Close Reading

“Close reading is a technique pioneered by the so-called ‘New Critics’ of the mid-twentieth century. It consists in reading a text carefully, paying attention to all textual and structural elements including imagery, voice, narrative technique, vocabulary, themes, and ellipses. Though there is no one method that can be used to approach all texts, there are some skills students will learn in the course of this module that will help them understand and analyse most literary texts they will come across. The readings will include short stories by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Kate Chopin, Saki, James Joyce, Joseph Conrad, William Faulkner, and Virginia Woolf.”