I'm a university lecturer of Drama and English Literature. On this page you'll find loads of powerpoint presentations filled with useful resources for teachers and students interested in English Literature, Drama, Art History, and Academic English / Research. Useful for all levels.
I'm a university lecturer of Drama and English Literature. On this page you'll find loads of powerpoint presentations filled with useful resources for teachers and students interested in English Literature, Drama, Art History, and Academic English / Research. Useful for all levels.
This resource is designed to help students write a close analysis essay on Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, focusing on Victor Frankenstein. The extract and question have been taken from a recent A Level English Literature past paper. The resource goes through the extract line-by-line to explore the themes of **suffering, ambition, responsibility, isolation, Gothic literature, and the Romantic Sublime **in the novel, Frankenstein. The text has been annotated with helpful advice, literary criticism, context, and quotes. It also includes a full sample answer. This resource will be useful for students who need to practice close textual analysis, and/or are working on Frankenstein: The Modern Prometheus.
This bundle contains 4 resources on academic writing & English skills, focusing on:
Essay writing for cause & effect
Researching tips and source integration for academic essays
Annotated biblographies & referencing
Writing & structuring an essay - a step-by-step guide
**The bundle covers the basics of essay writing, researching, and referencing. It is a perfect tool for teachers who want to teach academic / essay writing and critical thinking skills. **
This presentation on Shakespeare’s Hamlet explores the main themes - revenge, death, madness, power, corruption - of this play. It refers to Aristotle’s writings on tragedy to explore what makes the play a revenge tragedy. It then explores Ophelia’s madness and death in detail, referring to scholarship and close scene analysis. This powerpoint is useful for GCSE, A Level, and undergraduate university students focusing on Shakespeare’s Hamlet.
This package includes a PowerPoint presentation and detailed handout on **Jhumpa Lahiri’s The Namesake **
It is ideal for university and A Level students looking to write essays on Lahiri’s work and get a better understanding of ideas behind postcolonial studies.
The work package includes:
Carefully selected extracts from The Namesake to encourage discussion and analysis
An explanation of Homi K. Bhabha’s theories of hybridity, liminal spaces, and the Third Space
Comments made by Jhumpa Lahiri on her creative process when writing The Namesake
Questions to encourage analytical thinking
Scholarly engagements with Lahiri’s work
This presentation is on Hard Times by Charles Dickens. It is aimed at ALevel and undergraduate level university students exploring the work of Charles Dickens, the Industrial Revolution, and/or Victorian literature. The slides focus on how Dickens explores issues surrounding the Industrial Revolution in Hard Times. With particular focus on Dickens’s views on the rights of workers during Victorian Britain, this presentation draws on literary criticism to debate the two philosophies of that time: Utilitarianism (John Stuart Mill) and Political Economy (Adam Smith). The is resource also contains: key quotations, discussion points, and quotes from literary critics (including Mikhail Bakhtin). Perfect for preparing an essay on themes surrounding Dickens’s representation of the lower-class workforce in his novels, especially Hard Times.
This presentation explores John Milton’s Paradise Lost. It discusses Milton’s poetic form (blank verse), as well as issues regarding gender, free will, and religion. Sandra Gilbert’s discussion of Eve’s fall is outlined for some useful secondary criticism. There are also extracts (from Books 9 and 10 of Paradise Lost) with helpful pointers for close textual analysis and ideas that will prompt further discussion and exploration. The final slides recommend further reading, offer later poetic responses to Eve’s plight, and also encourage critical engagement with early scholarship on Milton’s epic poem. A great resource for A Level students and undergraduates.
This presentation explores Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice. With clear character discussions, analysis of themes, quotes, and contextual information, it is an ideal teaching and study resource for anyone studying The Merchant of Venice. It contains: a plot summary; contextual information about Shakespeare’s decision to set the play in Venice; a discussion of racial prejudice (especially from Antonio towards Shylock); character studies of Shylock, Jessica, and Portia; a discussion on the idea of value, and details from three notable performances of the play. The last slide contains a quiz with 10 questions focused on details from the play.
This PowerPoint presentation on **Shakespeare’s King Lear **is a great introductory lesson that includes:
A brief plot summary
Historical context (referring to James I of England)
Why Shakespeare is relevant today (drawing on Coleridge)
A close textual analysis of Lear’s reconciliation with Cordelia
King Lear’s **‘madness / enlightenment’ **
Scholarship on major concepts in King Lear: religion and psychoanalysis
Actors’ commentary on playing King Lear and Edmund
*** Essay questions **
‘Thinking Further’ activities that focus on Lear’s famous quote: ‘nothing will come of nothing’
**Fact File **
Quick Quotes
Recommended Research
References
This research is great for exam revision. It also provides useful context for writing an essay on Shakespeare’s King Lear.
This presentation explores F. Scott Fitzgerald’s famous novel, The Great Gatsby. The slides outline its publication, reputation as ‘The Great American Novel’, and themes such as corruption, the American Dream, class, nostalgia, and love. An in-depth character outline depicts all of the major characters with reference to the themes associated with their actions/role in the novel. Three slides are dedicated to close textual analysis of important moments/themes in the novel. The scholarship of Sarah Churchwell is referred to and there are also suggestions for further reading. This powerpoint is useful for A Level and undergraduate students looking at The Great Gatsby.
In this Developing a Speech module you will learn how to plan, write, and structure a speech about any given topic. You will gain excellent writing and presenting tools in order to engage your audience in your chosen subject / speech. This PowerPoint covers:
Key points in developing a speech
The Canons of Rhetoric
Strategies for finding a topic
Developing your main idea
Gathering material
Creating an outline / structure
Writing introductions
Signposting / having purpose and direction
Using supporting matierals
Writing conclusions
This is a great resource for teachers and students of any subject. It is ideal for anyone who needs to do a presentation and wants some guidelines for writing / planning their speech.
This package includes a PowerPoint and detailed handout on Bernard MacLaverty’s novel Cal.
The work pacakge includes:
Carefully selected extracts from MacLaverty’s Cal to aid discussion and analysis
Excerpts from scholarly criticism on Cal
Questions to aid interpretation of the novel
Short explanation of The Troubles in Northern Ireland
Poetry by Seamus Heaney and Douglas Carson
Ideal for A Level and university students writing essays on MacLaverty’s Cal
Handout for students discussing Ibsen’s A Doll’s House. Includes quotes from the play to discuss as well as an extract from Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own. The handout focuses on themes of gender and patriarchal society in A Doll’s House. Perfect for A Level students studying Ibsen and naturalism in theatre. Also useful for university seminars working on A Doll’s House.
This package includes a PowerPoint lecture, *full written lecture, * and detailed handout on Sandra Cisneros’s The House on Mango Street
It explores the novel’s concern with gender and race (particularly Hispanic communities in America), drawing parallels between Sandra Cisneros’s The House on Mango Street and Virginia Woolf’s A Room Of One’s Own.
The lecture document includes a university-level overview of 20th-century gender theory.
Ideal for A Level and university students working on Cisneros’s novel.
This presentation outlines the shift in drama from Realist to Symbolist to Modernist forms of theatre. It uses work by Chekhov, Maeterlink, and Beckett to illustrate the differences between representational and Avant-Garde playwrighting and scenography. The explanation of Ferdinand de Saussure’s semiotics is supported by examples form Luigi Pirandello’s Six Characters in Search of an Author. The presentation also covers the work of Ionesco and Tom Stoppard when discussing the Theatre of the Absurd (a term coined by Martin Esslin).
This handout covers the key concepts explored in The Homecoming by Harold Pinter. It outlines the premiere of The Homecoming in London’s Aldwych Theatre in 1965, exploring aspects of the set, audience reaction, as well as outlining the characters and plot.
The handout also covers:
Harold Pinter’s life, writing, themes, and contribution to theatre
The influence of Samuel Beckett on Harold Pinter
Questions that The Homecoming raises
Important extracts from scholarship on The Homecoming
A key scene between Lenny and Ruth
Discussion of the significance of staging at the end of The Homecoming
Final thinking point for further discussion
Great resource to aid in understanding of one of Harold Pinter’s most well-known plays. Suitable for university students, seminars, and in-depth A Level discussions.
This presentation is about Sarah Kane’s exploration of National Identity in her infamous play Blasted. Each slide contains quotes, images, factual information, and videos about Sarah Kane and In-Yer-Face Theatre. The powerpoint focuses on extracts from Blasted that examine human frailty, compassion, brutality, and powerlessness. It asks how Kane manages to evoke compassion through violence and uses the theory of Susan Sontag and the history of the Bosnian War (1992-1995) to unpick the relationship between the Soldier, Ian and Kate in the play. There are also many ‘thinking points’, including a video discussion of the (un)ethical nature of Kane’s drama and theorist Hanna Arendt’s ‘Reflections on Violence’.
This presentation looks at Oscar Wilde’s An Ideal Husband. It outlines the key themes of the play: suffrage, gender differences, sexuality, class conflict, Victorian society, and aestheticism. There are lots of sections for close analysis, as well as interesting biographical information relating to Wilde’s imprisonment. The presentation then explores the role of women in 19th century society, focusing on The New Woman in fin de siècle literature. The final slide contains a practice exam question with useful pointers and quotes from scholars and theatre critics such as Michael Billington.
This resource contains 1 examination (2 hours) in Academic English skills. The exam is divided into 4 sections: reading, source credibility, critical thinking, and writing. Students will be tested on the following essential skills:
Section 1: Reading and comprehension (multiple choice & true / false / not given questions)
Section 2: Identifying whether an article is peer-reviewed (comment on the main features of academic publications)
Section 3: Understanding & documenting findings from visual data (describing main findings of a graph)
Section 4: Essay writing, accurate source integration and correct referencing (final essay question with marking rubric)
The examination comes with a rubric (for the final essay question) and an answer key for Section 1. It is a perfect resource for students and teachers taking Academic English at A Level and Foundation level. It can also be used for high-level GCSE students. Students will gain exam practice, improve their reading and comprehension skills, and will develop their knowledge and critical thinking. The exam can also be used for revision classes.
**This academic English mock exam will lead to: better understanding of texts, confident use of academic research, improved fluency and accuracy in writing, ability to think critically about a range of topics. **
This resouce can be purchased in a bundle with 2 additional practice exams.
M. Butterfly , a play by David Henry Hwang is the focus of this presentation and handout. M Butterfly is explored alongside themes of gender, sexuality, Orientalism, representations of East/West.
The powerpoint and handout include:
Quotes from the playwright, David Henry Hwang
Quotes from the play, M Butterfly
Tasks, discussion questions, and thinking points
Extracts from Judith Butler’s Gender Trouble
Extracts from Edward Saïd’s Orientalism (and other texts)
Academic criticism with questions for students
Recommended reading
This is a very useful interactive powerpoint and accompanying handout for any course that covers M Butterfly and drama concerned with gender, performativity, race and ethnicity.
Suitable for A Level and undergraduate students.
Great lecture aimed at undergraduate level students taking English Literature and focusing on the work of Jhumpa Lahiri. Useful for postcolonial literature modules, esp. discussions on hybridity.