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English Current Students Intranet

Term 2

See TalisAspireLink opens in a new window for further reading recommendations.

Unit 3

Strange, Magickal, Uncanny: Histories and Futures

Leading on from your work on folkhorror but branching into new territories, this unit thinks about the strange pasts, presents, and futures of Britain, its identity and its people, its lands and its narrative. We will do so through a range of texts that engage with ghostly, weird, haunting, strange atmospheres and themes of the paranormal, the magickal/occult, the unexplained and the ambiguous in relation to "Britain". The texts in this unit blur genres and forms - fiction, pseudo-nonfiction, hybrids of dramatization and documentary, urban fantasy, travel writing, gothic novel, short form, novels, podcasts - and that is an aspect that will be key to our discussions as well.

There is reading/listening guidance for each text which you may find useful for note-taking but should not feel limited by these.

If you follow the hyperlinked book titles, they will take you to second-hand copies of the recommended edition.

Week 1

REQUIRED PRIMARY - Helen Cresswell, Moondial Link opens in a new window(1987) AND Episode One of the BBC adaptationLink opens in a new window from 1988.

REQUIRED SECONDARY - Beth Rodgers,. "Children’s Ghost StoriesLink opens in a new window." The Routledge Handbook to the Ghost Story. Routledge, 2017. 338-347.

Recommended extra Primary texts:

The rest of the TV series from 1988 is strongly recommended as an extra (3 hours total viewing time, over 6 episodes) and would count as a separate primary text.
Books - Philippa Pearce, Tom's Mdnight GardenLink opens in a new window; Nina Bawden, Carrie's WarLink opens in a new window (1973)
TV Series - King of the CastleLink opens in a new window (1977); Shadow of the StoneLink opens in a new window (1987); The Ghost Hunter Link opens in a new window(2000-2002); GhostsLink opens in a new window (BBC 2019-2023)

Week 2

REQUIRED PRIMARY - Danny Robins, The Witch Farm, (2022)

REQUIRED SECONDARY - Annette Hill, "Ordinary and ExtraordinaryLink opens in a new window" in Paranormal media: Audiences, spirits and magic in popular culture. Routledge, 2010, pp.1-17 (ignore book overview)

- Listen to episodes 1-9 (including case updates)

- Total listening time is 6hrs 30mins

Recommended primary extras:
Ghostwatch (1992, TV show)
Nigel Kneale's The Stone TapeLink opens in a new window (1972, TV drama)
The Magnus ArchivesLink opens in a new window (podcast series)
The first podcast series by Robins - The Battersea Poltergeist;

Week 3

REQUIRED PRIMARY - Jeremy Dyson, The Haunted Book (2012)

REQUIRED SECONDARY - Julian Holloway and James Kneale, "Locating Haunting: A Ghost-Hunter's GuideLink opens in a new window", Cultural Geographies, 15.3 (2008): 297-312.

Week 4

REQUIRED PRIMARY - Hilary Mantel, Beyond Black Link opens in a new window(2005)

REQUIRED SECONDARY - These extracts from Stewart, Spooner, Bird and ShomeLink opens in a new window.

Week 5

REQUIRED PRIMARY - Ben Aaronovitch, Rivers of London (2011)

REQUIRED SECONDARY - This extract from Borowska-Szerszun, Sylwia. "Ethnic and Cultural Diversity in Ben Aaronovitch’s Urban Fantasy Cycle Rivers of London." Nordic Journal of English Studies, 18.1 (2019): 1-26.

Unit 4

Neo-Victorian Crimes and Mysteries: Facts and Fictions

The final unit navigates neo-Victorianism through historical crime and/or mystery fiction in the various forms of non-fiction novels, fragmented prose novels, graphic novels, television episodes. Our critical questions will circulate around why there is a continued fascination with the Victorian period and particular its perceived darker, more criminal side, and what the ways in which the period is reimagined tell us about national histories and identities.

Content note: ALL of the texts in this unit containing upsetting material - murder, sexual violence and misogyny, psychological torment, economic degradation, some racial slurs and offensive stereotypes. Come and speak to me if needed ahead of reading/class.

There is reading/listening guidance for each text which you may find useful for note-taking but should not feel limited by these.

If you follow the hyperlinked book titles, they will take you to second-hand copies of the recommended edition.

Week 7

REQUIRED PRIMARY - Kate Summerscale, The Suspicions of Mr Whicher (2008)

REQUIRED SECONDARY -

  • Recommended edition of Summerscale is Bloomsbury Publishing 2008

  • Content note: As might be expected, the text contains some rather gruesome and upsetting imagery.
  • Reading Guidance

Week 8

REQUIRED PRIMARY - George Macrae Burnet, His Bloody Project: Documents Relating to the Case of Roderick MacraeLink opens in a new window (2015)

REQUIRED SECONDARY -

  • Recommended edition of Summerscale is Bloomsbury Publishing 2008

    • Content note: As might be expected, the text contains some rather gruesome and upsetting imagery.
  • Reading Guidance

Week 9

REQUIRED PRIMARY -

Peter Akroyd, Dan Leno and the Limehouse GolemLink opens in a new window (1994)

REQUIRED SECONDARY -

  • Suggested edition is the Vintage Publishing 1995 but the Sinclair-Stevenson 1994 hardback (red cover) is also fine.
  • Reading Guidance

Week 10

REQUIRED PRIMARY - selection of different literary and cultural representations of the Whitechapel Murders

Required secondary:

Holly-Gale Millett. "Vampiristic Museums and Library Gothic." Gothic Britain: Dark Places in the Provinces and Margins of the British Isles, ed. William Hughes and Ruth Heholt (UWP, 2018),pp. 137-158.