https://studiegids.vu.nl/en/courses/2025-2026/L_ELBALES217Students become acquainted with the main developments and a number of key texts in British literature from 1900 to the present, with a focus on how fiction, through styles and themes, reflects its historical context. By the end of the course, students can:Interpret the selected literary texts.Explain the concepts and arguments put forward in the selected secondary literature.Do all this in clear and concise written English.This course tracks the history of British literature from the First World War and the height of the British Empire to the multicultural voices of contemporary Britain. It seeks to understand how authors reflected on the trials and tribulations of the twentieth century, when Britain went from being a world power with colonies around the globe to adjusting to a humbler role. We examine relevant cultural and literary movements, including realism, modernism, postcolonialism, and postmodernism, against their respective historical backdrops. Topics and literary texts discussed in previous years include:The move from realism to modernism in Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway (1925).The estate novel as a nostalgic genre in Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited (1945).The postcolonial rewriting of the nineteenth-century British bildungsroman in Jean Rhys’s Wide Sargasso Sea (1966).The social critique of the effects of Thatcherism on the multicultural society in Hanif Kureishi’s My Beautiful Laundrette (1985) (both screenplay and film).The postmodern revision of British literary history in Ian McEwan’s Atonement (2001).Both topics and literary texts are subject to change.We meet once a week for four hours.Attendance is mandatory.Meetings are held on campus; no hybrid alternative is offered.Each meeting consists of group discussions, exam instruction/practice, and a lecture portion.Prior to each meeting, students complete a Canvas assignment.Devices with access to social media (this includes laptops) are not allowed in class. If an exception needs to be made for medical reasons, students must contact the academic advisor prior to the start of the course.There will be no meetings in period 6.Successful completion of the course is contingent on timely submission of all Canvas assignments and attendance at all meetings. The full final grade for the course is based on a take-home exam consisting of short essay questions. The take-home exam will be held over three days in week 9 of period 5 (the week of 25 May 2026). English writing proficiency is a key aspect of the assessment.To be announced in the course syllabus, which will be posted on Canvas well in advance of the start of the course.This course is part of the Bachelor’s program Literature and Society, track English.Students must have passed the course Literary Theory (L_ELBALES101).