Reading Fiction (2042HUM)
Semester 2 / 2011

Texts

Mrs Dalloway!$!Woolf!$! !$!Penguin!$!2000
Death In Venice And Other Stories!$!Thomas Mann!$! !$!Vintage!$!2001
Great Gatsby!$!Fitzgerald!$! !$!Penguin!$!2000
White Noise!$!Delillo!$! !$!Picador!$!1994
Pere Goriot!$!Balzac!$! !$!Norton!$!1997
y separately published work icon Tirra Lirra by the River Jessica Anderson , South Melbourne : Macmillan , 1978 Z300858 1978 single work novel (taught in 19 units)

'Liza used to say that she saw her past life as a string of roughly-graded balls, and so did Hilda have a linear conception of hers, thinking of it as a track with detours. But for some years now I have likened mine to a globe suspended in my head, and ever since the shocking realisation that waste is irretrievalbe, I have been careful not to let this globe spin to expose the nether side on which my marriage has left its multitude of images.

'Nora Porteous has spent most of her life waiting to escape. Fleeing from her small-town family and then from her stifling marriage to a mean-spirited husband, Nora arrives finally in London where she creates a new life for herself as a successful dressmaker.

'Now in her seventies, Nora returns to Queensland to settle into her childhood home.

'But Nora has been away a long time, and the people and events of her past are not at all like she remembered them. And while some things never change, Nora is about to discover just how selective her 'globe of memory' has been.

'Tirra Lirra by the River is a moving account of one woman's remarkable life, a beautifully written novel which displays the lyrical brevity of Jessica Anderson's award-winning style.' (Publication summary)

Description

Reading Fiction provides a comprehensive introduction to literary-critical concepts, tools and techniques required for the analysis of works of narrative fiction. It also explores the historical development of various genres and movements in narrative fiction. Students will read, discuss and write about some major novels and short stories written over the past 200 years. The course aims to develop the disciplinary grounding necessary for advanced literary studies, but also to introduce students to a practice of individual reading that will enable lifelong learning.

Other Details

Current Campus: Nathan
Levels: Undergraduate
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