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MA English Literature

Year of entry
2025/26
Course duration
Full Time: 12 months Part Time: 24 months

Year of entry
2025/26
Course duration
Full Time: 12 months Part Time: 24 months

Our MA English Literature presents students with an exciting range of topics and periods, from the Renaissance stage to minority literatures in contemporary Britain.

Come to the University of Reading to study a master's in English Literature. We are ranked in the top 150 universities in the world for English Language and Literature in the QS World University Rankings by Subject, 2025.

The University of Reading is 6th in the UK for research outputs in English Language and Literature (Times Higher Education analysis of the latest Research Excellence Framework 2021 – English Language and Literature, when scoring by GPA Output).

We deploy our distinctive research strengths, and our world-leading literary collections, to produce a degree that embodies the best of contemporary, critical and archival work. The department’s research widely supports all the teaching on the MA, from Medieval to Contemporary Literature, including postcolonial and world literatures.

You have the freedom to choose your own pathway through this programme. You’ll have access to our unique archives including the Archive of British Publishing and Printing and the world’s leading Samuel Beckett collection, and correspondence and other archival materials relating to James Joyce.

You will receive detailed one-to-one guidance on a dissertation topic of your choice. You might draw on our rich archival holdings on British publishing houses and on famous authors such as Wilde, Joyce and Beckett, or you might choose a topic emerging from one of our optional modules, such as ethnicity in contemporary literature or literary feminism. Alternatively, you might choose to write on a topic that hasn't been covered elsewhere on the programme, using the critical skills and theoretical knowledge that you have acquired.

Overview

Our MA English Literature presents students with an exciting range of topics and periods, from the Renaissance stage to minority literatures in contemporary Britain.

Learning

Entry requirements

Entry requirements: Normally a first class undergraduate honours degree or second class undergraduate honours degree with at least a 2:1 in 50% of your final year modules – or equivalent from a university outside the UK – in an appropriate subject.

IELTS: 6.5 overall with no element less than 6.0 (or equivalent)

Pre-sessional English language Programme

Our Pre-sessional English Programme is for international students who need to meet their degree programme English language requirements.

Our courses equip you with the skills and language needed for academic success, including critical thinking, self-reflection, learner autonomy, research skills and integrating sources. The Pre-sessional English Programme is accredited by the British Association of Lecturers in English for Academic Purposes (BALEAP), which guarantees you will receive a high-quality student experience.

To find out more, visit Pre-sessional English.

Structure

Modules

Compulsory modules

Dissertation

Complete a substantial work of literary-critical argument based on sustained independent research under the guidance of a supervisor. Engage in depth with a topic of particular interest as you develop the skillset accumulated during your first two years of study.

Materiality and Textuality

Develop your expertise in research techniques, focusing on archival materials. You’ll learn the practicalities of advanced literary research and receive guidance on using and constructing bibliographies, locating and using manuscripts, editorial practices, and the nature of copyright. Additionally, you’ll familiarise yourself with the modes of literary production and consumption and learn how to trace and analyse them in relation to specific resources.

Optional modules

Women's Rights, Women's Writing

Learn about women's political activism through an interdisciplinary approach, focusing on women's writing and texts as interventions in political controversy. Discover how women played a vital role in discussing their societal role and political rights during the early modern period, and learn about women's demands for a voice, their rhetorical strategies for rights, and their resistance to restrictions on agency.

Modern and Contemporary Literature

Develop your interests as you study the period from literary modernism up to the present day. You’ll engage with a wide range of primary and secondary texts, familiarise yourself with forms and genres relevant to the period, and consider problems associated with the ideas of modernity and the contemporary.

Opening Up Medieval English Texts

Discover innovative English literature forms and content from the Middle Ages. You'll dive into the work of key authors, including Geoffrey Chaucer, explore new literary forms including romance and treatments of new narrative material, and analyse themes such as chivalry, courtly love, the supernatural, and gender. You'll also learn about a wide range of material and performance contexts, from manuscripts to oral recitations, and understand how these contexts shape medieval approaches like author, genre, and textual authority.

Contemporary Literature and Ethnicity

Explore a range of contemporary British and American fiction about the theory and practice of multiculturalism and cultural pluralism. You’ll engage in detailed discussion of the work of authors such as Hari Kunzru, Kazuo Ishiguro, Zadie Smith, Claudia Rankine, Colson Whitehead, and Jocelyn Nicole Johnson, and interrogate different theories and models of ethnicity in relation to debates around pluralism, multiculturalism, identity politics, and critical race theory.

Modern Literary Feminisms: Theories/Praxis/Text

Explore modern feminist thinking and writing, while acknowledging the complexities within the term 'feminism'. You'll learn about feminist theory and practice through various texts – including fiction, non-fiction, film, drama, blogs, and websites – to problematise implicit hierarchies in knowledge types. You'll also reflect on your own embodied knowledge and connect your reading with the gendered world.

Samuel Beckett

Undertake a comprehensive analysis of the works and intellectual contexts of Samuel Beckett, one of the most important and experimental writers of the twentieth century. You’ll look at a representative selection from his drama, prose, poetry, and criticism, as well as his works in radio, television, and film. You’ll also engage with the University’s Beckett Archive, the largest collection of manuscripts and other materials relating to the author in the world.

Publishing and the Business of Books

Explore the place of the writer within the business of modern international publishing. Through a mixture of critical reading, seminars, and practice-based workshops in Reading’s Special Collections and publishers’ archives, you'll explore a series of modern writers’ interactions with publishers, editors, agents, and translators, considering the journeys and revisions that texts undergo to reach diverse, global readerships. You'll also critically evaluate how publishing rights are sold from one country to another, and how translations are commissioned and funded. You’ll gain a robust, historical understanding of creative writing and modern international book publishing, and have opportunities to interact with publishing professionals.

Romantics and Victorians

Discover English literature of the long nineteenth century, spanning the period between the revolutions of the late 1700s and the beginning of the First World War. You'll explore the rise of Romanticism, covering writers from the time of Wordsworth, Byron, and the Shelleys, before examining literature during Victoria's reign and beyond. Writers may include the Brontës, George Eliot, Henry James, Matthew Arnold, Oscar Wilde, and Joseph Conrad. You'll learn about all the major genres, including lyric and narrative poetry, the novel, the short story, drama, and critical prose.

Early Modern Literature

Explore early modern literature and drama, analysing texts within their historical, literary, and critical contexts and considering various methods and approaches. By delving into this period's drama, poetry, and prose, you’ll access a range of critical perspectives, developing a deeper understanding while reflecting on your own approaches to reading.

Emerging Issues in Data Protection and Copyright Law

This module explores the two expert fields of law, namely data protection and copyright, through cutting-edge discussions around scholarship and case law. It analyses the legal protection afforded to privacy and personal data, with an emphasis on the processing of personal information in the UK and EU regulatory framework. It also provides advanced knowledge of the legal protection that is afforded to creative works and authors under UK copyright law. The sessions involve current debates such as AI-created works, deepfakes and automated decision-making.

The module aims to provide students with advanced and the most cutting edge knowledge of the legal, regulatory and policy issues on the protection of privacy, personal data and copyright to enable them to appreciate and critically assess both the practical day-to-day operation of these areas and their rationales.

Management in Creative and Cultural Industries

This module examines organisations that are engaged in creative or cultural activities and the industries they create from an interdisciplinary management perspective. Students will define and understand the parameters of the creative or cultural industries; identify the management challenges faced by organisations in these sectors; and examine strategies for addressing them. You will continuously engage with a range of creative and cultural industries, from adverts on public transport to broadcasted historical events, considering not only their significant impact on society, but also their contribution to the economy and links to other industries.

Modules relevant to the publishing industry

If you have a particular interest in pursuing a career in the publishing industry or related fields, you can take a suite of modules that form an ad hoc publishing pathway: ‘Materiality & Textuality’ in semester 1 and two of the following three modules in semester 2: ‘Publishing and the Business of Books’, ‘Emerging Issues in Data Protection and Copyright Law’ and ‘Management in Creative and Cultural Industries’. These last two modules are offered from within the School of Law and the Henley Business School, respectively, and are taught and assessed quite differently from the other modules on the programme. You will learn alongside students from these schools and also from students from the School of Arts and Communication Design.

These are the modules we currently offer for 2024/25 entry. They may be subject to change as we regularly review our module offerings to ensure they're informed by the latest teaching and research methods.

Please note that the University cannot guarantee that all optional modules will be available to all students who may wish to take them.

You can also register your details with us to receive information about your course of interest and study and life at the University of Reading.

Fees

New UK/Republic of Ireland students: £11,750

New international students: £25,850

Tuition fee information

The fees listed are for full-time study, unless otherwise stated. Fee information will be confirmed in offer letters sent out to successful applicants. You can find further information, including information for part-time study, through our dedicated fees and funding page.

EU student fees

With effect from 1 August 2021, new EU students will pay international tuition fees. For exceptions, please read the UK government’s guidance for EU students.

Additional costs

Some courses will require additional payments for field trips and extra resources. You will also need to budget for your accommodation and living costs. See our information on living costs for more details.

Financial support for your studies

You may be eligible for a scholarship or bursary to help pay for your study. Students from the UK may also be eligible for a student loan to help cover these costs. See our fees and funding information for more information on what's available.

Careers

Our students continue on to, or return to, careers in teaching, publishing, the media, the civil service, the charity sector and advertising, as well as going on to do PhD research. Students report that their careers are supported by the skills they have acquired on the MA English Literature in terms of not only subject expertise, but also critical thinking, reading closely and with advanced understanding, and writing well.

Read about Elle Codling's experience studying MA English Literature and how her degree prepared her for a career.