| CODE | ENG2090 | |||||||||
| TITLE | The Bestseller and Genre Fiction | |||||||||
| UM LEVEL | 02 - Years 2, 3 in Modular Undergraduate Course | |||||||||
| MQF LEVEL | 5 | |||||||||
| ECTS CREDITS | 2 | |||||||||
| DEPARTMENT | English | |||||||||
| DESCRIPTION | The study-unit seeks to introduce students to the complex relation between popular and critical success in literature and to the importance to that relation of the book trade, commercial considerations, and the nature of popular taste in books and reading. This study-unit examines the processes through which books enter the market place, and seeks to examine the extent to which the workings of the market place may determine the types of books which are produced and which find themselves on booksellers’ shelves. We shall question what it is that makes a bestseller. Is it a matter of marketing? Can any book be made successful? What roles do genre recognition and genre repetition play? What about the personae of authors, and how are they used as endorsements? How do book marketing and book packaging address the consumer? To what extent do prizes, such as the Man Booker Prize, influence sale of books, both positively and negatively? Is there a connection between a book being a bestseller and featuring within the literary canon? Or they exclusive to each other? Can a bestseller be considered literature? What is literature? What about the bestsellers of the past, and what can they teach us about popular works today? Reading List: Escarpit, Robert, Sociology of Literature, (Frank Cass, 1971) Manguel¸ Alberto, A History of Reading (London: Penguin, 1997) Milner, Andrew, Literature, Culture and Society (London: Routledge, 1996) Siskin, Clifford, The Work of Writing: Literature and Social Change in Britain 1700-1830, (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998) The study-unit will also make use of primary texts: that is, books currently considered bestsellers at the time the study-unit is being given, and these books will necessarily change. |
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| RULES/CONDITIONS | Before TAKING THIS UNIT YOU MUST TAKE ENG2089 | |||||||||
| STUDY-UNIT TYPE | Lecture | |||||||||
| METHOD OF ASSESSMENT |
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| LECTURER/S | Clare Vassallo |
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The University makes every effort to ensure that the published Courses Plans, Programmes of Study and Study-Unit information are complete and up-to-date at the time of publication. The University reserves the right to make changes in case errors are detected after publication.
The availability of optional units may be subject to timetabling constraints. Units not attracting a sufficient number of registrations may be withdrawn without notice. It should be noted that all the information in the description above applies to study-units available during the academic year 2023/4. It may be subject to change in subsequent years. |
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