| A300 Index | Block 1 | Block 2 | Block 3 | Block 4 | ECA | My Personal Site |
A300 Twentieth Century Literature: Texts and Debates
I've decided to continue my Open University studies with a Bachelor of Arts degree. My background is in technology and computing, so I'm preparing for A300 by doing a couple of short writing courses - A171 Writing for the Internet, and A172 Writing Essays. Although the study of literature is new to me, I really enjoy reading and the way writers use language, so I'm hoping my enthusiasm and, study and information literacy skills will make up for my lack of specific subject knowledge. I'm also preparing for the course by reading the set books before the course starts. I'm really looking forward to the challenges this new subject will bring.
I rely heavily on a computer and the Internet for study, but I also realise the immense value of 'real' books, and the importance of what they contain and the people who write them. I hope that by understanding more about modern literature this course will also improve my own writing.
An OUSA FirstClass conference has been set up for A300 (OU Shield / OU Students Association / Signpost). The course team have posted the Course Guide, TMA booklet, and Course Calendar, which gives a good insight into the course. The TMA's look difficult, gulp!
Pre-course preparation
The OU Course Description page recommends reading the set books for preparation, but with hindsight, and more time available I would have preferred to do some extra reading. For example, two of the novels are part of trilogies - Pat Barker's The Ghost Road is part of the Regeneration trilogy and follows Regeneration and Eye in the Door. Lewis Grassic Gibbon's Sunset Song is part of the A Scots Quair trilogy . Other background material has come up in the conferences such as Janet Malcolm's Reading Chekhov: A Critical Journey. I've also found a DVD of Orlando which gives a visual perspective to the story, although I'm still finding it difficult to understand.
Course start date 5th February 2005
Block one - What is literature for?
Block Two - Competing modernisms
Block Three - Varieties of the popular
Block Four - Judging literature
Final project
| A300 Index | Block 1 | Block 2 | Block 3 |
Block 4 | ECA | My Personal Site |
Written by bill "at" larnach "dot" info
URL of this page: http://www.larnach.info/A300/index.htm
A300 links
Course description
Arts Faculty A300 site
Set Book List
Tutorial finder 2005
Pre-course preparation
Bookbrain
Modern critical thought
Resources
Literature Online
Academic Search Premier
Internet Poetry Archive
20th Century Literature
Google Scholar
Humbul
Internet for English
London Region Arts Club
SAC LitWeb
Representative Poetry Online
Modern American Poetry
Literary Resources
Reading a Poem
Block one
OLLC Chekhov
OLLC Lewis Grassic Gibbon
Preface to edition (Wilfred Owen)
Dulce et Decorum Est
George Orwell -"why I write"
John Reid essay
Chekhov
The Cherry Orchard (Julius West 1916 translation)
Chekhov on writing
Chekhov pages
Cherry Orchard play notes
Mansfield
Books and writers: Katherine Mansfield
NZ Edge
Katherine Mansfield collection
New Zealand Book Council Mansfield page
The Short Story versus the Novel
Mansfield Short stories online
A Short guide to Mansfield
Katherine Mansfield birthplace
The garden Party and other stories online
Grassic Gibbon
Sunset Song (Stage Play)
Block two
Prufrock (Gutenberg)
Prufrock (Blackmask)
Prufrock hypertext resource
Prufrock Sparknotes
Prufrock ClassicNotes
Prufrock notes
Prufrock notes
Prufrock notes
Orlando (eBook)
Orlando Sparknotes
Galileo essay
Bertold Brecht
Brecht ClassicNotes
Brecht biography
International Brecht Society
IBS links
T.S. Eliot
Modern American Poetry
What the Thunder Said
Academy of American Poets
London Review of Books
Selected Poetry
Christopher Okigbo
Pegasus Okigbo biography
Answers.com Okigbo biography
Post Colonial Web Okigbo page
African Data baseOkigbo page
LitEncyc Okigbo profile
Alex Irvine Okigbo page (.pdf)
Virginia Woolf
Virginia Woolf BBC interview (audio)1937
Block three
Daphne De Maurier
HOWL
Philip K. Dick official site
Guardian online Philip K. Dick
Allen Ginsberg
The beat page (Allen Ginsberg)
American classics (poetry.org)
Kiss of the Spider Woman eNotes
Block four
'Waiting for Godot' research guide
'Waiting for Godot' BBC 4 radio discussion
Samuel Beckett resources
Waiting for Godot adapted for guinea pigs - yes really!
Nobel prize in Literature - Laureates
Heaney BBC Interview
The Ghost Road - Prior's masculinity
ECA
Booker prize Guardian Online article
Useful DVDs
Orlando
Regeneration
Rebecca
Blade runner
Useful Videos
Kiss of the Spider Woman
Other useful stuff
FireFox Athens toolbar
Citing references guide (.pdf file)
Wordweb (free Windows dictionary and thesaurus)
