Code 19639
Level of study Third/Final year
Credit value 20
Semester 2
Pre-requisite modules You must have completed at least two years of appropriate study in this discipline.
Chaucer's writings, continuing to offer readerly delight and enjoyment after six hundred years, also challenge the reader to reflect on modes and practices of reading. The concerns of post-modern literary theory have made newly visible Chaucer's own pre-modern engagement with issues of interpretation and the pleasures of the text. Reading Chaucer in relation to a variety of recent critical approaches, you will have opportunities to become a engaged and self-aware reader of Chaucer, to reflect on and situate your own practices as a postmodern reader. Texts discussed in seminars will cover a range of Chaucer's works. Learning will be by seminar and individual essay work; you will be required to contribute to learning by giving presentations on your reading and taking turns at making a written record of seminar discussion. The module will assume some previous study of Middle English texts in the original language (e.g. Texts in History at Level C); however, it is equally suitable for those who have done level I "Writing Society 1380-1580" and those who have not.