A clear introduction to the idea of the canon, exploring the process by which certain works, and not others, receive high cultural status. The work of Shakespeare and Aphra Behn is used to illustrate and challenge this process.

Literature and Gender

by Lizbeth Goodman

Published 28 March 1996

Literature and Gender combines an introduction to and an anthology of literary texts which powerfully demonstrate the relevance of gender issues to the study of literature. The volume covers all three major literary genres - poetry, fiction and drama - and closely examines a wide range of themes, including:

  • feminity versus creativity in women's lives and writing
  • the construction of female characters
  • autobiography and fiction
  • the gendering of language
  • the interaction of race, class and gender within writing, reading and interpretation.

Literature and Gender is also a superb resource of primary texts, and includes writing by:

  • Sappho
  • Emily Dickinson
  • Sylvia Plath
  • Tennyson
  • Elizabeth Bishop
  • Louisa May Alcott
  • Virginia Woolf
  • Jamaica Kincaid
  • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
  • Susan Glaspell

Also reproduced are essential essays by, amoung others, Maya Angelou, Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar, Toni Morrison, Elaine Showalter, and Alice Walker. No other book on this subject provides an anthology, introduction and critical reader in one volume. Literature and Gender is the ideal guide for any student new to this field.


Women and Poetry

by Angus Calder and Lizbeth Goodman

Published 4 September 1997
Written and presented by Lizbeth Goodman and Angus Calder, this cassette includes a wide variety of readings of poems, followed by discussions about the way in which gender affects the reading and interpretation of poems. Among the poets covered are Emily Dickinson, Robert Browning, Sylvia Plath and Elizabeth Bishop. There are also interviews with contemporary female poets, including Gillian Clarke, Val Smith and Jackie Kay.
Produced by Mags Noble.