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Freedom and French Realism

Module description

This module will introduce you to two novels set against the backdrop of the July Revolution of 1830, an event that echoed the French Revolution’s earlier insistence on individual freedom. Both novels dramatize the conflict between the individual and society, where the freedom of the central character is limited by social origins, in the first case, and gender, in the second. Both works, by Stendhal and Sand, are early examples of what would later be known as French realism, but they take interesting liberties with the codes that would later be associated with this style of representation.

Module aims - intentions of the module

This module aims to explore the treatment of the theme of freedom in two early works of French Realism. It will introduce you to the work of two major nineteenth-century authors and will situate the selected novels in their social, cultural and historical contexts. It will explore freedom as a universal Revolutionary and post-Revolutionary ideal but also as a particularly fraught problem for women in nineteenth-century France. Seminars will enhance critical skills by encouraging you to compare and contrast the two novels from the perspective of their handling of the theme of freedom, and will hone analytical skills by engaging in guided close readings.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 1. Demonstrate a sound general understanding of the chosen texts; situate texts within their sociohistorical/literary/cultural context

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 2. With some guidance from the course tutor, evaluate and apply a range of critical approaches to the material covered
• 3. Mount a detailed argument in the appropriate register of English, mustering a range of textual or other evidence in its support
• 4. Access and use critically printed and, where appropriate, electronic learning resources identified as useful by the course tutor, and, to a limited extent, discover other useful materials independently
• 5. Analyse selected TL texts, relating them to significant elements in their cultural/historical/generic context
• 6. Following broad guidelines, locate and identify library and electronic resources on a given topic
• 7. Use recommended reference works to compile a bibliography, within given parameters (chronological, thematic, etc.) on a specified topic

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

• 8. Undertake defined learning activities with a measure of autonomy, asking for guidance where necessary
• 9. Adopt a critical approach to the selection and organisation of material in order to produce, to a deadline, a written or oral argument
• 10. Using course material provided, research, plan and write an essay on a chosen aspect of the subject, to a specified length and deadline
• 11. Demonstrate general competence in word-processing and in use of the Internet

Syllabus plan

Lectures will begin by discussing the legacy of the French Revolution, offering a brief introduction to the social and political realities of nineteenth-century France, with particular reference to the historical context informing the two set texts and to the cultural forces that shaped them. The texts themselves will also be discussed in lectures from the perspective of the course theme. The novels will be subjected to close, guided readings within the framework of the seminars.

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

Formative assessment

Summative assessment (% of credit)

Details of summative assessment

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Re-assessment notes

Deferral – if you miss an assessment for certificated reasons judged acceptable by the Mitigation Committee, you will normally be either deferred in the assessment or an extension may be granted. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of deferral will not be capped and will be treated as it would be if it were your first attempt at the assessment.

Referral – if you have failed the module overall (i.e. a final overall module mark of less than 40%) you will be required to submit a further assessment as necessary. If you are successful on referral, your overall module mark will be capped at 40%.

Indicative learning resources - Basic reading

• Sand, George, Indiana (Paris: Gallimard, Folio Classique, 1984)
• Stendhal, Le Rouge et le Noir (Paris: LGF, Livre de Poche, 1972)
• [other editions of the primary texts are available for free kindle download at www.archive.org, though these editions must not be read instead of the recommended editions]

Indicative learning resources - Web based and electronic resources

• ELE – https://vle.exeter.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=4702

Indicative learning resources - Other resources

• Barthes, Roland et al, Littérature et réalité (Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1982)
• Brombert, Victor, Stendhal: Fiction and the Themes of Freedom (New York: Random House, 1968)
• De Beauvoir, Simone, ‘Stendhal ou le romanesque du vrai’, Le Deuxième Sexe , 2 volumes (Paris: Gallimard, 1986), I, 376–89
• Finch, Alison, ‘Reality and its representation in the nineteenth-century novel’, in Timothy Unwin (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to The French Novel: From 1800 to the present (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997), pp. 36–53
• Furst, Lilian R., ed., Realism (London: Longman, 1992)
• Lough, John and Lough, Muriel, An Introduction to Nineteenth-Century France (London: Longman, 1978)
• Nelson, Brian, ‘Realism: Model or Mirage’, Romance Studies , 1 (1982), 1–17.
• Petrey, Sandy, ‘George and Georgina Sand: Realist Gender in Indiana’, in Texuality and Sexuality: Reading Theories and Practices (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1993), pp. 133–47
• Petrey, Sandy, Realism and Revolution: Stendhal, Balzac, Zola, and the Performances of History (London: Cornell University Press, 1988)
• Schor, Naomi, Introduction to George Sand, Indiana , trans. by Sylvia Raphael (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008)
• Scott, Maria, Stendhal’s Less-Loved Heroines: Fiction, Freedom, and the Female (Oxford: Legenda, 2013)
• Starobinski, Jean, ‘Stendhal pseudonyme’, in L’Oeil vivant : Corneille, Racine, La Bruyère, Rousseau, Stendhal (Paris: Gallimard, 1999), ‘Stendhal pseudonyme’, pp. 23–84

Key words search

Realism, Freedom, Stendhal, Sand, Le Rouge et le Noir, Indiana