Aims

Students should be able to understand how different methods of textual analysis, taught in theoretical lectures, are applicable to the scientific study of literary novels.
Among other things, by the end of the tutorials, students should be able to
- construct a scientific discourse around long literary works (novels or plays) belonging to French heritage (from the 17th till the 20th century);
- study the effects of construction on the represented reality (particularly on the basis of literary genres);
- place these texts within a historical perspective (history of literary genres);
- analyse the ideological and aesthetic dimensions of the works studied.

This course thus prepares students for the personal choices required in the writing of a licence thesis.

Main themes

The analysis of a work (or of several works within one narrative genre) written in French will provide students with the opportunity to become familiar with a great number of methods of explanation. Examples of subjects covered: Alain Fournier's Le Grand Meaulnes; Zola's L'Assommoir; short stories from Balzac, Flaubert, and Maupassant; Diderot's Jacques le Fataliste; Marcel Proust's A la recherche du temps perdu; Beckett's works.

The tutorial takes the form of an interactive seminar and brings together a limited number of students (maximum of 20). Together, they will examine the linguistic, stylistic, and aesthetic dimensions of a certain number of plays and novels belonging to French heritage.
In a first moment, through the analysis of highly representative excerpts, students are lead to elaborate, individually or in groups, a critical discourse on a work. As concerns the novel: they will analyse the plot and the characters, the temporal and spatial representations, the focus, the place of the narrator, etc. As concerns the play, they will analyse the different types of dialogue at work - dialogues, monologues, and stage direction -, they will uncover the aesthetic constraints of time and space (the units), they will analyse redoubled communication situations - between the characters on stage, and between the playwright and the spectators.
In a second moment, discussion is stimulated by the reading of critical commentaries elaborated by specialists of the literary genres or authors. A place is kept for specific pedagogical initiatives (attendance at plays, rehearsals, literary conferences, discussions with directors) in order to stimulate a reading that allows a real appropriation of the work by students. The ultimate goal, at the end of the day, is to encourage students to broaden their reading horizons.

Content and teaching methods

The course comprises the complete and detailed reading of French literary works according to different methods.
Tutorials cover 15 or so works from the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries.

Other information (prerequisite, evaluation (assessment methods), course materials recommended readings, ...)

The course will not attain its goal if students do not acquire a sufficient knowledge of the work under study in the first weeks of the course.

Written exam. Continuous and final assessment for the tutorials. This assessment covers tutorial participation on the basis of personal interventions and an oral presentation (analysis of a novel or play not covered in class).

Reading folder for the tutorials.

15 hours, 3 groups.

Means: The tutorial activities directed by a new course holder correspond to a part-time assistant work-load.

Other credits in programs