Seminars

July 16–Aug. 4, 2012

During the three-week session, your seminar meets every weekday morning, with the afternoons kept free for independent study. Choose one seminar from the following list:

Britain in the Age of Total War, 1914–1963 (full)

Examine how the UK changed during this period of two world wars, the Attlee administration, the age of Churchill, the beginnings of decolonization and the Profumo scandal.

Capability Brown and All That: Politics, Painting and Planting in the English Landscape Garden (full)

Trace the origins, evolution and aftermath of the English landscape garden, from the gardens of Charles Bridgeman and William Kent to Lancelot Brown, Humphry Repton and others.

The Elizabethan World (full)

Study aspects of life in Elizabethan England at all social levels through a range of contemporary source materials, from plays and poetry to letters and other documents.

English Cathedrals and Monasteries in the Middle Ages

Use documentary, archaeological and architectural evidence to examine the role of the monastery and the cathedral in medieval society and the differences among the monastic orders.

Excellent Tragedie: Shakespeare’s Tragic Worlds (full)

Study the full range of Shakespeare’s tragic writing, from the early ardor of Romeo and Juliet and the transcendent conclusion of Antony and Cleopatra to the great plays of his artistic maturity: Hamlet, Othello and King Lear.

Haunted Cities, Twisted Minds: The Victorian Gothic (full)

Considering the Gothic genre as a whole, chart the shifts that occurred across the mid-to-late-Victorian period, exploring the texts as cultural documents inextricably connected to the historical conditions of the 19th century and as radical developments in literary style.

House of All Rarities: English Country House Collections 1660–1900 (full)

Examine these collections to gain a rich, fascinating insight into the cultural tastes of different periods and the manner in which elites wished to present and to distinguish themselves.

The Rise and Fall of the English Medieval Castle (full)

Study the characteristic features in these aristocratic houses, the reasons they were built in different forms at different times and the nature of a society that saw war and disorder as normal.

Science Fiction, Science Fact: Alternative Views of the Future

Immerse yourself in the works of writers who created other worlds or satirized trends in human affairs by creating fictitious societies based on the science of their times.

Story to Script to Screen: An Introduction to Screenwriting

Do you want to learn how to show, rather than just tell, a story? Acquire a simple set of tools to help you analyze how screenplays work and know what ingredients good stories need.

Words and War: British Literature of the Second World War

Prepare to read Elizabeth Bowen's The Heat of the Day, George Orwell's Coming Up for Air, Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited, T.S. Eliot's Four Quartets and Rebecca West's Black Lamb and Grey Falcon.