Brief description
This module covers a representative range of writing published between 1660 and the 1780s; a wide span of history stretching from the Restoration of King Charles II to the American War of Independence and a period which witnessed substantial changes in modes of literary production and reception. We do not aim to be comprehensive. Rather for convenience of lecturing, discussion and assessment, we shall address this rich and lively period of literary production under four key-headings: Comedy, Poetry, Satire and Novels.

Under Comedy we shall examine the changing shape of dramatic comedy as the libertine Restoration theatre gave way to new codes of politeness.Under Poetry we shall focus upon the contrast between 'Town and Country' to explore a shift from neo-classical imitation towards more realistic, 'modern' and sentimental poetic forms. Satire was a very dominant literary mode of both the late seventeenth-century, when party-politics emerges, and the early eighteenth-century, when literary professionalism, including an increase in female-authorship,generated a new climate of public criticism. Importantly, with the rapid expansion of the literary marketplace, this period also sees the development of sophisticated forms of prose-fiction which we now problematically label Novels. The lectures are primarily concerned with mapping generic and cultural contexts and suggesting ideological and critical consequences, whilst the seminars provide a forum for close textual analysis and the discussion of critical issues.

Tutors will present a seminar programme covering material under all four headings. Subject to availability etc titles will be selected from the following recommended editions

Drama:
Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Comedy (The Country Wife, The Man of Mode, The Rover, The Way of the World, The Conscious Lovers, The School for Scandal), 2nd edn., edited by Scott McMillin (Norton)

Poetry:
all students are required to purchase: Eighteenth-Century Poetry: An Annotated Anthology edited by David Fairer and Christine Gerrard (Blackwell).

Satire:
Alexander Pope, either The Dunciad edited by Valerie Rumbold or Selected Poetry (Penguin); Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels (any edition); John Gay, The Beggar's Opera (Penguin)

Novels:
Eliza Haywood, Love in Excess (Broadview); Samuel Richardson, Pamela (Penguin); Henry Fielding, Joseph Andrews (Oxford World's Classics); Fanny Burney, Evelina (Oxford World's Classics).

Aims and objectives
to introduce students to a range of poetry, drama, and fiction from the period from the 1660s to the 1780s;
to locate this writing in the literary, socio-historical and cultural contexts in which it was produced and read;
to encourage students to reflect critically on the texts chosen for special study;
to encourage students to explore the relations between literary texts and between texts and their contexts;
to encourage students to familiarize themselves with recent critical debates about the writing of this period.