CO4022 Illness and Literature

Academic year

2025 to 2026 Semester 2

Further information on which modules are specific to your programme.

Key module information

SCOTCAT credits

15

The Scottish Credit Accumulation and Transfer (SCOTCAT) system allows credits gained in Scotland to be transferred between institutions. The number of credits associated with a module gives an indication of the amount of learning effort required by the learner. European Credit Transfer System (ECTS) credits are half the value of SCOTCAT credits.

SCQF level

SCQF level 10

The Scottish Credit and Qualifications Framework (SCQF) provides an indication of the complexity of award qualifications and associated learning and operates on an ascending numeric scale from Levels 1-12 with SCQF Level 10 equating to a Scottish undergraduate Honours degree.

Availability restrictions

Not automatically available to General Degree students

Planned timetable

To be arranged.

This information is given as indicative. Timetable may change at short notice depending on room availability.

Module coordinator

Dr K E Jones

Dr K E Jones
This information is given as indicative. Staff involved in a module may change at short notice depending on availability and circumstances.

Module Staff

Team taught

This information is given as indicative. Staff involved in a module may change at short notice depending on availability and circumstances.

Module description

This module will explore the wide range of functions and representations of illness and disease in a variety of European (French, English, German, Italian and Russian) literary and theoretical texts from the 14th to the 20th century, and how its metaphorical employment can reflect changing beliefs related to individual identity, socio-cultural codes, narrative construction and the possibilities and limitations of language itself. Starting with a brief theoretical overview of modern canonical writings on illness by Virginia Woolf, Susan Sontag and Elaine Scarry which will provide an introduction to common tropes of mythologizing and metaphorizing illness, as well as the linguistic challenges to its representation, we will move on to focused thematic explorations of disease, employing close comparative readings of texts to reflect upon and discuss three broad topics: early plague narratives; the aesthetics of Romantic illness and the idea of illness as enlightenment; and the modern and postmodern employment of disease to subvert canonical representations of time and language in literature.

Relationship to other modules

Pre-requisites

PERMISSION OF THE COMPARATIVE LITERATURE HONOURS ADVISER.

Assessment pattern

Coursework = 100%

Re-assessment

Written Coursework = 100%

Learning and teaching methods and delivery

Weekly contact

1 seminar and an optional surgery hour.

Scheduled learning hours

16

The number of compulsory student:staff contact hours over the period of the module.

Guided independent study hours

134

The number of hours that students are expected to invest in independent study over the period of the module.