Materials: a passage from Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontė and a passage form Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf.

Objectives: The teaching unit aims at focusing on woman condition described by two female writers. During the 19th century the heroine was represented as the thoughtful woman living the contrast between her own desires and the social constraints (Catherine in Wuthering Heights). Women characters in the 20th - century began to show a growing awareness of their identity (Clarissa in Mrs. Dalloway). By working on this topic, the students will be able to deal with two narrative texts in order to highlight and identify their content and their main features. They will also be able to compare the two passages belonging to different periods.

Receivers: students of a fifth year in a high school, who have an upper intermediate level of English.

Period of the year: May-June.

Time: four hours: two hours for the analysis of the extract taken from Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontė and two hours for the extract taken from Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf.

Prerequisites: the class must know the literary, social and historical background from Victorian Age to Modernism. As the students attend the final year, they must have learnt some reading skills enabling them to reflect on narrative techniques, linguistic and rhetorical figures.

Methodology: silent reading of each student; reading altogether; listening activity; individual work; pair work; group work; lecture (lezione frontale) and discussion with the class.