ENGL 318-01, Victorian Literature and Economics, Spring 2007

Abstract

The course will have 3 areas of focus. First, we will read literary texts that take up economic questions in direct or indirect ways. Emphasis will be on fiction (Gaskell,Eliot,Gissing), with some reading in non-fiction prose (Carlyle,R uskin) and poetry (C. Rossetti). Second, the course will provide students with an accessible overview of British economic thought, from Smith and the rise of political economy, to the birth of neo-classicael conomics at the turn of the 20th century. (Political economy in Ireland develops in quite different ways, and we will look briefly at this tradition and at the literary culture that accompanied it .) Third, the course will look at several strands of literary theory that offer ways of studying literature and economics and it will consider the work of literary critics writing in this area. (Theoretical readings by Marx, Williams, Derrida,Spivak; criticism by Gagnier, Gallagher, etc.). Thus, while the course will focus on Victorian Britain it is designed to introduce students to recent studies in literature and economics( sometimes called The New Economic Criticism). Students in other fields may develop research projects that apply methods studied in the seminar to their own area, or may pursue a question or problem within this body of theory.