Critical Readings

Celebrating Halloween, the panel discusses one of Washington Irving's best-known works—The Legend of Sleepy Hollow—with special attention to the role of characterisation, historical detail, and descriptive imagery in a near contemporary to Jane Austen. Continue reading

The panel discusses the concluding chapters and a series of insightful reader questions about the influence of Austen's religion, the role of romance in her novels, and her development of realistic, compelling characters with flaws and areas of growth. Continue reading

The panel discusses chapters 35–49, with special attention to the rational development of Elizabeth's appreciation of Mr. Darcy, and to Jane Austen's reformist, but not revolutionary, attitude to the social mores and expectations of Regency-era England. Continue reading

The panel discusses chapters 18–34, with topics of interest including Mr. Darcy's concealed gallantry, whether Mr. Collins has any goodly qualities, Elizabeth's sensible regard for her family's reputation, and her internally conflicted personal values. Continue reading

The panel reads chapters 1–17 of Pride and Prejudice, with special attention to the developing form of the novel in the Regency era, the biographical connexions between Austen's life and her novels, and the initially peripheral nature of the protagonists. Continue reading

The panel discusses five poems by E.A. Robinson, with discussion centring on their use of the gothic, their shared imagery of death and hell (and their response), and particularly their formal qualities seen across three villanelles and two sonnets. Continue reading

The panel discusses four poems from Edwin Muir's collection The Narrow Place (1943), with a focus on their formal features, their connexion to a version of Nietzsche's philosophy, and their opposed characterisation of the civilised and natural worlds. Continue reading

The panel discusses two of the earliest examples of English poetry—Caedmon's Hymn and The Dream of the Rood (sometimes attributed to Cynewulf)—with a discussion of translation theory, Saxon influence, and the development of English poetry and language. Continue reading

The panel discusses the concluding three cantos, with attention to Pope's heroi-comic satire of epic in both content and form, and his use of references to his own involvement in the real-life events enacted by the poem's fictional protagonists. Continue reading

The panel discusses the first two cantos of Alexander Pope's heroi-comical peacemaker poem, with special attention to its use of foreshadowing, the style and tenor of its dialogue, and its allegedly Rosicrucian spiritology (and its textual origins). Continue reading

The panel is joined by the novelist H.S. Cross to discuss three poems that have been famously set to music: "The Lark Ascending" by George Meredith, "Most Glorious Lord of Life" by Edmund Spenser, and "Three Songs for St. Cecilia's Day" by W.H. Auden. Continue reading

The panel concludes the summer reading with the ninth and final book of Tristram Shandy, compassing the manner of the liaison between Uncle Toby and the Widow Wadman, with special attention to Toby's wound, Trim's knee, and Mrs. Shandy's constant purity. Continue reading

The panel reads the conclusion of the eighth book, with attention to metaphorical fortifications and battle plans, a tale of one-sided love between Corporal Trim and a Nursing Nun, and a budding romance between Uncle Toby and the Widow Wadman. Continue reading

The panel discusses the books seven and eight, with particular attention to the parallel narratives used to describe the approach to Lyons, the different forms of bad luck Tristram encounters there, and the Widow Wadman's love for Uncle Toby. Continue reading

The panel discusses narrative lines straight and winding in book six, and parallel trips in France in book seven, including Tristram's three visits to Auxerre: as a child, as a young man, and in the narrative 'present' when the book is being written. Continue reading

The panel discusses the majority of the sixth book, with attention to the 'picture' of the Widow Wadman, the story of Le Fever and his orphaned son, the mode of classical dress, and the rise of the novel in both its historical and literary contexts. Continue reading

The panel discusses the conclusion of the fifth book, with attention to how the hobby horses of Trim and Toby reappear, and what they suggest about the potential truth in ancient knowledge and the pedagogical value of learning fundamental texts by rote. Continue reading

The panel discusses the beginning of book five, including the extreme discomfort of riding post-chaise, the concupiscent meanings which attach to ordinary words thereby rendering them unusable, and the highly irregular manner of Tristram's circumcision. Continue reading

The panel discusses the conclusion of the fourth book, including Walter and Toby stuck on the stairs amidst further discussion of the definition of a nose (or noes), and the inflexible irrevocability of all of the mishaps that occur during the narrative. Continue reading

The panel reads the conclusion of book three and the beginning of book four in which the topic of noses recurs and features prominently, providing an opportunity to examine how Dr. Slop and Walter Shandy can be compared to Uncle Toby and Corporal Trim. Continue reading

The panel approaches the moment of Tristram's birth beginning with the author's preface (in book 3), followed by a definition of 'nose', and a series of mix-ups involving the words 'mortar' and 'bridge' with dire implications for the unhappy newborn. Continue reading

The panel concludes the second book and, in a series of retrograde manoeuvres, progresses through the third book until Dr. Slop is able to receive delivery of his forceps, free them from their knotted bag, and demonstrate their usage on Uncle Toby. Continue reading

The panel discusses book II, chapters 6–17 and Sterne's use of metanarrative focus on the correct art of oratory, the use of puns and textual elisions, the need to fill in details or leave them to readerly imagination, and the use of real-world sermons. Continue reading

The panel discusses Tristram's father's theories about nominative determinism, the different translations of identical biblical names, and the latest contemporary French developments regarding pre-natal baptism and its theological justifications. Continue reading

The panel begins the summer reading of The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman with a biographical overview of Laurence Sterne, followed by the first eighteen chapters, with a focus on the novel's metatextual moves and discursive structure. Continue reading