Close Reading of a Major English Text: Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens

elective courses
pedagogical qualifications

The aim of the course is to contextualise "Oliver Twist" within the political, social and economic concerns of its time to enable the modern reader to better appreciate the comic and political nuances of this Dickens novel. Students will explore such issues as juvenile crime in the 19th century and how Dickens constructs childhood and family within the context of "Oliver Twist." The novel will be also discussed in conjunction with the Victorian Gothic, the Newgate novel, the silver-fork novel, melodrama, the comedy of manners and the picaresque novel. Students will examine the novel as one of Dickens’s popular performance fictions and discuss selected theatrical and movie adaptations of "Oliver Twist", for example David Lean's 1948 British film, Carol Reed's 1968 film based on Lionel Bart's musical "Oliver!", or extracts from Miriam Margolyes's one-woman show about Dickens's women.

Second-cycle studies (Master's degree programme)

Education at language level B2+.

The aim of the course is to contextualise "Oliver Twist" within the political, social and economic concerns of its time to enable the modern reader to better appreciate the comic and political nuances of this Dickens novel. Students will explore such issues as juvenile crime in the 19th century and how Dickens constructs childhood and family within the context of "Oliver Twist." The novel will be also discussed in conjunction with the Victorian Gothic, the Newgate novel, the silver-fork novel, melodrama, the comedy of manners and the picaresque novel. Students will examine the novel as one of Dickens’s popular performance fictions and discuss selected theatrical and movie adaptations of "Oliver Twist", for example David Lean's 1948 British film, Carol Reed's 1968 film based on Lionel Bart's musical "Oliver!", or extracts from Miriam Margolyes's one-woman show about Dickens's women. Apart from the above, the following issues will be discussed throughout the course:

- the Poor Law Amendment Act 1834

- Utilitarianism

- the Victorian workhouse

- funeral mutes

- London Metropolitan Police in 1830s

- Bow Street Runners

- the police magistrate

- the pastoral in "Oliver Twist"

- the Newgate Calendar and the Newgate novel

- early critical reception of the novel

- modern criticism

- Dickens's "streaky-bacon" narrative technique

- the parochial beadle

- London of 1830s in the novel

- symbolism, imagery, allegory in the novel

- Victorian prostitution

- "Oliver Twist" and conduct books

- "Oliver Twist" and the Gothic tradition

- Victorian realism

- Dickens and medicine

- "Oliver Twist" as Dickens's performance fiction

Second-cycle studies (Master's degree programme)

Education at language level B2+.

Selected sources:

Dickens, Charles. Oliver Twist. Penguin Books, 2003.

Dickens, Charles. The Story of Little Dombey and Other Performance Fictions. Broadview Press, 2013.

Paroissien, David. The Companion to Oliver Twist. Edinburgh University Press, 1992.

John, Juliet, ed. Charles Dickens’s Oliver Twist. A Sourcebook. Routledge, 2006.

Schlicke, Paul, ed. The Oxford Companion to Charles Dickens. OUP, 2011.

Patten, Robert and John O. Jordan, Catherine Waters, eds. The Oxford Handbook of Charles Dickens. OUP, 2018.

Charles Dickens Museum. https://dickensmuseum.com

Having completed the course participants will have the knowledge and skills to:

• analyse "Oliver Twist" considering its patchwork of literary genres.

• understand and successfully use a range of terms and concepts integral to literary studies.

• understand "Oliver Twist" in relation to the themes and issues delineated in the description of the course.

• read carefully with attention to detail to develop and discuss their own ways of interpreting a wide variety of literary texts (developing such skills as critical thinking, analysis, synthesis)

In class discussions students acquire skills of expressing their thoughts in a clear, coherent, logical and precise manner, with the use of language which is correct grammatically, lexically and phonetically.

Your final grade will depend on:

- active participation in classes

- two mid-term tests (passing score: 60%)

Allowable absences: 2

A student who fails an exam may write it again during the resit examination session.

Due to COVID-19 pandemic, the course may be conducted online, at the time assigned for it in the academic syllabus on the Institute's website.

The assessment method may change depending on the current epidemic situation. Equivalent assessment criteria will be determined in accordance with the guidelines in force at the University of Warsaw, in consultation with the participants of the classes.