Eleanor
Vance
Email
:
eleanor
.
vance
@
post
.
com
|
Phone
: +44 7700 900123 |
London
,
UK
My
fascination
with
English
Literature
began
not
in
a
classroom
,
but
in
the
attic
of
my
grandmother
'
s
house
in
Cornwall
,
where
I
discovered
a
water
-
damaged
copy
of
Jane
Eyre
.
The
pages
smelled
of
mildew
,
yet
the
voice
of
that
furious
,
solitary
child
on
the
window
seat
seemed
to
speak
directly
to
me
.
Since
that
afternoon
,
literature
has
functioned
as
both
a
mirror
and
a
door
:
reflecting
the
contours
of
human
interiority
while
offering
passage
into
lives
radically
different
from
my
own
.
It
is
this
dual
capacity
that
I
wish
to
explore
at
degree
level
,
convinced
that
the
study
of
literature
is
not
an
escape
from
the
world
but
a
more
precise
way
of
engaging
with
it
.
During
my
A
-
Level
studies
,
I
became
particularly
absorbed
by
the
relationship
between
form
and
political
context
.
Reading
Virginia
Woolf
'
s
Mrs
Dalloway
,
I
was
struck
by
how
the
stream
of
consciousness
technique
does
not
merely
represent
subjectivity
but
enacts
a
radical
democratisation
of
narrative
voice
.
I
explored
this
idea
in
my
coursework
,
comparing
Woolf
'
s
temporal
experimentation
with
the
fractured
chronology
of
Toni
Morrison
'
s
Beloved
.
Both
novels
,
I
argued
,
manipulate
narrative
time
to
bear
witness
to
trauma
that
linear
history
cannot
adequately
contain
.
My
essay
received
the
faculty
prize
and
was
selected
for
publication
in
the
school
'
s
humanities
journal
,
an
honour
that
confirmed
my
desire
to
pursue
literary
study
beyond
the
sixth
form
.
My
interests
extend
beyond
the
modernist
and
contemporary
novel
.
In
Year
Twelve
I
founded
a
reading
group
focused
on
early
modern
drama
,
convinced
that
Shakespeare
'
s
language
rewards
the
kind
of
close
attention
that
only
collaborative
discussion
can
sustain
.
We
read
Coriolanus
alongside
Livy
and
Plutarch
,
tracing
how
source
material
is
transformed
by
theatrical
exigency
.
This
project
taught
me
that
literary
criticism
is
a
collective
discipline
,
sharpened
by
disagreement
and
the
willingness
to
revise
one
'
s
first
impressions
.
I
carried
this
lesson
into
a
summer
placement
at
Silver
Street
Books
,
where
I
assisted
with
cataloguing
a
collection
of
post
-
war
poetry
pamphlets
.
Handling
physical
archives
gave
me
a
new
understanding
of
literature
as
material
culture
:
the
choice
of
paper
,
the
typography
,
the
price
stamped
on
the
cover
all
participate
in
meaning
.
Outside
the
curriculum
,
I
have
sought
opportunities
to
understand
how
literature
operates
in
the
public
sphere
.
I
volunteered
as
a
tutor
with
a
local
literacy
charity
,
helping
Key
Stage
Three
students
engage
with
poetry
by
encouraging
them
to
read
aloud
and
attend
to
sonic
patterning
rather
than
rushing
to
thematic
paraphrase
.
Watching
a
reluctant
reader
discover
the
pleasure
of
Heaney
'
s
consonantal
music
convinced
me
that
literary
analysis
,
properly
taught
,
is
a
transferable
skill
of
attention
and
empathy
.
I
also
completed
an
online
seminar
offered
by
the
University
of
Edinburgh
on
literary
theory
,
where
I
encountered
the
work
of
Eve
Kosofsky
Sedgwick
and
postcritique
.
While
I
found
some
of
Sedgwick
'
s
reparative
reading
practices
intuitively
attractive
,
the
seminar
'
s
rigorous
scepticism
taught
me
to
interrogate
my
own
methodological
assumptions
rather
than
adopting
theoretical
frameworks
uncritically
.
The
breadth
of
the
English
Literature
curriculum
at
university
level
excites
me
profoundly
.
I
am
eager
to
deepen
my
understanding
of
medieval
literature
,
a
period
I
have
only
glimpsed
through
Chaucer
,
and
to
encounter
the
full
range
of
Anglophone
writing
from
outside
the
British
Isles
.
I
am
equally
drawn
to
the
creative
-
critical
nexus
:
I
write
poetry
and
short
fiction
,
and
I
am
curious
about
how
compositional
practice
might
inform
academic
analysis
.
Ultimately
,
I
see
literature
as
a
discipline
that
refuses
easy
answers
,
demanding
instead
patient
attention
to
language
,
context
,
and
form
.
I
am
applying
to
university
because
I
want
to
spend
the
next
three
years
in
the
company
of
readers
who
1 / 2
share
that
patience
,
and
who
understand
that
a
novel
or
a
poem
is
never
merely
a
text
,
but
an
event
in
the
life
of
its
reader
.
2 / 2
