A day in the life of the everyday: the twentieth century circadian novel: Mrs. Dalloway, One Fine Day, The Hours

What is the course about?

This in-college course examines how three novels use the architecture of the circadian form to evoke interior thought and feeling, as well as depicting a particular place and time. It examines the narrative technique employed by all three novelists, thereby tracing the development of the novel form in the course of the twentieth century.

In studying Woolf’s Mrs Dalloway, alongside Michael Cunningham’s imaginative reworking of the novel, we will consider the literary status of adaptations and how far we should expect them to be ‘faithful’ to the original. Placing One Fine Day next to Mrs Dalloway brings a different comparative perspective to the course: how have two female authors depicted a society radically changed by a world war?

What will we cover?

Beginning with Mrs Dalloway, the course looks at how Woolf evokes London life in the first few years after the First World War, paying particular attention to the author’s modernist style and preoccupations. Moving next to One Fine Day, it considers how Panter-Downes depicts rural Sussex just after the Second World War – a time of ongoing rationing and austerity. Finally, the course returns to Mrs Dalloway via Michael Cunningham’s The Hours, an imaginative rewriting of Woolf’s novel, which extends the circadian structure to take in three single days in three different lives: Virginia Woolf in 1923, a housewife in Los Angeles in the late 1940s, and a female writer in 1990s New York.

In studying these three novels we will cover some important concepts of literary fiction, including intertextuality, parallel story structures, and stream-of-consciousness narration.

What will I achieve?
By the end of this course you should be able to...

• Appreciate the challenges and rewards of the circadian novel form
• Understand how three novelists have used the form to depict individual and collective experiences at a particular time in the twentieth century
• Identify a range of narrative devices used to represent human consciousness
• Discuss twentieth-century fiction, including fictional adaptation, with confidence.

What level is the course and do I need any particular skills?

Some experience of the study of literary fiction would be useful.

Learners will need to have an enthusiasm for the novel, an openness to different approaches to reading fiction, and a willingness to listen to the views of others.

How will I be taught, and will there be any work outside the class?

There will be a mixture of tutor presentation and small-group and whole-class discussion. We will study key passages from each novel in class and you will need to read the novels in their entirety outside of class time.

Are there any other costs? Is there anything I need to bring?

You will need to buy or borrow copies of the three novels to be studied.
Any editions will do, though the following edition is recommended for Mrs Dalloway (Penguin Classics, 2019)
Mrs Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
One Fine Day by Mollie Pater- Downes
The Hours by Michael Cunningham

All other materials will be supplied by the tutor.

When I've finished, what course can I do next?

You might be interested in HLT289 Historical Novels: re-imagining and rewriting. Look for this and other fiction courses at www.citylit.ac.uk under history, culture & writing/literature/fiction.