The UPHESC English Syllabus consists of four sections. The questions will come from every section. The Commission also stated that the number of questions on each section should not exceed 40. Each selection should be represented by a minimum of 10 questions. These questions will test your knowledge and understanding of literary movements, outlines, and texts.
Section 1 focuses on the literature and society in periods including, renaissance, reformation, restoration, neo-classical period, romantic period, Victorian period, modern period, and post-modern period.
These are the prominent authors that you must definitely read: Marlowe, Shakespeare, Spenser, Milton, Wordsworth, Charles Lamb, P.B. Shelley, John Keats, Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, Robert Browning, George Eliot, T.S.Eliot, Thomas Hardy, Virginia Woolf, W.B. Yeats, G.B. Shaw, Samuel Beckett
Section 2 focuses on the literary theory and criticism. Here you need to focus on Dryden, Coleridge, Mathew Arnold, Richards, etc. The section also covers recent movements like structuralism, deconstruction, feminism, new historicism, post-colonialism.
In Section 3, you need to focus on American Literature and read prominent works of authors like Emerson, Emily Dickinson, Hawthorne, Robert Frost, Hemmingway, etc.
The Section 4 will cover all aspects of Indian Literature and read works of authors like Sri Aurobindo, Kamala Das, Mulk Raj Anand, Raja Rao, R.K. Narayan, Anita Desai, Shashi Deshpande.
In the Section 5, you need to cover linguistics, phonetics, and modern grammar.