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Hong Kong Shue Yan University
Department of English Language & Literature
2nd term, 2015-2016
Course Title:
Course Code:
Year of Study:
Number of Credits:
Duration in Weeks:
Contact Hours per Week:
Prerequisites:
Prepared by:
Modernist Fiction
ENG 274
2nd year
3
15
Lecture (2 hours)
Tutorial (1 hour)
ENG120 Introduction to Literature
Dr. Robert Kiely
Course Description:
This course introduces students to the themes and forms of modernist fiction within their
cultural and historical milieus. Students first explore the artistic and intellectual
movements and cultural positions of the period (1900 – 1945). They do this by taking up
the core epistemological question in Modernism (how do we get to know the world as
represented by creative texts?), and then the ideological and psychological significance of
modernist experimentations, particularly its narratology, its relationship with the
discourses of imperialism, its sense of time and space, the issue of gender, and the politics
of modernist form and style. Students survey the works of major modernist writers, and in
the latter part of the course, move towards the limits of the modernist canon which may
have heralded the appearance of post-modernist discourse.
Course Outcomes
Upon completion of the course, students will be able to:
Course Outcomes, Teaching Activities and Assessment
Course Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)
Upon completion of this course students should be able to:
identify and describe the features of modernist fiction
ILO1
read and discuss the texts with a critical eye
ILO2
be familiar with the artistic, intellectual and cultural contexts of the
ILO3
modernist period
demonstrate an understanding of the themes of modernist fictions by
ILO4
writing critically on the selected texts
reflect on the limits of modernist canon
ILO5
Teaching and Learning Activities (TLAs)
Textual analysis of the texts
TLA1
Explanation of the artistic, intellectual and cultural background of the
TLA2
period
Critical reading of literary texts with reference to the themes of
TLA3
modernism
In-class Discussions
TLA4
Oral Presentations by students
TLA5
Term Paper
TLA6
Final written examination
TLA7
2
Assessment Tasks (ATs)
Oral Presentation
AT1
Students are required to deliver a group presentation on a
selected topic
Discussion and Participation
AT2
Students are expected to participate in the discussion in class
Term Paper
AT3
Students are to submit a term paper of the length of 2500 –
3000 words on a selected topic at the end of the semester
Final Examination
AT4
Open-book format
TOTAL
20%
10%
30%
40%
100%
Alignment of Course Intended Learning Outcomes, Teaching and Learning
Activities and Assessment Tasks
Course Intended Learning
Teaching and Learning
Assessment Tasks
Outcomes
Activities
TLA1,2,4,5,6
AT1,2,3,4
ILO1
TLA1,3,4,5
AT1,2
ILO2
TLA2,3,4
AT1,2
ILO3
TLA2,3,6,7
AT3,4
ILO4
TLA2,3
AT3,4
ILO5
Course Outline:
Week 1 Modernism and Modernity
Randall Stevenson. (1992) Modernist Fiction: An Introduction. pp. 1-15.
Week 2 Modernism and Art
Franz Kafka, “The Metamorphosis” (1915)
Henry James, “The Real Thing” (1909)
Virginia Woolf, “Modern Fiction” (1921)
Weeks 3 & 4 Life, Death and Sexuality
Thomas Mann, Death in Venice (1912)
Week 5 Consciousness and Narratology
D.H. Lawrence, “The Horse-Dealer’s Daughter” (1922)
James Thurber, “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” (1938)
Weeks 6 & 7 Consciousness and Narratology
William Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury (1929)
Week 8 Modernist Bildungsroman
Ernest Hemingway, “The Killers” (1928)
Ruth Suckow, “A Start in Life” (1924)
Week 9 Modernist Bildungsroman
James Joyce, “An Encounter” from The Dubliners (1914)
Katherine Anne Porter, “Flowering Judas” (1930)
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Week 10 Reading Week
Week 11 Modernism and Gender
Dorothy Parker, “The Sexes” (1942)
Virginia Woolf, “Mark on the Wall” (1927)
Eudora Welty, “A Memory” (1930)
Weeks 12 & 13 Modernism and Gender
Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse (1929)
Week 14 Modernism and Postmodernism
Randall Stevenson. (1992) Modernist Fiction: An Introduction. pp. 195-199.
Week 15 Reading Week
Academic Honesty
You are expected to do your own work. Dishonesty in fulfilling any assignment undermines the
learning process and the integrity of your college degree. Engaging in dishonest or unethical
behavior is forbidden and will result in disciplinary action, specifically a failing grade on the
assignment with no opportunity for resubmission. A second infraction will result in an F for the
course and a report to College officials. Examples of prohibited behavior are:
 Cheating – an act of deception by which a student misleadingly demonstrates that s/he has
mastered information on an academic exercise. Examples include:
 Copying or allowing another to copy a test, quiz, paper, or project
 Submitting a paper or major portions of a paper that has been previously submitted for
another class without permission of the current instructor
 Turning in written assignments that are not your own work (including homework)
 Plagiarism – the act of representing the work of another as one’s own without giving
credit.
 Failing to give credit for ideas and material taken from others
 Representing another’s artistic or scholarly work as one’s own
 Fabrication – the intentional use of invented information or the falsification of research or
other findings with the intent to deceive
To comply with the University’s policy, the term paper has to be submitted to VeriGuide.
Principal Texts
William Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury
Virginia Woolf, To the Lighthouse
Supplementary Texts
Armstrong, Tim. (2005) Modernism: A Cultural History. Cambridge: Polity.
Booth, J. Howard and Rigby, Nigel, eds. (2000) Modernism and Empire. Manchester:
Manchester University Press.
Bradshaw, David. (2003) A Concise Companion to Modernism. Blackwell (eBook)
Levitt, Morton P. (2006) The Rhetoric of Modernist Fiction. Hanover & London:
University Press of New England.
Linett, Maren Tova, ed. (2010) The Cambridge Companion to Modernist Women Writers.
Cambridge University Press.
Rabaté, Jean-Michel. (2007) 1913: The Cradle of Modernism. Oxford: Blackwell.
Roe, Sue and Sellers, Susan. (2000) The Cambridge Companion to Virginia Woolf.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Stevenson, Randall. (1992) Modernist Fiction: An Introduction. Lexington, Kentucky: The
University Press of Kentucky.