Write an essay of 1500 words on one of the following questions or topics. Your answer should: • Show detailed knowledge of at least two stories or other short narratives (e.g. poems) that we have studied on the module. • Contain a bibliography of around five items (including both primary and secondary sources) • Be presented in accordance with The Essential Style Guide (available on MyBeckett) Your essay will be marked in relation to the following criteria: • Relevance to the question; • Strength of argument; • Knowledge of the topic displayed in your response; • Fluency of written expression; • Evidence of some research undertaken in the preparation of the essay; • The use you make of that research; • Professionalism of presentation (in relation to the style rules set out in the Essential Style Guide). Questions 1. Examine the relationship between nineteenth-century understandings of female sexuality and haunting phenomena in at least two texts, including The Turn of the Screw. 2. How might you argue that haunting situations in ghost stories of the nineteenth-century are conditioned by the social class system in nineteenth-century Britain? Discuss with reference to The Turn of the Screw plus at least one other text from the module. 3. What effect does the presence of a framing narrator have on our interpretation of The Turn of the Screw plus at least one other story from the module? 4. Robert Browning’s dramatic monologues are short stories in poetic form. Identify similarities and contrasts between at least one of Browning’s narrators and the narrator of one or two prose texts you have studied on this module. 5. To what effect do writers modify the conventions of the genre in their late-nineteenth century versions of the ghost story? Your answer should discuss at least two texts from the module. You may include both stories by M.R. James, or one by M.R. James and a least one by either Oscar Wilde, Perceval Landon, or Henry James. 6. The Uncanny as developed as an idea by Freud is often regarded as a central concept in discussing the ghost story. Discuss the usefulness of Freud’s concept in an analysis of at least two short fictions by different writers, including at least one text from week 6 of the module. (Freud’s essay is available on My Beckett and you should make direct reference to it.) 7. References to the colonial world, in particular India, occasionally appear in nineteenth century ghost stories, and B.M. Croker’s ‘To Let’ is set entirely in India. Drawing upon contextual information, explain this connection between colonialism and haunting in ‘To Let’ plus one or more other story from the module. 8. Does Oscar Wilde’s parodic tale ‘The Canterville Ghost’ simply exist to mock the ghost story genre, or does it also poke fun at social customs and conventions? Discuss with reference to Wilde’s story plus at least one other text from the module.
