Class Description
Our Mutual Friend (1864-65) is Charles Dickens’s last completed novel, filled with high and low comedy, vicious satire, intersecting plot lines, and remarkable prose. This class considers the book in serial weekly installments (no spoilers) for an engaging, accessible, and in-depth look at Dickens’s literary craft, social criticism, and psychological insights. Juxtaposing scenes of high society and unforgiving poverty, Our Mutual Friend concerns the interwoven lives of those who have profited by material accumulation and those who create the conditions for wealth. Panoramic in its scope and multiply-voiced in its narrative, the novel follows mysteries of inheritance, the hypocrisies of social climbing, the power of art to connect people, the restoration of integrity, and love stories of innocence, experience, and revenge.
Steven J. Venturino, PhD, the author of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism, has taught classes at the Newberry Library since 2015 and is a former Adjunct Professor of English at Loyola University Chicago.
All virtual classes are recorded and made available to participants registered in the class. These recordings are password-protected and available for up to two weeks after the class ends.
What to Expect
Format: Virtual
Class Capacity: 30
Class Style: Mix of lecture and discussion; participation encouraged
Materials List
Required
- Charles Dickens, Our Mutual Friend. Penguin, 1998. ISBN: 9780140434972
- Other Instructor-Distributed Materials
First Reading
- For the first session, please read only chapters 1-4 of Our Mutual Friend. Please do not read the book’s introduction.
A Brief Syllabus
- Chapters 1.1-1.4. Theme: Reading and Serialization
- Chapters 1.5-1.7. Theme: Psychology (and Literary Form)
- Chapters 1.8-1.17. Theme: Money, Profit, and Poverty
- Chapters 2.1-2.10. Theme: Detective Fiction
- Chapters 2.11-3.4. Theme: London Theatricals
- Chapters 3.5-3.14. Theme: Dickens’s Life
- Chapters 3.15-4.7. Theme: Femininity and Masculinity
- Chapters 4.8-4.17. Theme: Critical Legacies
Cost and Registration
8 Sessions, $300 ($270 for Newberry members, seniors, and students). Learn about becoming a member.
We offer our classes at three different price options: Regular ($300), Community Supported ($280), and Sponsor ($320). Following the models of other institutions, we want to ensure that our classes are accessible to a wider audience while continuing to support our instructors. You may choose the price that best fits your situation when registering through Learning Stream.
To register multiple people for this class, please go through the course calendar in Learning Stream, our registration platform. When you select the course and register, you’ll be prompted to add another registrant.
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