In this class we will read two modern British novels that engage with the sensory experience of London as a metropolitan city at the beginning of the twentieth century: Joseph Conrad’s The Secret Agent (1907) and Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway (1925). Our focus will be on the innovations both in literary form and language with which Conrad and Woolf experiment in order to fictionally render what it feels like to be subjected to the dynamically changing material and social reality of London. Reading and discussing excerpts from Charles Dickens’ Bleak House (1852) would allow us to establish how Woolf’s and Conrad’s modern London has evolved away from the Victorian London of Dickens. We will also discuss the differences between the modern and Victorian novel. Along with the literary texts, we will read selected criticism on urban experience and the language of the novel in Conrad and Woolf. Assignments for the class will include two-page response papers for almost every class session, an Internet project on the social, political and material reality of London around 1907 and 1925, and one five-page paper. Course participants are strongly encouraged to read The Secret Agent and Mrs. Dalloway before the beginning of the course.


NOTE: There will be a Catalyst course webpage where those who are registered for the course will be able to access scholarly articles and assignments.