The Victorian Age: - Liceo scientifico statale Gobetti-Segrè - Torino

PROGRAMMA DI INGLESE
a. s. 2012 -2013
Liceo Scientifico Piero Gobetti
Classe V C sperimentazione Scienze
4 ore settimanali
Programmazione didattica di INGLESE
Testo di Letteratura: Only Connect… New Directions, Terza Edizione, From the Early Romantic
Age to the Present Age, vol 2 (Zanichelli)
Appunti e fotocopie distribuiti dall’insegnante
Testi integrali di romanzi (vedi reading list)
Film tratti dai romanzi o di interesse per gli argomenti trattati
Per la Terza Prova il Dipartimento di Lingue (Inglese e Francese) del Liceo Gobetti predilige la tipologia B con due
domande a risposta aperta. Tale scelta tiene conto della difficoltà che comporta l’espressione in lingua straniera di
contenuti complessi. Nella griglia di valutazione proposta dal dipartimento si tiene infatti conto della correttezza
lessicale e grammaticale, oltre che del contenuto e dell’organizzazione della risposta.
A febbraio durante le ore curricolari la professoressa Jeaneen McAmis, esperta di cultura americana ha tenuto un
modulo a progetto della durata di 5 ore, concernente il Civil Rights Movement americano.
Reading List
Most of the students read the following works in English. However students with difficulties may have read some of
them in Italian.
E.A.Poe, from Tales of Mystery and Imagination, Ligeia, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Black Cat, The Tell Tale
Heart, William Wilson, The Man of the Crowd, The Murders in the Rue Morgue, The Purloined Letter
Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist
Thomas Hardy, Tess of the D’Urbervilles
O. Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest
J. Conrad, Heart of Darkness (in Italian)
H. James, The Turn of the Screw
Virginia Woolf, Mrs Dalloway
F.S. Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
G. Orwell, Animal Farm
Angela Carter, The Bloody Chamber (alcuni racconti)
Michael Cunningham, The Hours (read in the 4th year)
Programma di Letteratura
The short story: E. A. Poe: life and works. Poe’s theory on the composition of a short story (from The
Philosophy of Composition). Reading of some short stories from Tales of Mystery and Imagination and of some
detective stories (see reading list): oral and written presentation.
The Victorian Age:
The early Victorian Age (E4-E6), The later years of Queen Victoria’s Reign (E7-E9), The American Civil War and the
Settlement in the West (E12- E13), The Victorian Compromise (E14-E16), The Victorian Frame of Mind (E17—E19):
Utilitarianism, J.S. Mill, Darwin’s Theory on Evolution, social Darwinism, hints to Marx, Ruskin, Arnold.

The Victorian Novel (E20-21) Types of Novel (E22-23), Aestheticism and Decadence (E3132).
Charles Dickens: life and works, characterization, didactic aim of his novels. style (flat vs round characters,
omniscient narrator, linear time, stereotyped plot, happy ending), E37-E40.
Oliver Twist, reading and written text analysis of the novel, vision of the film Oliver directed by Roman Polansky
(2005).
Thomas Hardy: life and works, Hardy’s deterministic view, the Wessex, main themes of his novels, style,
omniscient intrusive narrator (E74-E81).
Tess of the D’Urbevilles, reading and written text analysis of the novel.
Revision of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter (text read in the third year). Sentimental novel, historical novel,
the American Renaissance (E131-132).
Oscar Wilde and the Aesthetic Movement: life and works, the rebel and the dandy, Art for Art’s Sake (E110-
E111).
The Picture of Dorian Gray: detailed comment of “The Preface” to The Picture of Dorian Gray (E114) and the
principles of the Aesthetic Movement. Plot, narrative technique, allegorical meaning (E112).
Wilde’s Theatre: Brilliant comedies, full reading of The Importance of Being Earnest, comment on the anthology
excerpts E124-125. Focus on the use of paradox and nonsense, criticism to moralism and classism in Victorian society.
Vision of the film The Importance of Being Earnest in L2 (starring Rupert Everett, Colin Firth, Judy Dench).
Analysis of two novelists leading to Modernism: Conrad e James.
Chronological time vs time as perception: hints to Freud, Bergson (time as ―durée‖) and to William James (stream of
consciousness), psychological insight in the characters, flashback and the technique of the point of view.
Henry James: life and works and the psychological novel, the international theme, the internal focalization.
Hints to Portrait of a Lady in relation to the international theme.
Vision of the film in L2, Portrait of a Lady directed by Jane Campion.
Reading of the psychological novel The Turn of the Screw, the frame structure, the internal focalization, paranoia and
allucination or ghost story
Joseph Conrad, life and works, Conrad’s oblique style, the individual consciousness, the technique of the point
of view and of flashback (F83-F86).
Heart of Darkness: full reading, written text analysis, different levels of interpretation, Conrad’s vision of colonialism.
Vision of the film in L2 Apocalypse Now, directed by F. F. Coppola.
The Modern Age:
Historical Context: World War I, the Edwardian Age (F4-F5), Britain and World War I (F6-F7)
The Twenties and the Thirties (F8), The Second World War (F9).
Vision of the film Land and Freedom directed by ken Loach on the Spanish Civil War.
The United States between Two Wars (F10-F11), The Great Depression of the 1930s in the USA (F12).
Vision of the film Modern Times directed and interpreted by Charlie Chaplin.
The Age of Anxiety (F14-16).
Modernism (F17-18).
New trends in British poetry at the beginning of the XX century: Imagist Movement, Imagism. Symbolism and Free
Verse (F19-20)
Examples of Imagist poetry (Ezra Pound, In a Station of the Metro William Carlos Williams, This is just to say),
(F21)
War Poets: W. Owen, Dulce et Decorum Est (F46)
Modernist Poetry

Thomas Stearns Eliot: life and works. The mythical method and the objective correlative in The Waste Land
(F52-F55)
From The Waste Land, extract from ―The Burial of the Dead‖ (F57), ―A Game of Chess‖ (photocopy), ―The Fire
Sermon‖ (F59-60) – translation, analysis and comment.
Modernism and the novel:
The Stream of Consciousness Technique (F22-23), The interior monologue (F24-26)
Virginia Woolf: life, works, the Bloomsbury Group, Woolf vs Joyce, her narrative technique (F157-158)
Full reading and analysis of Mrs Dalloway (free indirect speech, the technique of the point of view, moments of being),
comment on the book: F159-160
Vision of the film in L2 Mrs Dalloway (starring Vanessa Redgrave) - if we have time
Vision of the film in L2 The Hours from the novel by M. Cunningham (read in the 4 rd year)
James Joyce: life and works. Epiphany and interior monologue (F138-139)
Dubliners, the use of epiphany, paralysis, narrative technique (F141-142). Reading of Eveline (F143-146),
and from Ulysses, an example of interior monologue (E155) ―I said yes I will sermon‖
The Lost Generation of American Writers
The Jazz Age, the end of the American Dream. A new generation of American Writers (F28-29)
Francis Scott Fitzgerald, life and works (F212)
The Great Gatsby, full reading, analysis of the narrative technique, characters, point of view, New York vs the Midwest
and comment (F 213-14)
Vision of the film in L2 The Great Gatsby, screenplay by F.F. Coppola
Utopian and Dystopian Novel: general characteristics and evolution of the genre through the centuries
(hints to Aldous Huxley, Ray Bradbury Fahrenheit 451 read in the 3 rd year)
George Orwell, life and works (F189-190)
Full reading of Animal Farm, analysis of the characters, historical background (F191)
Vision of the film Metropolis, directed by Fritz Lang, and Bladerunner, directed by Ridley Scott
The Present Age (1945- 2001)
WWII and the Post War Period (historical presentation: the welfare state, paths to freedom, the Thacher years, from
Blair to present day) (G2-10)
The USA after WWII (G11-13) The American Civil Rights Movement (modules of 5 hours with an American
Expert), Martin Luther King and Malcolm X (vision of the homonymous film directed by Spike Lee)
The Cultural Revolution (G14-16)
General Overview of the literary prose production in the 2 nd half of the XX century (The contemporary novel, G23)
The Theatre of the Absurd
Samuel Beckett: life and works (G100)
Waiting for Godot (G101-102), plot, absence of traditional structure, symmetry, the meaninglessness of time, the comic
and the tragic

Prose production in a gender perspective: Angela Carter, from The Bloody Chamber ―Werewolf‖, ―Wolf Alice‖,
―The Company of Wolves‖
Revision of the novel read in the 4 th year The Hours by Michael Cunningham
La professoressa I rappresentanti di Classe