An exploration of how literature and film reflect the artistic and cultural concerns that shaped the twentieth century.

Building on ENGA10H3, this course considers how literature and film responds to the artistic, cultural, and technological changes of the late twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

This course introduces students to a diverse selection of writing by Indigenous authors (primarily Canadian) from Turtle Island, including novels, poetry, drama, essays, oratory, and autobiography. Discussion of literature is grounded in Indigenous literary criticism, which addresses such issues as appropriation of voice, language, land, spirituality, orality, colonialism, gender, hybridity, authenticity, resistance, sovereignty, and anti-racism.

Indigenous Literatures of Turtle Island course

This course will provide science students with practical strategies, detailed instructions, and cumulative assignments to help them hone their ability to write clear, coherent, well-reasoned prose for academic and professional purposes. Topics will include scientific journal article formats and standards, peer-review, and rhetorical analysis (of both scientific and lay-science documents).

An introduction to the understanding of poetry in English. By close reading of a wide range of poems from a variety of traditions, students will learn how poets use the resources of patterned language to communicate with readers in uniquely rich and powerful ways.

A study of Canadian literature from pre-contact to 1900. This course explores the literatures of the "contact zone", from Indigenous oral and orature, to European journals of exploration and discovery, to the works of pioneer settlers, to the writing of the post-Confederation period.
Pre-1900 course

A continuation of ENGB06H3 introducing students to texts written from 1900 to the present. Focusing on the development of Canada as an imagined national community, this course explores the challenges of imagining an ethical national community in the context of Canada's ongoing colonial legacy: its multiculturalism; Indigenous and Quebec nationalisms; and recent diasporic and transnational reimaginings of the nation and national belonging.

An examination of Early American literature in historical context from colonization to the Civil War. This introductory survey places a wide variety of genres including conquest and captivity narratives, theological tracts, sermons, and diaries, as well as classic novels and poems in relation to the multiple subcultures of the period.
Pre-1900 course

An introductory survey of major novels, short fiction, poetry, and drama produced in the aftermath of the American Civil War. Exploring texts ranging from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn to Rita Dove's Thomas and Beulah, this course will consider themes of immigration, ethnicity, modernization, individualism, class, and community.

Life-writing, whether formal biography, chatty memoir, postmodern biotext, or published personal journal, is popular with writers and readers alike. This course introduces students to life-writing as a literary genre and explores major issues such as life-writing and fiction, life-writing and history, the contract between writer and reader, and gender and life-writing.

A study of major plays and playwrights of the twentieth century. This international survey might include turn-of-the-century works by Wilde or Shaw; mid-century drama by Beckett, O'Neill, Albee, or Miller; and later twentieth-century plays by Harold Pinter, Tom Stoppard, Caryl Churchill, Peter Shaffer, August Wilson, Tomson Highway, David Hwang, or Athol Fugard.

A study of fiction, drama, and poetry from the West Indies. The course will examine the relation of standard English to the spoken language; the problem of narrating a history of slavery and colonialism; the issues of race, gender, and nation; and the task of making West Indian literary forms.

A study of literature in English from South Asia, with emphasis on fiction from India. The course will examine the relation of English-language writing to indigenous South Asian traditions, the problem of narrating a history of colonialism and Partition, and the task of transforming the traditional novel for the South Asian context.

A study of fiction, drama, and poetry from English-speaking Africa. The course will examine the relation of English-language writing to indigenous languages, to orality, and to audience, as well as the issues of creating art in a world of suffering and of de-colonizing the narrative of history.

A study of the Canadian short story. This course traces the development of the Canadian short story, examining narrative techniques, thematic concerns, and innovations that captivate writers and readers alike.

A study of Dante’s Inferno and its influence on later art and literature. Inferno describes a journey through the nine circles of hell, where figures from history, myth, and literature undergo elaborate punishments. Dante’s poem has inspired writers and artists since its composition, from Jorge Luis Borges to Gloria Naylor to Neil Gaiman. In this course, we will read Inferno together with a selection of 19th, 20th, and 21st century works based on Dante. Throughout, we will explore how Dante’s poem informs and inspires poetic creativity, social commentary, and political critique. No prior knowledge of Dante or Inferno is necessary; we will encounter the text together.

Pre-1900 course.

An introduction to the historical and cultural developments that have shaped the study of literature in English before 1700. Focusing on the medieval, early modern, and Restoration periods, this course will examine the notions of literary history and the literary “canon” and explore how contemporary critical approaches impact our readings of literature in English in specific historical and cultural settings.
Pre-1900 course

An introduction to the historical and cultural developments that have impacted the study of literature in English from 1700 to our contemporary moment. This course will familiarize students with the eighteenth century, Romanticism, the Victorian period, Modernism, and Postmodernism, and will attend to the significance of postcolonial and world literatures in shaping the notions of literary history and the literary “canon.”
Pre-1900 course

The history of Shakespeare and (on) film is long, illustrious—and prolific: there have been at least 400 film and television adaptations and appropriations of Shakespeare over the past 120 years, from all over the world. But how and why do different film versions adapt Shakespeare? What are the implications of transposing a play by Shakespeare to a different country, era, or even language? What might these films reveal, illuminate, underscore, or re-imagine about Shakespeare, and why? In this course, we will explore several different Shakespearean adaptations together with the plays they adapt or appropriate. We will think carefully about the politics of adaptation and appropriation; about the global contexts and place of Shakespeare; and about the role of race, gender, sexuality, disability, empire and colonialism in our reception of Shakespeare on, and in, film.
Pre-1900 course.

The goal of this course is to familiarize students with Greek and Latin mythology. Readings will include classical materials as well as important literary texts in English that retell classical myths.
Pre-1900 Course

A study of the romance a genre whose episodic tale of marvellous adventures and questing heroes have been both criticized and celebrated. This course looks at the range of a form stretching from Malory and Spenser through Scott and Tennyson to contemporary forms such as fantasy, science fiction, postmodern romance, and the romance novel.
Pre-1900 course

An introduction to the poetry and plays of William Shakespeare, this course situates his works in the literary, social and political contexts of early modern England. The main emphasis will be on close readings of Shakespeare's sonnets and plays, to be supplemented by classical, medieval, and renaissance prose and poetry upon which Shakespeare drew.
Pre-1900 course.

A continuation of ENGB32H3, this course introduces students to selected dramatic comedies, tragedies and romances and situates Shakespeare's works in the literary, social and political contexts of early modern England. Our readings will be supplemented by studies of Shakespeare's sources and influences, short theoretical writings, and film excerpts.
Pre-1900 course.

An introduction to the short story as a literary form. This course examines the origins and recent development of the short story, its special appeal for writers and readers, and the particular effects it is able to produce.

An introduction to children's literature. This course will locate children's literature within the history of social attitudes to children and in terms of such topics as authorial creativity, race, class, gender, and nationhood.

Pre-1900 course.

This course considers the creation, marketing, and consumption of popular film and fiction. Genres studied might include bestsellers; detective fiction; mysteries, romance, and horror; fantasy and science fiction; "chick lit"; popular song; pulp fiction and fanzines.

A study of extended narratives in the comic book form. This course combines formal analysis of narrative artwork with an interrogation of social, political, and cultural issues in this popular literary form. Works to be studied may include graphic novels, comic book series, and comic book short story or poetry collections.

This course will explore Tolkien's writing, including selections from the Lord of the Rings trilogy, together with the medieval poetry that inspired it. We will consider how the encounter with medieval literature shapes Tolkien’s attitudes toward themes including ecology, race, gender, and history.

Pre-1900 course.

What is the relationship between “literature” and video games? This class will explore how we can read this relatively new – but increasingly dominant – media against and alongside more established literary forms like prose, poetry, and film, and will give students the opportunity to practice critical close reading skills. The course will focus on thematic and formal resonances between digital texts (“games”) and traditional texts (“literature”), and will also explore questions of direct adaptation (books that become games, games that become film, etc.).

An examination of the development of a tradition of women's writing. This course explores the legacy and impact of writers such as Christine de Pizan, Julian of Norwich, Mary Wollstonecraft, Anne Bradstreet, Margaret Cavendish, Jane Austen, Mary Shelley, Emily Dickinson, and Margaret Fuller, and considers how writing by women has challenged and continues to transform the English literary canon.
Pre-1900 course