English Literature Optional Syllabus

English Literature comprises two papers, Paper I and Paper II, with each paper carrying a total of 250 marks.

Both papers are segmented into two sections. Each paper presents a total of eight questions, equally divided into four questions per section. Candidates are required to attempt five questions in total. Question 1 and Question 5 are compulsory. From the remaining six questions, candidates must choose any three to attempt, ensuring at least one question is answered from each section.

Paper 1

Section A

1. William Shakespeare : King Lear and The Tempest.

2. John Donne. The following poems :

   • Canonization;

   • Death be not proud;

   • The Good Morrow;

   • On his Mistress going to bed;

   • The Relic;

3. John Milton : Paradise Lost, I, II, IV, IX.

4. Alexander Pope. The Rape of the Lock.

5. William Wordsworth. The following poems :

   • Ode on Intimations of Immortality.

   • Tintern Abbey.

   • Three years later she grew.

   • She dwelt among untrodden ways.

   • Michael.

   • Resolution and Independence.

   • The World is too much with us.

   • Milton, thou shouldst be living at this hour.

   • Upon Westminster Bridge.

6. Alfred Tennyson : In Memoriam.

7. Henrik Ibsen : A Doll’s House.

Section B

1. Jonathan Swift. Gulliver’s Travels.

2. Jane Austen. Pride and Prejudice.

3. Henry Fielding. Tom Jones.

4. Charles Dickens. Hard Times.

5. George Eliot. The Mill on the Floss.

6. Thomas Hardy. Tess of the d’Urbervilles.

7. Mark Twain. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.

Paper 2

Section A

1. William Butler Yeats. The following poems :

   • Easter 1916.

   • The Second Coming.

   • A Prayer for my daughter.

   • Sailing to Byzantium.

   • The Tower.

   • Among School Children.

   • Leda and the Swan.

   • Meru.

   • Lapis Lazuli.

   • The Second Coming.

   • Byzantium.

2. T.S. Eliot. The following poems :

   • The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.

   • Journey of the Magi.

   • Burnt Norton.

3. W.H. Auden. The following poems :

   • Partition

   • Musee des Beaux Arts

   • In Memory of W.B. Yeats

   • Lay your sleeping head, my love

   • The Unknown Citizen

   • Consider

   • Mundus Et Infans

   • The Shield of Achilles

   • September 1, 1939

   • Petition

4. John Osborne : Look Back in Anger.

5. Samuel Beckett. Waiting for Godot.

6. Philip Larkin. The following poems :

   • Deceptions

   • Afternoons

   • Days

   • Mr. Bleaney

7. A.K. Ramanujan. The following poems :

   • Looking for a Cousin on a Swing

   • A River

   • Of Mothers, among other Things

   • Love Poem for a Wife 1

   • Small-Scale Reflections on a Great House

   • Obituary

Section B

1. Joseph Conrad. Lord Jim.

2. James Joyce. Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.

3. D.H. Lawrence. Sons and Lovers.

4. E.M. Forster. A Passage to India.

5. Virginia Woolf. Mrs. Dalloway.

6. Raja Rao. Kanthapura.

7. V.S. Naipaul. A House for Mr. Biswas.