Prof. Dr. Gabriele Rippl

Many British writers have been infatuated with classical antiquity and ancient myth. We will read plays, novels and poems from the Renaissance to the postmodern period which refer back to the Greek and Roman roots of our Western culture. While the classics constituted a set frame of reference for British literature up to the first decades of the 20th century, a drastic shift seems to have taken place over the last fifty years. Our discussions will aim a) to understand the fascination of British writers with classical literature and b) to differentiate the specific characteristics of the reception of antiquity over different periods of literary and cultural history. Texts: William Shakespeare, Titus Andronicus; a selection of Aphra Behn’s poems; poems by Percy Bysshe Shelley, John Keats, Alfred Tennyson, H.D., David Dabydeen and Derek Walcott; Walter Pater’s short story “Denys l’Auxerrois”; as well as plays by Tony Harrison (“Phaedra Britannica”), Sarah Kane (“Phaedra’s Love”) and Timberlake Wertenbaker (“The Love of the Nightingale”).

Wann: Do 14:00-18:00 Uhr, alle 14 Tage / Beginn: 26.10.2006
Wo: PLH-1-105 (Englisches Seminar, Plattenstrasse 47)