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Semester 1

Shakespeare's Comedies: Identity and Illusion (ENLI10279)

Course Website

https://www.ed.ac.uk/literatures-languages-cultures/english-literature/undergraduate/current/honours

Subject

English Literature

College

CAHSS

Credits

20

Normal Year Taken

3

Delivery Session Year

2023/2024

Pre-requisites

Visiting students must have completed 4 English Literature courses at grade B or above. We will only consider University/College level courses, and we do not consider civilisation & other interdisciplinary courses, freshman seminars, writing/composition courses or film/cinema/media courses; visiting students who have taken multiple courses in literature in other languages, should have passed at least two courses in English Literature as well. **Please note that this course may incur additional costs to purchase core texts** **Please see Additional Restrictions below**

Course Summary

This course explores the range of Shakespeare's writing of comedy from the early romantic comedies, through the "mature" and "problem" comedies, to the tragicomic romance of the last plays. The course will consider early modern and recent ideas about comedy as a genre and mode, and trace the ongoing engagement of the plays with various interpenetrating thematic debates.

Course Description

This course explores the range of Shakespeare's writing of comedy from the early romantic comedies, through the "mature" and "problem" comedies, to the tragicomic romance of the last plays. The course will consider early modern and recent ideas about comedy as a genre and mode, and trace the ongoing engagement of the plays with various interpenetrating thematic debates. An early interest in illusion leads to a focus on the shifting and unstable nature of perception and identity, linked on the one hand to the effects of love and desire, and on the other to notions of the theatrical. These interests lead to a comic and comedic exploration of the nature and growth of the self, the problems of desire and of gendered identity, and the ways in which these may be addressed through the artifice of the comic form. **Course Description: *Week 1: Introduction: What is Comedy?: Shapes and Ideas; *Week 2: Classical Comedy and Confusions of Identity: The Comedy of Errors; *Week 3: Comic Stereotypes: Love's Labour's Lost; *Week 4: Identity and Gender: The Taming of the Shrew; *Week 5: Illusion and Identity: A Midsummer Night's Dream; *Week 6: Comedy and Race: The Merchant of Venice; *Week 7: 'The Green World': As You Like It; *Week 8: Essay Completion Week; *Week 9: The Borders of Comedy I: Twelfth Night; *Week 10: The Borders of Comedy II: Measure for Measure; *Week 11: Comedy and Romance: The Tempest.

Assessment Information

Written Exam 0%, Coursework 100%, Practical Exam 0%

Additional Restrictions

Unless you are nominated on an English Literature exchange agreement, visiting students are only permitted to enrol in one 3rd year English Literature course each, per semester, before the start of the relevant semester’s welcome period – and spaces on each course are limited so cannot be guaranteed for any student. Enrolment in a second course from this group will depend on whether there are still spaces available in the September Welcome Period, and cannot be guaranteed, and students will not be permitted to enrol in three 3rd year English Literature courses in the same semester at any time. It is NOT appropriate for students to contact staff within this subject area to ask for an exception to be made; all enquiries to enrol in these courses must be made through the CAHSS Visiting Student Office. This is due to the limited number of spaces available in this very popular subject area.

view the timetable and further details for this course