Student and tutor module reviews

This is a challenging, but enjoyable module. It gives the student the opportunity to read and study a large range of different texts. My area of interest is 19th-century literature, therefore, 'Realities' was my favourite block. 'Movements' and 'Futures' were testing at times but I found that I gained so much from tackling experimental modernist and post-modernist texts. There is a choice of tutor-marked assignments/end-of-module assessment questions for A335 so it is not absolutely necessary to read all the texts. The collaborative element of the module was good and was very useful for me when I was writing the end-of-module assessment.

Jan Thompson

Course starting: October 2021

Review posted: August 2022

This module is a natural progression from Reading and studying literature (A230). The workload is not as intense, with tutor-marked assignments (TMAs)well spaced out. Despite the huge reading list, it was fairly easy to keep up with assignments and activities.
One major plus is that the texts are very interesting - everyone on the module loved at least one of the books or poems, with some discovering new favourites.
Although not everyone enjoyed the personal research, I found it really stimulating. Trawling through Victorian newspapers on OU library looking for novel reviews was time consuming but different and very interesting. Using Library Resources is a good skill to develop.
I was very pleased with the choices available for the TMAs, and it was easy to bypass texts that didn't appeal. I completely skipped Tennyson!
The Wiki collaboration was happily much more straightforward than the one on Voices, texts and material culture (A105), and not weighted too highly in overall marking. Everyone was relieved at how simple it was.
I feel the module will improve now the exam has been replaced with an end-of-module assessment. It was impossible to offer in-depth analysis in an exam situation.
On the minus side, there were too few face-to-face tutorials in too few locations. The small number of tutors meant TMAs were often returned late. Hopefully this will already be resolved. A few people also complained that the time given for reading was too tight, and I was certainly glad that I had read some of the book list before my start date.
I would recommend this module to anyone who enjoys, or can attempt, literary analysis. I found myself completely won over by writers I had never considered before.
And if you do decide on it, get a head start on the reading! Bleak House alone takes a serious amount of time.

Frances Copeland

Course starting: October 2017

Review posted: January 2019