‘Stranger’ Things: Muriel Spark’s Shapeshifting
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- Start Date: 05 Nov 2025End Date: 26 Nov 2025Wed (Evening): 18:30 - 20:30OnlineFull fee £129.00 Senior fee £129.00 Concession £84.00
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What is the course about?
This online literature course will introduce us to Spark’s fictional worlds by introducing two of her novels by way of example, so allowing a close analysis of her use of fictional characters, narrative perspective, relationships, employment, mortality, symbolism, and setting. A Scot, self-professedly influenced by Scottish gothic tales and ballads, Spark’s uncanny fiction is often set outside of her homeland, allowing an element of stranger intrusion to be felt within the conventions of a realist London backdrop. As well as being an outsider in London, as a woman writer in patriarchal society, Spark writes against the grain of dominant social conventions of gender and class inequality. Rather than incidental to her work, her Scottishness plays a fundamental role in her use of otherness and marginalisation as a means of challenging the status quo.
According to critic Gerard Carruthers, Spark’s fiction ‘asks us to consider the possibility that there is another world beyond the materialistic’, ultimately interrogating naturalised social norms and structures, to disruptively pose difficult questions and suggest uncomfortable truths about the fabric of our reality.
What will we cover?
During this course, two of Spark’s works will be considered, Memento Mori and The Ballad of Peckham Rye. Our online classes will discuss her novels by paying close attention to important issues and themes like characters, setting, narrative voice, endings, authority and power, symbolism, creativity, humour, national identity, social norms and conventions, realism and non-realist elements.
What will I achieve?
By the end of this course you should be able to...
-Have a knowledge of a range of Spark’s fictional works
-Critically analyse these novels, developing a more confident and informed approach to reading.
-Understand the importance of secondary reading material in supporting your critical engagement.
-Have an understanding of social and historical context.
-Have a knowledge of some major themes and issues raised in the novels.
What level is the course and do I need any particular skills?
It is anticipated that you will have an interest in or even enthusiastic passion for literature, and a willingness to develop your critical enjoyment of Spark’s work, but no previous skills or knowledge are required for this course. Some preparatory reading will be necessary before each class, and a willingness to participate in class discussions, while also respectably listening and responding to others is desirable.
How will I be taught, and will there be any work outside the class?
Online classes will be held in 2 hr sessions over a four-week period. Each session will be divided into an interactive short lecture with power point, as well as large and small group workshop and discussion focussing on the stories in more detail. Class preparation in advance is required by reading the set short stories and any supplementary reading provided for that session.
Are there any other costs? Is there anything I need to bring?
Please purchase or borrow the following books. Any copies are fine, but here are suggested editions:
Memento Mori by Muriel Spark (Virago Modern Classics, 2010 or 2013)
The Ballad of Peckham Rye by Muriel Spark (Penguin Modern Classics, 2006)
Often books can be bought second-hand on, for instance, Amazon.co.uk, Abebooks.co.uk, Ebay.co.uk, Wob.com.
Any other material will be provided by the tutor.
When I've finished, what course can I do next?
The tutor will also be teaching HLT271 Angela Carter: ‘A Different Kind of Human Being’ starting on 6 October 2025. Look for other fiction courses in the Literature programme at www.citylit.ac.uk/history, culture and writing/literature/fiction.
Fiona McCulloch is a Literature academic, specialising in Children’s Literature, Young Adult Fiction, Scottish Literature, Contemporary British Fiction, Women’s Writing, Victorian Literature, Twentieth-Century Literature, Cosmopolitanism, Posthumanism, and Ecocriticism. She was Lynn Wood Neag Distinguished Visiting Professor of British Literature at the University of Connecticut in 2015. As well as publishing several peer-reviewed journal articles, her books include Contemporary British Children’s Fiction and Cosmopolitanism (2017), Cosmopolitanism in Contemporary British Fiction: Imagined Identities (2012), Children’s Literature in Context (2011), and The Fictional Role of Childhood in Victorian and Early Twentieth-Century Children’s Literature (2004). She also writes poetry and is published in Northwords, Mechanics Institute Review Online, Lumpen, and Dreich (forthcoming).
Please note: We reserve the right to change our tutors from those advertised. This happens rarely, but if it does, we are unable to refund fees due to this. Our tutors may have different teaching styles; however we guarantee a consistent quality of teaching in all our courses.