Instructor: Heller | TuTh 2:00PM – 3:20PM
This course surveys the rich diversity of literature of the Victorian age (1832-1901). Since this is the golden age of the novel, we’ll read two—Mary Elizabeth Braddon’s Lady Audley’s Secret (1862) and Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1897)—which demonstrate how Victorian authors, in addition to enthralling their readers, used fiction to comment on issues of class, gender, and empire. Other readings will include poems and essays by such writers as Tennyson, Arnold, the Brownings, Darwin, and Ruskin. Our syllabus will be organized around units that explore such important areas of debate in Victorian culture as industrialism and urbanization, science and religion, the role of art and the artist, and controversies over the nature and role of women.