Pour Henriette

Beloved reader,

After my former fellow student Henriette complained about me not publishing a new chapter on my blog - about which she was absolutely right, as I have not written anything here for more than a month - I should like to dedicate this post to her.

Let me give you a short update about what I have done within these past 6 weeks. I have read the following primary books:

• Homer's Iliad
• Shakespeare's The Tempest
• Shakespeare's Hamlet
• Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream
• Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew
• (Shakespeare's Julius Caesar - not on any of my reading lists but a great play nonetheless)
• Conrad's Heart of Darkness
• Eliot's The Waste Land

I started reading:

• Dickens's Hard Times (2/3 so far)
• Milton's Paradise Lost
• Beckett's Endgame (1/2)
• Plato's Republic (1st chapter)
• Jonson's Eastward Ho! (1/2)

Then I have digitalized almost all my notes. With Apple's Pages this not only is easily done but also looks pretty! I have watched several online lectures that I found through iTunes, one lecture on Shakespeare, one on Early Modern England and one on Literary Theory. 

As for secondary literature I have not really devoted myself to it too much, but for some background reading on playhouses in Shakespeare's and Jonson's times and some of the texts for approaches to text.

One thing that I enjoy quite a lot is watching film adaptions of books. There are many different film versions of the Shakespeare plays, which usually means that I can watch more than just one film. This helps me to understand the contents of the plays better and memorize them more easily. Sometimes these movies are exceptionally well done, such as the 2010 adaption of The Tempest with Helen Mirren as Prospera, Russell Brand, Alfred Molina, Chris Cooper and Ben Whishaw. And then again, sometimes the movies in regard to the books could not be worse, like Troy of 2004 with Brad Pitt, Orlando Bloom, Brendan Gleeson, Eric Bana and Diane Kruger. I did not expect much of the film before watching it, though! What made me laugh almost hysterically, however, was the way in which they introduced Aeneas into the film to ensure the survival of Troy's heritage. Thanks to the vast possibilities offered by the internet, I can watch most of the film adaptions online. One highly entertaining and recommendable series of adaptions is Shakespeare Retold by the BBC. Modern adaptions of the plays with brilliant actors, not using the original verse though. I especially loved Shirley Henderson (probably best known for her portrayal of Moaning Myrtle in the Harry Potter movies) as Kate Minola, the Shrew - just bloody brilliant!

Another internet resource that helps me immensely with my studies is Librivox, where 'volunteers record chapters of books in the public domain and publish the audio files on the internet.' As all of these recordings are done by volunteers you can get across some recordings that are not the best, by experience, however, I can say that a lot of them are done extraordinarily well. The plays are usually read by various readers (here I can definitely recommend the Shakespeare plays) some of which soon become familiar voices as many volunteers devote their time to recording many books. Some of the novels are even turned into these dramatic readings, which makes the listening experience more interesting than just hearing everything from monotonous narrator. Some of the best known books are usually provided in 2-5 different versions by different readers, for example Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice is available in 6 different versions, including one dramatic reading. Some of my favorite Librivox readers are Elizabeth Klett, Arielle Lipshaw and Bob Neufeld, as the readings by these people are usually done very well.

I tend to listen to the audio recordings while having the text in front of me. This helps me immensely to focus on what I read/listen to. If I only read a text my mind starts to wander off. If I only listen to a text my mind starts to wander off. Getting both visual and audio input I can focus. Listening to Charles Dickens's Hard Times I do not necessarily have to have the text in front of me, as the dramatic reading is easy to listen to and I can crochet while listening. :-)

One more thing that I would like to mention here is something that has kept me busy over the last weeks: Finding a teaching position abroad. I have started writing about my experiences in my blog A Whole New World. 

These days the studies-accompanying e-seminars by the UoL are starting. I will write about my experiences with these soon. 

Yours sincerely,

Kris

Well, what can I say?

Beloved reader,

so, this is me, 4 weeks after I have commenced my studies. And guess what: I am already behind schedule. I should be done with Homer and Conrad, should have started on Joyce and Woolf and should have read lots of things for Renaissance Comedy and Approaches to Texts by now. For the latter I have read the stuff for the first two weeks but every time I read things about Theory I fall asleep. I am not joking. Theory is just boring as shit. And yet I know about its importance. And I know it is interesting. It's just that reading texts about theory makes me sleepy. Not my only problem. I often lack motivation and self-discipline. I knew this was coming, I didn't think it was coming so fast, though.

And yet, none of this is much of a problem. My biggest advantage is that I have time! I am not in a hurry to rush through my studies just to earn a degree. No, I can take my time and actually concentrate on my studies and really look into things as much as I want. Time is on my side!

What I mean is, that my first decision will have to be made in January, as that is the month that I have to register for my exams at the latest. By then I will be able to judge whether or not I will sit any of them in 2012 or not. If not, then I will sit them all in 2013. Or maybe I will just take 2 exams next year and the other 2 the year after that. But I am not in a position where I have to stress myself completely so that I could sit all 4 of them in 7 months.

Then again, 7 months is a long time. Considering, however, that I really want to dig deep into the matter of literature and not only scratch on the surface, 7 months is nothing. I could probably spend 7 months only dealing with one book, for example Homer's Iliad or Milton's Paradise Lost. But I gotta deal with some 20 books and 6 plays and lots and lots and lots of secondary readings. That would be about 4 books per month or a book every week. Considering this, a week is not a lot of time to read a book and then dig into the secondary literature.

Of course you might ask now, why I had not started reading earlier, when I already knew that I would do this course and already were aware of the books that I'd have to read. Guess what, I have asked myself the same thing. And then again, it is ok the way it is. Because I had to deal with many other things within the last 12 months, among them getting through a phase of depression and solving a not so easy martial situation. And the last 12 months were awesome! I have traveled for 4 months out of these 12, visited 6 countries, thought a lot about my life and my family, successfully finished a TESOL Certificate with an above average grade, reconciled with my husband and most of all had fun! All this has benefitted my current situation, as I constantly learn about the important things in life, I learn how to be relaxed, how to deal with stressful situations, how to focus on the things I like.

Now all these things are great and my situation could hardly be any better - except the physical separation from my husband - and yet all I lack is motivation and discipline. Or am I? It's not as if I were not doing anything for my studies. No, I do stuff every day. I read and I write and I learn.  But then I get distracted for hours on end. I do not think this is too bad, though. I just do stuff at my own pace and not the pace that others try to make me go. Maybe I should try not to get distracted too much by stupid internet sites like facebook, 9gag or lolsnaps. Other distractions are even more fun and are better for the soul: Going for a walk, hanging out with friends, listening to a great piece of music.

Then again, I am always proud when I have accomplished a study-related task, such as working on a difficult chapter, digitalizing my notes, finishing a book, etc.

I would not want to do it any other way. Otherwise I'd do it differently!

Yours sincerely,

Kris

Starting the Studies

Beloved reader,

once I had received all my books I was quite ready to start.

Well, not quite. I read the instructions in the student handbook and I worked on some chapters in "The Arts Good Study Guide" (which was really helpful). Of course I could have just begun reading one book after the other but I began by making a time schedule. I looked into my calendar at how many weeks I have until my final exams, then I deducted 4 weeks for revision. Before creating a reading plan I had to make a choice of books that I would work on in Explorations 1 and 2. For the Units Approaches to Texts and Renaissance Comedy I will follow the suggested study syllabus in the handbooks. Once I decided on the books I scribbled down a first version of my study syllabus. This syllabus I revised some days later and this is what it looks like now:

Studies begin on 2011-09-19

Explorations in Literature 1

• Weeks 1-4: Author Study: Homer "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey"
• Weeks 5-6: Single Text Study: Virgil "The Aeneid"
• Weeks 7-10: Comparative Study: Chaucer "The Canterbury Tales" and (unknown) "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight"
• Weeks 11-13: Author Study: Plato "The Republic" and "Symposium"
• Weeks 14-17: Author Study: Marlowe "Dr Faustus" and "The Jew of Malta"
• Weeks 18-19: Single Text Study: Dante "The Inferno"
• Weeks 20-21: Single Text Study: More "Utopia"
• optional: Weeks 22-24: Author Study: Shakespeare "Hamlet" and "The Tempest"

Explorations in Literature 2

• Weeks 1-2: Single Text Study: Conrad "Heart of Darkness"
• Weeks 3-6: Comparative Study: Joyce "A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" and Woolf "Mrs. Dalloway"
• Weeks 7-9: Single Text Study: Milton "Paradise Lost"
• Weeks 10-11: Single Text Study: Morrison "Beloved"
• Weeks 12-15: Author Study: Dickens "Hard Times" and "Great Expectations"
• Weeks 16-18: Author Study: Beckett "Waiting for Godot" and "Endgame"
• Weeks 19-20: Single Text Study: Fielding "Joseph Andrews"
• optional: Weeks 21-22: Comparative Study: Austen "Pride and Prejudice" and Bronte "Jane Eyre" 

All in all I have 28 weeks for the studies from now on until April, then 4 weeks for revision and then the exams in May. To cover all the essential reading I will, according to my plan, need 20/21 weeks which leaves 7/8 weeks that I can add here or there for further intense studying or exam practice. This is a really tight schedule so far but it is manageable. I have tried to combine longer books with shorter ones during the same weeks, for example The Iliad and Heart of Darkness, to make sure to have enough time to read the books. 

Besides these two syllabi I will follow the ones for Approaches to Text and Renaissance Comedy. They are also designed for 20 weeks of intense studying.

My daily schedule will be the following: Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays are devoted to work. If I have time, I will do some primary reading on these days.

On Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays I will devote 8 hours on studying every day. And I will try to work on 2 units every day. So, for example on a Thursday 4 hours on Explorations 1 in the morning and 4 hours on Approaches to Text in the afternoon. On a Friday I would work on Explorations 2 in the morning and Renaissance Comedy in the afternoon.

One of the good things about my studies is that I am not place bound so that I can read at home, on the train, in a tea house, on the plane, in the library or elsewhere. Therefore I can also for example combine shopping trips with listening to audio books or I can watch podcast lectures (for example from Yale or Stanford University, that are available through iTunes) on my Notebook while I am traveling. 

Well, I hope I can more or less follow this schedule. I know I have to focus on working and try not to get distracted too much by the internet or other things. And I am aware of the fact that I have to do a lot of things within a limited time frame. But I also know that people have passed their exams when they only focused on 6 or 7 books per Unit instead of 10. So I am not too worried about not finishing the schedule.

I have to admit, however, that now, at the end of week one, I have worked on Explorations 1 and 2 a lot but have not yet done anything for Renaissance Comedy and Approaches to Texts. I have, however, obtained all the secondary reading material for both units which is already worth a lot and took up quite some time. I will talk about secondary literature and university libraries in another post.

Yours sincerely,

Kris

P.S: Talking about notebooks: For the beginning of my studies I have treated myself with a little gift. A new laptop. It is about time for one as the old one keeps on making trouble. Therefore I spared no expense and ordered one of the newest and best equipped 13'' MacBook Airs. I cannot wait to hold it in my hands! Apple just takes some time to deliver it. Well, within the next 10 days it should be here.

P.P.S: Thank you Rhea and Sumit for the comments on my last post. 

Getting ready to start

Beloved reader,

after enrolling with the University of London and completing registration, which I described in the last post, it took about four days until I received the study material, consisting of the handbooks (one for each Unit), the study guide, a collection of former exam papers (of 2008 an 2009) and a really helpful book called "The Arts Good Study Guide". The latter I can recommend everyone who is about to start studying, be it via distance learning or at a brick and mortar university.

One important thing, that I have not yet received, which was supposed to be included in this 'welcome package', is a student card. I just recently found out that the UoL did not even give these to their distance learning students for some reason or other (well, no official reason given), but that they decided - after the students had protested - to start issuing student IDs.

The next step for me was to order the books for primary reading for the four foundation units. The UoL provided a very detailed reading list that suggested, not dictated, various editions of the books. Some books. I noticed, I had already had at home. Others I needed to buy. It is always a big pleasure of mine to surround myself with books and to go book shopping, therefore the research that ensued was quite some fun for me.

First of all I checked out the German amazon homepage. I looked up the various editions, that were mentioned in the reading list, and then took a closer look at the books. Fortunately, nowadays amazon provides a preview of most the books so that you can check out the index, introduction and the first pages or so. This helps a lot when buying books online. What was also really helpful in some cases were the recommendations by other readers. Especially when it came to choosing a suitable translation of the ancient epics, such as Homer's Iliad or Virgil's Aeneid. I was able to compare several translations, which is, in my opinion, very important with books like these. There have been published so many translations  over the centuries that there is a lot to consider. And with these books it is vital to own a translation that is understandable and yet as close to the original as possible.

Once I had made up my mind about which editions I should by I put them all into the basket in order to find out the price. For all the books - all new ones - I would have spent about 500€. That was too much. So I figured, there needs to be a cheaper way to get the books. I love old and used books but in this case, for my studies, I thought it would be worth buying new copies. So I went to the English amazon homepage and checked and compared the prices there. Fortunately I found most of the books for a much cheaper price, including postage and packing, so that I ordered most of the books in the UK and some of the books in Germany. This way I paid only about 320€, which is, for 32 books, about 10€ per book.

An alternative would have been to buy the books through amazon marketplace, which would have been the cheapest option, I guess. However, mostly used books. Another option would have been to buy an iPad or Kindle and download the books as e-books (most of them for free).

After I had placed my order, I awaited delivery very eagerly. Some of the books were not supposed to be sent out until September 17, however, by now all books have arrived as they were available earlier... Over the last ten days or so, there came a big or small package full of books every day. The last one reached me today.

Here is the result. This is what 4 Units worth of primary reading looks like on one bookshelf. That's quite a lot!

Together with these and the handbooks I am now ready to start!

And to be honest: That are quite a lot of books to read!!

That's it for tonight. Stay tuned.

Yours sincerely,

Kris

P.S: Fortunately I won't have to read all of them!

How and when to enroll?

Beloved reader,

in my last post I informed you of my reasons to start studying via distance learning, today I want to tell you about my experiences with enrolling at the University of London.

After I had made up my mind that the BA in English would be the perfect program for me, I tried to gather information about how and when to enroll. As with everything else (so far), the homepage provides detailed information on enrollment. (Link) They have a fixed date by when you must have sent in your application and by when registration must be finished in order to sit exams the following year.

I found out about the course some time in November 2010. As the application-deadline for EU-residents is October 17 (non-EU-residents September 17; both dates for BA English. Dates for other courses may vary!) I was about three weeks late for it. Damn it, I thought. What a 'lucky' girl I am. (In hindsight this wasn't too bad after all!) Well, I thought, that will give me enough time to get my life back in order and actually give this course some thought. (Even though I have to admit that I had already made up my mind that this actually WAS what I wanted to study when I first found out about it.)

After disclosing my plans to my family to quit studying in Eichstätt, where I had lived and studied for the past year and then some, I started to fill out the online application form (Link). This is fairly easy when you have all the necessary information and documents ready (i.e. certified translations; scanned documents). If you do not have everything you need, you can just save your application and finish it later. That's what I did. I added bits and pieces of information over the course of time and worked on and rewrote my supporting statement.

Once I was satisfied with everything and had gathered all necessary documentation, I wanted to finish my application, pay the fee and then wait for the University to contact me and tell me that they had accepted my application. So I triple checked every single entry that I made, reread my statement, made sure I had uploaded all necessary files and proceeded to "check out". The only thing left was paying the fee. I typed in my credit card info, clicked "Pay now" and then waited... and waited.. and waited.. until my browser told me "your request could not be processed" (or something like it, whatever browsers tell you when something doesn't work).

Fortunately I had saved the application data before - guess how much it sucks when you fill out a detailed online form and then everything's gone because of a server error. As I wasn't sure whether or not it had worked, I did not reload the page, in order to make sure that they wouldn't charge my credit card several times in case it did work. I decided to wait for some days and try it again later. When I tried it again - some weeks later (this was probably January 2011 already), the same error occurred. So, again, I waited. I gave it several other tries over the course of the following months but it never worked.

As I wasn't under too much time pressure to register, however, I decided only in May to stop trying to apply online and hand in my application by mail. So again I went through the process of filling out forms, gathering documents and preparing the application. By then I was even able to rewrite the statement yet again, as I could add some important study-related information.

Some time in June, after I had mailed out the application I received a letter and an e-mail from the University telling me, that something was missing for processing my application: A transcript of records from the KU Eichstätt where I had studied before. When applying, I had not thought it necessary to send any such thing, as I did not want to skip any Units anyway. Mr Harry Evans, my contact at the admissions office of the University of London, was very helpful in this matter and quickly answered all my questions regarding this document.

So, I found out how to get hold of this transcript of records. The process was fairly easy, only the examination office in Eichstätt took their time. I waited, and waited, and waited, and then waited some more. Finally some time in August I received my copy of this transcript of records. I had the examination office send another copy directly to Mr Evans in order to speed up the progress.

Then again I waited and waited and waited, as I thought the UoL would write me a message once they had received the document. Yet, nothing came, so I contacted them and Mr Evans informed me that they had received it and had already sent me the offer letter via e-mail some week before. In case I couldn't locate this offer in my spam folder (which I couldn't as my spam folder deletes mails after 24 hours) he'd arrange for it to be sent to me again.

Now (it was August 22) I started to get nervous and kept on checking my spam folder every hour or so.  Nothing came. Eventually I received the offer letter on August 25. Waiting for three days can be a veeeeeeeeery long time, I assure you!

Once I had received the offer letter I started the online registration progress for my classes - this actually worked - and subsequently I am now enrolled as a student with the University of London! How cool is that, huh?

To sum up my experiences with enrolling: Inform yourself as early as possible about the dates and the necessary requirements, try to get together all necessary documentation, and in case the online registration doesn't work, pen and paper will do just as well!

For me, enrolling was easy but time consuming in a way. Despite all the trouble, it got me where I wanted to be: A student with the UoL International Programme.

That's it for now. Check back to find out in my next post what kind of preparations are necessary and how I tackle them.

Yours faithfully,

Kris

P.S: Always make sure to check your spam folder regularly :-)
P.P.S: I do not know why there was always a server error with the online application. I never cared to inquire. Maybe they have fixed the problem. Or maybe nobody but me has had this problem. Who knows?

What?

Beloved reader,

this blog shall inform you about the experiences that I encounter with a distance learning Bachelor's degree in English Literature with the University of London. My studies commence ... hmm. well. I can't really tell.

Let's do this thing here from the beginning:

I'm Kris, 25 years old, German, passionate reader, avid photographer and experienced traveler. About 10 months ago I decided - after two and a half semesters - to quit my English and Classical Studies at a brick and mortar university, as that just wasn't the real deal for me. Too much stuff in too short a time, lots of things that wouldn't interest me at all, wrong study techniques (on my side) and mostly personal (subject-related) preferences that did not coincide with the syllabus.

So I quit. And I made up my mind and thought about what I could do instead (not in that order). I thought about something that would give me the chance to study the parts of English that interest me the most. I took some detours in research until I found the University of London's International Program. (Link) And I found out about their BA English Program that sounded just about perfect for me:

Reading a whole lot of interesting books that I can select on my own instead of reading a whole lot of uninteresting books that are mandatory. Writing a final exam in each Unit instead of having to do stupid homework, ridiculous presentations, nerve-wracking portfolios or research papers (ok, I admit, the papers aren't too bad - depending on the subject!) under a whole lot of time pressure in order to obtain a grade. Four in-depth units per year instead of ten or more shallow courses per semester.

What also stuck out was the fact that I - even though I wasn't enrolled yet - could take a look at all the final exams of the last years which gave me a good idea about what I had to do and learn for this course: Perfect!

I am about to embark on this whole new adventure called distance learning and I want to share my experiences with you. I hope to mostly report about happy events and informative topics, I am sure, however, that there will be times of depression (that every student has to face) sometimes where I will wail and complain and curse the University and myself.

And now: It's time to play the music, it's time to light the light. It's time to get things started on my little show, all right?

Please feel free to leave your comments and questions anytime. I want this blog to be interactive.

Yours faithfully,

Kris