University of International Business and Economics
International Summer Session
LIT 210: The History of the Novel in English
Term: June 29-July 31, 2015
Instructor: Laura Brodie
Home Institution: Washington and Lee University
Office Hours: TBA and by appointment
Email: brodiel@wlu.edu
Class hours: Monday through Friday, 95 minutes each day (2375 minutes in total)
Discussion session: 2 hours each week (600 minutes in total)
Credit: 4
Total contact hours: 66 hours (45minutes each)
Course Overview
This five-week course provides students with an overview of the development of the novel
in the English language. The course uses six books (two in excerpted form) as representative
texts to learn about changes in the novel form from the 18th through the twentieth centuries.
These six works--Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe, Pamela by Samuel Richardson, Pride and
Prejudice by Jane Austen, Hard Times by Charles Dickens, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott
Fitzgerald, and Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, by James Joyce—also offer lessons in
how the novel treated important social issues of the day. Defoe through Dickens comment
on major aspects of English social history in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries;
Fitzgerald gives a scathing indictment of the American dream; and Joyce examines the impact
of Catholicism and the movement for Irish independence on twentieth-century Ireland.
While six novels constitute the course’s core reading, lectures cover other major novelists in
the English tradition, including Henry Fielding, Charlotte Bronte, Thomas Hardy, Virginia
Woolf, Ralph Ellison, Toni Morrison, and Cormac McCarthy, among others. The class
concludes by examining new directions in contemporary fiction.
Required Texts
Robinson Crusoe, by Daniel Defoe
Pamela, by Samuel Richardson
Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen
Hard Times, by Charles Dickens
The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, by James Joyce
1/4
Attendance
Summer school is very intense and to be successful, students need to attend every class.
Occasionally, due to illness or other unavoidable circumstance, a student may need to miss
a class. UIBE policy requires a medical certificate to be excused. Any unexcused absence
may affect the student's grade. Moreover, UIBE policy is that a student who has more than
1/3 of the class in unexcused absences will fail the course.
Requirements
Course requirements include a practice exam, a midterm exam, and a final exam. All three
exams include short answer questions and one five-paragraph essay. Students must keep
up with all reading, to be prepared for question and answer sessions at the end of each
lecture.
Grading Scale
Assignments and examinations will be graded according to the following grade scale:
A
90-100
A–
85-89
B+
82-84
B
78-81
B–
75-77
C+
72-74
C
68-71
C–
64-67
D
60-63
F
below 60
General expectations: Students are expected to:





Attend all classes and be responsible for all material covered in class and otherwise
assigned. Any unexcused absence may impact a student's grade. Moreover, UIBE
policy is that a student who has missed more than 1/3 classes of a course will fail the
course
Complete the day’s required reading and assignments before class
Participate in group discussions and project
Refrain from texting, phoning or engaging in computer activities unrelated to class during class
Participate in class discussions and complete required written work on time 2/4
Course Schedule:
Week 1
Monday: Novel Precursors, The history of storytelling before the English novel
Tuesday: The Rise of the Novel and Daniel Defoe
Wednesday: Alexander Selkirk and Robinson Crusoe
Readings: RC, Preface through Chapter 7 (the beginning of Crusoe’s journal)
Thursday: Robinson Crusoe
Readings: RC, Chapter 18 (the discovery of a man’s footprint) to the novel’s end
Friday: Samuel Richardson and Pamela
Readings: Pamela, Letters 1-31
Week 2
Monday: Pamela cont’d
Readings: Pamela, pages 230-284
Tuesday: The Novel in the Second Half of the 18th Century—Fielding and Radcliffe
Wednesday: Jane Austen and Pride and Prejudice
Readings: P and P, Volume 1
Thursday: Pride and Prejudice
Readings: P and P, Volumes 2 and 3
Friday: Film versions of Pride and Prejudice, Distribution of Practice Exam
Week 3
Monday: Practice Exam Corrections, The Brontes
Tuesday: Charles Dickens and Hard Times
Readings: HT, Book the First
Wednesday: Dickens, Hard Times
Readings: HT, Books the Second and Third
Thursday: Midterm exam
Friday: The history of the novel in America—Hawthorne, Twain, and Stowe
Week 4
Monday: F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
Readings: Gatsby, Chapters 1-5
Tuesday: Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby cont’d
Readings: Gatsby, Chapters 6-9
Wednesday: Ireland in the Age of James Joyce
Thursday: Joyce, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Readings: Portrait, Parts I-III
Friday: Joyce, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
Readings: Portrait, Parts IV-V
3/4
Week 5
Monday: The Modern Novel in England--Thomas Hardy and Virginia Woolf
Tuesday: Ethnic fiction in America
Wednesday: Final Exam
Thursday: Jennifer Egan, Cormac McCarthy and other contemporary voices
Friday: Review, Conclusions, and Return of Final Exams
4/4