This seminar explores the rich and restless world of Victorian poetry through the distinct voices of Alfred Lord Tennyson, Christina Rossetti, Matthew Arnold, Edward Lear, and Lewis Carroll. While the focus will be on these five seminal poets, the course will also discuss both pre-Victorian and Victorian poets, Lord Byron, Charlotte Brönte, William Morris, Oscar Wilde and Elizabeth Siddell. Through these seminal poets, we will explore some of the important literary movements that dominated the Victorian period, including the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, Decadence, Arts for Art’s Sake, Aestheticism and the Arts and Crafts Movement. This lecture will trace how their poetry grapples with the upheavals of the nineteenth century—urbanisation, disease, death madness, sexuality, sin, and the fractured self.From Tennyson’s haunted landscapes to Rossetti’s spiritual resistance, from Arnold’s cultural laments to Lear and Carroll’s poetic nonsense, we’ll uncover how poetry both mirrored and challenged Victorian society.
Assessment/requirements: Übung : test at the end of term; Seminar : 12-page research paper.
- Kursleiter/in: Stephanie Stratton