secondary ideas and expressing them with linguistic correctness.
  16. In an effective manner, organise the autonomous component to learning.
  17. Incorporate ideas and concepts from published sources into work, citing and referencing appropriately.
  18. Integrate knowledge and information from academic sources consulted for written work, citing, referencing and paraphrasing correctly.
  19. Issue rating pertinent criticism supported in understanding the relevant information on issues related to the literature and culture.
  20. Locate and organise relevant English-language information available on the internet, databases and libraries, and apply this to work and/or research environments.
  21. Locate specialised and academic information and select this according to its relevance.
  22. Maintain an attitude of respect for the opinions, values, behaviors and practices of others.
  23. Make appropriate critical evaluations supported by an understanding of relevant information on topics related to Literature and Culture.
  24. Organise the autonomous component to the learning process in an effective manner.
  25. Plan work effectively, individually or in groups, in order to fulfil the planned objectives.
  26. Plan, organise and carry out work in a team.
  27. Produce normatively correct written and oral texts.
  28. Produce work in accordance with academic ethics.
  29. Produce written and spoken academic texts at a higher-proficient-user level (C2) on the concepts and skills relevant to the study of English literary texts and contexts.
  30. Recognise the principles of the discipline of study and its main sources.
  31. Strengthen the capacity of reading, interpretation and critical analysis of literary texts and language.
  32. Understand and differentiate adequately between the concepts of literature and culture in English, as well as their mutual relations and interactions.
  33. Use appropriate terminology in the construction of an academic text.
  34. Use the appropriate terminology in the construction of an academic text and in the transmission of their knowledge.
  35. Write text commentaries from a critical standpoint.

Content

Syllabus

Unit 1: The works of William Shakespeare: a) poetry: "The Sonnets" and the Petrarchan tradition; b) drama: "The Merchant of Venice" and the early modern stage. 
Unit 2: Metaphysical poetry: selected poems of John Donne and Andrew Marvell.
Unit 3: John Milton: "Paradise Lost" (a selection). 
Unit 4: The Rise of the Novel: Daniel Defoe's "Robinson Crusoe".


Activities and Methodology

Title Hours ECTS Learning Outcomes
Type: Directed      
Practice classes: reading and debates 20 0.8
Theory classes 30 1.2
Type: Supervised      
Assignments 25 1
Type: Autonomous      
Reading 15 0.6
Study 35 1.4

The teaching methodology will be based on:

  • Directed activities (30%, 1.8 cr)
  • Supervised activities (15%, 0.9 cr)
  • Autonomous activities  (50%, 3 cr)
  • Assessment activities (5%, 0.3 cr)

Annotation: Within the schedule set by the centre or degree programme, 15 minutes of one class will be reserved for students to evaluate their lecturers and their courses or modules through questionnaires.


Assessment

Continous Assessment Activities

Title Weighting Hours ECTS Learning Outcomes
Exam 45% 2.5 0.1 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 20, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35
In-class essay writing 45% 2.5 0.1 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 14, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 23, 25, 26, 28, 30, 32, 33, 34, 35
Participation in class discussion and debates 10% 20 0.8 1, 6, 7, 10, 12, 13, 15, 18, 22, 32

Assessment for this course is based on the following criteria:

  • Exam (45%)
  • In-class essay writing (45%) 
  • Class attendance and participation (10%)

PLEASE NOTE:

  • Continuous assessment. All exercises are compulsory and submission of one of the two exams automatically excludes the possibility of obtaining “No avaluable” as a final grade. The minimum mark for any exercise or exam to be considered for the average final mark is 5. The minimum average pass mark for the whole subject is 5.
  • The student’s command of English will be taken into account when marking all exercises and for the final mark. It will count as 25% of this mark for all the exercises and will be assessed on the basis of the following criteria:
    • Grammar (morphology and syntax)
    • Vocabulary (accuracy and variety)
    • Cohesion (among sentences and paragraphs)
    • Organization (sound argumentation of ideas)
    • Style (expression and register)
    • Spelling 
  • Review procedure: Students have a right to review their exercises with the teacher in a personal tutorial, on the set dates, never later than 2 weeks after the marks have been made available. The student loses this right if s/he fails to collect the exercise/exam within the period announced by the teacher.

i) On carrying out each assessment activity, lecturers will inform students (on Moodle) of the procedures to be followed for reviewing all grades awarded, and the date on which such a review will take place.

ii) In the event of a student committing any irregularity that may lead to a significant variation in the grade awarded to an assessment activity, the student will be given a zero for this activity, regardless of any disciplinary process that may take place. In the event of several irregularities in assessment activities of the same subject, the studentwill begiven a zero as the final grade for this subject.

Not Assessed as Final Grade:

Students will obtain a Not assessed/Not submitted course grade unless they have submitted more than 30% of the assessment items, that is, provided that they have taken none of the two exams. 

 

 

 

Item-by-Item Reassessment

a)     Students who fail both the exam and the essay are not eligible for re-assessment; those who have failed either the exam or the essay are eligible provided that the mark of the failed exam or essay is higher than 3.5. Students who have failed one of the two exams must opt for re-assessment even if the provisional average mark of the course were 5 or higher.

b)    Students whose re-assessment is successful will get, in all cases, a final grade of 5. Students who have passed both exams cannot opt for re-assessment in order to upgrade their average mark. 

 

Single assessment:

The single assessment option, where taken, will consist of the following activities:

A written exam that will include questions about all of the course´s readings. (50 %).

An oral text about all of the obligatory texts in the course. (50 %).

The same re-assessment method as continuous assessment will be used.

 

Plagiarism and other irregularities

In the event of a student committing any irregularity that may lead to a significant variation  in the grade awarded to an assessment activity, the student will be given a zero for this  activity, regardless of any disciplinary process that may take place. In the event of several irregularities in assessment activities of the same subject, the student will be given a zero as  the final grade for this subject.

Irregularities refer, forinstance, to copying in an exam, copying from sources without indiacting authorship, or a misuse of AI such as presenting work as original that has been generated by an AI tool or programme. These evaluation activities will not be re-assessed

 

 


Bibliography

BIBLIOGRAPHY (A more detailed bibliography will be provided in class)

UNIT 1

Set reading:

  • William Shakespeare’s "Sonnets" (1609)
  • "The Merchant of Venice" (ed. Jay L. Halio, Oxford Shakespeare, OUP, 1993).

Optional reading:

  • Tempest (1610-11)
  • Romeo and Juliet (1596)
  • Hamlet (1601)

UNIT 2

Set readings:

  • Metaphysical poetry: John Donne, George Herbert, Andrew Marvell.
  • Henry Vaughan, Selected poetry (1650s)
  • Francis Bacon, "Essays" (1597)

UNIT 3

Set readings:

  • "Paradise Lost" by John Milton (1645)

Optional readings:

  • "Paradise Regained", John Milton 
  • "Samson Agonistes", John Milton 

UNIT 4
Set reading:

  • "Gulliver's Travels" (1726) de Jonathan Swift


Optional readings:

  • "Robinson Crusoe", 1719, Daniel Defoe.
  • Political Writings, 1720, Mary Astell.
  • "Love Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister" (1684), Aphra Behn.

Websites:

Please note:
For each unit at least one academic article will be read (see Campus Virtual).

Other recomended texts:

Kermode, Franak. "Shakespeare's Language". London: Penguin Books, 2000. 

Levi, Anthony. "Renaissance and Reformation: Intellectual Genesis". New Haven: Yale University Press,2002.

MacCulloch, Diarmaid. "Reformation: Europe’s House Divided". London: Penguin Books, 2003.

Milton, John (Scott Elledge ed.). "Paradise Lost: an Authoritative Text Backgrounds and Sources". New York: Norton, 1993.

Norbrook, David (ed.) "The Penguin Book of Renaissance Verse". London: Penguin, 2005.

Patterson, Annabel. "John Milton". London: Longman, 1991.

Smith, Emma, "This is Shakespeare", London, Random House, 2020. 

Van Doren, Mark: "Shakespeare". New York: New York Review of Books, 2005.

Zwicker, Steven N. "The Cambridge Companion to English Literature 1650:1740". Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998.

 

 


Software

Not applicable


Language list

Name Group Language Semester Turn
(PAUL) Classroom practices 1 English second semester morning-mixed
(PAUL) Classroom practices 2 English second semester morning-mixed
(TE) Theory 1 English second semester morning-mixed
(TE) Theory 2 English second semester morning-mixed