Outlines of English Literature - Final Examination



I think this applies to Literature students too...

(I sent this out by email but one or two people may not have received it, so I'm posting it on here as well.)

Here is some information about the final examination that I hope will be useful.

The exam will cover the whole spectrum of the course, from Old English literature to the Romantics.

İn the exam you will be given a number of short texts. These may be extracts or complete poems. Most will come from texts we have studied together in class. A few may come from texts we have not studied in any detail, but with which you may be familiar.

In the first part of the exam you will be asked to indicate the period in which you think each text was written and the name of the author. If you get the name of the author wrong but give an author from the correct period, you will get half the marks.

In the second part of the exam you will be asked to write short commentaries on some of the texts, explaining your reasons for believing they belong to that period, and discussing in what ways they are typical of the literature of that time. You might do this by pointing out particular features of form, theme or style, and/or making comparisons with other work of the same period.

You will not be allowed to take any books or notes into the exam with you. This includes the course anthology, the Norton anthology, and any dictionaries.

If you have any questions, please email me.

Good luck!