This highly valued and popular academic course aims to broaden and deepen appreciation of literature through a wide range of genres and contexts. The texts studied are varied and exciting and include modern and classic novels, poetry, and drama. You will improve your critical abilities and develop your academic essay writing through careful and profound analysis of the ideas in literary texts. Primarily, you will be developing your ability to read: to discern the inferences and influences in literary texts, to explore the thematic implications, to consider character and narrative. You will be able to examine the ways in which literary texts use language, form and structure to create meanings and how they are influenced by historical and cultural contexts. You will be exploring the fascinating links between texts and how writers explore universal themes and concerns in very different ways. You will therefore develop the skill of analysis. You will also become a better writer and communicator on this course: you will refine your essay writing skills as well as your ability to discuss and argue with flair and sophistication.