ENGL 237

Fall 2026 Part of Term 1

Part of Term 1
Aug 24-Dec 9

Nineteenth-Century British Fiction

Credit: 3 hours.

Focuses on novels and short stories produced in Britain and Ireland between approximately 1800 and 1900. Students will learn to read these texts both as exemplars of literary form and expressions of Regency and Victorian culture. Authors taught may include Jane Austen, Mary Shelley, Walter Scott, Charlotte Brontë, Emily Brontë, Charles Dickens, George Eliot, Wilkie Collins, Oscar Wilde, Bram Stoker, Olive Schreiner, Arthur Conan Doyle, and H.G. Wells.

Prerequisite: Completion of the Composition I requirement.

This course satisfies the General Education Criteria in Fall 2022 for:

Humanities – Lit & Arts

Cultural Studies - Western

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ENGL 237 class schedule data for fall 2026
	Status		CRN	Type	Section	Time	Day	Location	Instructor	Section Details
			81711	Lecture-Discussion	E	2:00PM -3:15PM	TR	Henry Administration Bldg	Courtemanche, E	Availability: Open Part of Term: 1 Date Range: 08/24/26-12/09/26 Degree Notes: Humanities - Lit & Arts, and Cultural Studies - Western course. Credit: 3 hours Section Info: FA26 ENGL 237 - 19th-Centiry British Fiction - Eleanor Courtemanche - With their vicious tea parties, romantic moors, melodramatic slums, and sardonic aristocrats, the novels of 19th-century Britain continue to delight the imagination. These stories were balanced between a drive to realism (detailed descriptions of everyday life, recognizable characters, skepticism about the supernatural) and a fascination with the sensational (sudden violence, wicked villains, and dark mysteries from the past). This class will focus on novels that combine romance, the novel of education, the detective story, and uncanny Gothic historicism. We will also learn about some aspects of 19th century British culture including class structures in Regency England, the social effects of the industrial revolution, the laws controlling women’s rights in marriage, the origins of the British Raj in India, the rise of aestheticism, and basic British geography. Our readings will include Jane Austen’s “Emma,” Charles Dickens’s “Bleak House,” Emily Brontë’s “Wuthering Heights,” Wilkie Collins’s “The Moonstone,” and Oscar Wilde’s “The Picture of Dorian Gray.” The course will require two short papers, a midterm and final written by hand in person, weekly written assignments, and active class participation. Prerequisite: Completion of the Composition I requirement.