Women & Words in Early Modern England - ENG00003H

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Module summary

In A Room of One’s Own, Virginia Woolf declared: ‘any woman born with a great gift in the sixteenth century would certainly have gone crazed, shot herself, or ended her days in some lonely cottage outside the village, half witch, half wizard, feared and mocked at’. Is it true that women had no space for creativity in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries? Or that women were modest, quiet and well-behaved?

This module explores the extraordinary range of women’s voices, and women’s literature, in a period that has historically been assumed to be dominated by men. We will analyse women’s writing from love poems to scientific investigations, closet drama to politics and statecraft, ambitious prose Romances to ballads and libels. Along the way, we will think about all the other ways women were involved with books and literary culture, whether as printers and booksellers, patrons, needleworkers turning stories into stitches, readers, and agents for the circulation of ‘private’ poems. You’ll learn new skills in archival and historical research, and pose novel questions about what counts as literature, where and how women have navigated the constraints designed to keep them in their place, and what it means to make a literary work. Along the way, you will also have the opportunity to develop practical skills, including in letterpress printing.

Assessment will be via a single 3,000 word summative essay. You also have the option to submit a practice-led assessment (e.g. creative writing, embroidery, visual art) that speaks to the themes of the module and is accompanied by a shorter essay of 1,500 words.

Module will run

Occurrence	Teaching period
A	Semester 2 2025-26

Module aims

This module aims to challenge conventional understandings of this crucial period of English literature, and to introduce students to a wide range of women writers, artists and workers. It aims to expand students’ sense of the possibilities and varieties of feminist approaches to literary study and to expand our understanding of what constituted literature in this vibrant and creative period. The module aims to introduce students to new skills in historical, archival and literary research, along with hands-on work in letterpress printing and other forms.

Module learning outcomes

On successful completion of the module, you should be able to:

1. Demonstrate an advanced understanding of and engagement with a range of literary texts and related art and craft objects from early modern England;

2. Demonstrate an advanced understanding of and engagement with debates around women’s social and political roles, and the realities of early modern women’s lives and experiences;

3. Evaluate key debates within the relevant critical fields dealing with early modern women, feminist literary history, books and authorship, and the canon;

4. Produce independent arguments and ideas which demonstrate an advanced proficiency in critical thinking, research, and writing skills.

Module content

This module is feminist in its ethos and objectives, and has the explicit aim of broadening the early modern canon, and introducing students to authors and texts they are unlikely to encounter otherwise. Students will engage with the project of feminist literary history, and develop sophisticated critical responses to questions of women’s representation, cultural and creative activity, and agency. The module engages with under-represented authors, and several sessions foreground questions of race, social status, and sexuality (themes which students will be encouraged to keep present throughout). We will use Kate Morrison’s recent novel A Book of Secrets as a way to address and imagine alternative histories.

Indicative assessment

Task	% of module mark
Essay/coursework	100.0

Special assessment rules

None

Additional assessment information

Throughout the module, you will have the opportunity to pitch, road-test, and develop essay ideas. Feedback will be integrated into your seminars or the ‘third hour’ (i.e. the lecture or workshop).

You will submit your summative essay via the VLE during the revision and assessment weeks at the end of the teaching semester (weeks 13-15). Feedback on your summative essay will be uploaded to e:Vision to meet the University’s marking deadlines

Indicative reassessment

Task	% of module mark
Essay/coursework	100.0

Module feedback

You will receive feedback on all assessed work within the University deadline, and will often receive it more quickly. The purpose of feedback is to inform your future work; it is designed to help you to improve your work, and the Department also offers you help in learning from your feedback. If you do not understand your feedback or want to talk about your ideas further you can discuss it with your tutor or your supervisor, during their Consultation and Feedback Hours

For more information about the feedback you will receive for your work, see the department's Guide to Assessment

Indicative reading

Anne Askew, The Examinations of Anne Askew

Elizabeth I, Collected Works

Elizabeth Cary, The Tragedie of Mariam

Euripides, The Tragedy of Iphigenia, trans Jane, Lady Lumley

Aemilia Lanyer, Salve deus rex judaeorum

Jane Sharp, The Midwives Book

Isabella Whitney, ‘Wyll and Testament’

Lady Mary Wroth, Urania

A selection of poems by women writers including Anne Bradstreet, Margaret Cavendish, Hester Pulter and Mary Sidney (students will create a short anthology of texts via a research exercise);

A selection of books printed, published, and/or sold by women stationers (students will identify these texts via a research exercise);

A selection of needlework samplers and other items.