Courses

Courses

Fall 2005 Courses

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010. Modern American Poetry
Celeste Goodridge T 1:00 - 2:25, TH 1:00 - 2:25 CT-16 Whiteside Room
Analysis of the work of poets which will include Robert Frost, William Carlos Williams, Wallace Stevens and Marianne Moore.
011. Film Noir
Ann Kibbie M 2:30 - 3:55, W 2:30 - 3:55 Mass-McKeen Study
A survey of the film genre from the 1940s to the 1990s. Films include The Big Sleep, Gun Crazy, Gilda, Chinatown, and Bound. Readings include film criticism and theory, as well as some of the novels adapted for the screen. In addition to regular class sessions, attendance at evening screenings is required.
LAB
Ann Kibbie M 6:30 - 9:00 VAC-Beam Classroom
A survey of the film genre from the 1940s to the 1990s. Films include The Big Sleep, Gun Crazy, Gilda, Chinatown, and Bound. Readings include film criticism and theory, as well as some of the novels adapted for the screen. In addition to regular class sessions, attendance at evening screenings is required.
012. Reincarnations of the Monkey
Belinda Kong M 1:30 - 2:25, W 1:30 - 2:25, F 1:30 - 2:25 Mass-McKeen Study
The legendary Monkey, or Sun Wu Kong of sixteenth-century Wu Cheng-en's Journey to the West, is a figure that embodies fierce independence of spirit as much as rebellious mischief and loyal service. This course explores contemporary refigurings of Monkey in diasporic contexts (primarily the U.S., but also Britain and Hong Kong) and in multiple genres (novel, essay, film, and music). How is Monkey transformed, to what purposes, and for what audiences? Authors and artists may include Wu Cheng-en (in translation), Timothy Mo, Maxine Hong Kingston, Frank Chin, Patricia Chao, and Fred Ho.
013. Hawthorne
William Watterson T 2:30 - 3:55, TH 2:30 - 3:55 Mass-McKeen Study
Readings include selected short stories, Fanshawe, The Scarlet Letter, The Blithedale Romance, The House of the Seven Gables, The Marble Faun, Septimus Felton, and James Mellow’s Nathaniel Hawthorne in His Times.
014. Animal Life
Hilary Thompson M 10:30 - 11:25, W 10:30 - 11:25, F 10:30 - 11:25 Sills-209
This course explores the ways in which the figure of the animal serves as both a point of analogy and opposition to the concept of the human, and thus has been crucial for our definitions of human life. Focusing on contemporary world literature, we will investigate the fantastic images and ethical quandaries that are unleashed when the dividing boundaries between human and animal life lapse. Authors to be studied may include J. M. Coetzee, Brigid Brophy, Philip K. Dick, Italo Calvino, Haruki Murakami, and Anita Desai.
015. Eight American Poets
Anthony Walton M 11:30 - 12:55, W 11:30 - 12:55 Mass-McKeen Study
A seminar on a group of American Poets representative of a certain strain in the tradition, loosely called "transcendental." Strong emphasis on prosody, close reading "excavation" of multiple meanings and sources in poems, and the poet's negotiation of the implicit tension between technique and subject matter. Poets include Emerson, Dickinson, Frost, Stevens, Berryman, Plath, Ammons, and Charles Wright.
016. "The Way Life Ought to Be": Pastoral and Utopia
Julia Major M 11:30 - 12:55, W 11:30 - 12:55 Searles-127
How can watching sheep and engaging in singing contests be political? What is aesthetically satisfying about imagining impossible places? This class explores genres of early modern pastoral and utopia and proposes that they function as means of reinventing the imaginary relation between the natural and the human in order to achieve both aesthetic contemplation and political intervention. It also investigates the intersection between pastoral and utopia in representations of the New World, including contemporary extensions into ecocriticism, science fiction, and cyberspace. Readings may include selections from Virgil, Eclogues and Georgics; More, Utopia; the diaries of Christopher Columbus; Spenser, The Shepheardes Calender; Shakespeare, As You Like It; John Winthrop, A Modell of Christian Charity; and Thoreau, The Maine Woods.
060. English Composition
Mary Edsall T 8:30 - 9:55, TH 8:30 - 9:55 CT-2 South
Practice in analytic and critical writing, with special attention to drafting and revision of student essays. Assignment sequences allow students to engage a variety of modes and topics that build toward the developed expository essay. Practice in grammar as well. Does not count toward the major or minor in English.
068. Nonfiction Literary Narrative
Anthony Walton M 6:30 - 9:25 Mass-Faculty Room
We will engage in an intensive study of the writing of literary non-fiction narratives through the workshop method. Students will be expected to engage in the study and discussion of craft techniques and issues particular to this genre, to read deeply from an assigned list of writers, and to compose a substantial narrative of their own.
104. Introduction to Narrative
Aviva Briefel T 11:30 - 12:55, TH 11:30 - 12:55 Searles-315
Explores the topic of “adaptation,” specifically, the ways in which cinematic texts transform literary narratives into visual forms. We will begin with the premise that every adaptation is an interpretation, a rewriting/rethinking of an original text that offers an analysis of that text. Central to our discussions will be close attention to the differences and similarities in the ways in which written and visual texts approach narratives; the means through which each medium constructs and positions its audience; and the types of critical discourses that emerge around literature and film. May include works by Jane Austen, Philip K. Dick, Charles Dickens, Howard Hawks, Amy Heckerling, Stanley Kubrick, David Lean, Anita Loos, Vladimir Nabokov, and Ridley Scott.
LAB
Aviva Briefel M 7:00 - 9:55 VAC-Kresge Auditorium
Explores the topic of “adaptation,” specifically, the ways in which cinematic texts transform literary narratives into visual forms. We will begin with the premise that every adaptation is an interpretation, a rewriting/rethinking of an original text that offers an analysis of that text. Central to our discussions will be close attention to the differences and similarities in the ways in which written and visual texts approach narratives; the means through which each medium constructs and positions its audience; and the types of critical discourses that emerge around literature and film. May include works by Jane Austen, Philip K. Dick, Charles Dickens, Howard Hawks, Amy Heckerling, Stanley Kubrick, David Lean, Anita Loos, Vladimir Nabokov, and Ridley Scott.
105. Introduction to Poetry
Peter Coviello M 11:30 - 12:55, W 11:30 - 12:55 VAC-Beam Classroom
Explores varied topics in the Anglo-Irish-American poetic tradition, including aesthetic, political, and social questions. Strong emphasis on prosody, close reading, and the use of multi-media to “place” a poem or poet; “excavations” of multiple meaning and sources in poems; and examinations of poetic approaches toward negotiating the implicit tension between technique and subject matter.
202. Chaucer: Troilus and Criseyde
Mary Edsall T 1:00 - 2:25, TH 1:00 - 2:25 Searles-313
Learn Middle English and study Chaucer's tragic story of love in besieged Troy. Includes a focus on medieval discourses of love and empire, on the Troy story in the Middle Ages, and on the history and court culture of Ricardian England. Attention given to trends in Chaucer studies.
210. Shakespeare’s Comedies and Romances
William Watterson T 8:30 - 9:55, TH 8:30 - 9:55 Mass-Faculty Room
Examines A Midsummer Night’s Dream, The Merchant of Venice, Twelfth Night, As You Like It, The Winter’s Tale, and The Tempest in light of Renaissance genre theory.
220. Golden World, Green World, New World: Imaginary Worlds of the Renaissance & their Real Counterparts
Julia Major M 2:30 - 3:55, W 2:30 - 3:55 Mass-Faculty Room
How did Renaissance humanists and reformers draw upon classical models to imagine ways of being in the world that could express new poetic and political affiliations? Explores the reclamation of rhetoric as the basis for new ideas of human civility; the turn to pastoral, including English translations of the Psalms, as a bridge between ancient wisdom and an uncertain future; and the search for the New World in both geographical discovery and in the beginnings of scientific discourse. Readings may include selections from Petrarch’s letters; Castiglione, The Book of the Courtier; Montaigne, “Of Cannibals”; poems of Sir Thomas Wyatt; Shakespeare, selected sonnets and The Tempest; Donne, selected poems; Aphra Behn, Oroonoko and Margaret Cavendish, Blazing World.
222. Milton
Ann Kibbie M 11:30 - 12:55, W 11:30 - 12:55 Sills-Smith Auditorium
A critical study of his chief writings in poetry and prose.
246. Romanticism, Lyricism, and Nature
David Collings T 10:00 - 11:25, TH 10:00 - 11:25 Sills-109
Examines English romantic poetry about nature, with particular emphasis on the way such poetry finds a lyric impulse already present in nature. Considers such subjects as the interplay of nature and transcendence, the supernatural dimension of nature, the boundary between the human and the natural, the contrast of urban and rural life, and the value of traditional landed society. Authors may include Clare, Coleridge, Keats, Shelley, and Wordsworth.
262. Drama and Performance in the Twentieth Century and Beyond
Marilyn Reizbaum M 2:30 - 3:55, W 2:30 - 3:55 Chase Barn-Chamber
Examines dramatic trends of the century, ranging from the social realism of Ibsen to the performance art of Laurie Anderson. Traverses national and literary traditions and demonstrates that work in translation like that of Ibsen or Brecht has a place in the body of dramatic literature in English. Discusses such topics as dramatic translation (Liz Lochhead’s translation of Molière’s Tartuffe); epic theater and its millennial counterpart (Bertold Brecht, Tony Kushner, Caryl Churchill); political drama (Frank McGuinness, Athol Fugard): the “nihilism” of absurdist drama (Samuel Beckett); the “low “ form of the musical (as presented, for example, by Woody Allen); and the relationship of dance to theater (Henrik Ibsen, Ntozake Shange, Stomp. Enda Walsh) with an eye to the cultural and sexual politics attending all of these categories.
272. TOPICS IN TWENTIETH CENTURY AMERICAN LITERATURE: THE 50s
Celeste Goodridge T 10:00 - 11:25, TH 10:00 - 11:25 CT-16 Harrison McCann
Analysis of the work of authors which may include: Nabokov, Carson McCullers, Cheever, Salinger, Mary McCarthy, Highsmith, Plath, Sexton, Jarrell and Baldwin.
284. Introduction to Asian-American Literature
Belinda Kong M 10:30 - 11:25, W 10:30 - 11:25, F 10:30 - 11:25 CT-16 Whiteside Room
An introduction not only to the writings of Asian America but also to the historical development of Asian-American literature as a field of discussion, study, and debate. We will begin by focusing on a seminal moment in the formation of this field: the critical controversy sparked by the publication of Maxine Hong Kingston's The Woman Warrior (1976), and then turn to more contemporary writings, and the question of how we should reconceive the terrains of Asian-American Literature in light of recent works. Besides Kingston, authors may include Amy Tan, David Henry Hwang, Frank Chin, Louis Chu, John Okada, Carlos Bulosan, Jade Snow Wong, Diana Chang, Edith Maude Eaton (Sui Sin Far), Gish Jen, Chang-rae Lee, and Jhumpa Lahiri.
285. American Postmodernism
Daniel Moos T 2:30 - 3:55, TH 2:30 - 3:55 Mass-Faculty Room
This course will survey the terrain of American literature, art, and culture generally known as “postmodern” that first appeared in the 1960s along with the theoretical arguments that sought to define this new philosophical and cultural moment. In addition to working through the literature and philosophy, we will also ask questions about the present situation of postmodernism—whether this movement has past, whether its fragmentation is still innovative, and whether postmodern expression still aids in either identifying or challenging dominant political discourse at the end of the twentieth century (and the early twenty-first century as well). We will read various philosophical explorations of the postmodern condition as well as literature by Thomas Pynchon, Donald Barthelme, Kurt Vonnegut, Ishmael Reed, Kathy Acker, and Gerald Vizenor, among others. We will also explore postmodern humor through the films of Mel Brooks, and others.
310. The Victorian Fin de Siecle
Aviva Briefel T 2:30 - 3:55, TH 2:30 - 3:55 Searles-127
Focusing especially on representations of gender and sexuality, this course will examine the Victorian end of the century. We will concentrate on the works of authors and artists who sought to challenge the moralities and aesthetics of what they perceived as an earlier, restrictive period in English social and cultural history. Through an analysis of a variety of genres, including novels, short stories, plays, poems, essays, and images, we will examine these strategies of artistic resistance, while asking what it means for an artistic movement to attempt to revolutionize and rewrite cultural norms. May include texts by Beardsley, Beerbohm, Field, Gissing, Grand, Hardy, Schreiner, Symons, and Wilde.
312. Untimely Passions: Sexuality in 19th Century America
Peter Coviello W 1:00 - 3:55 Searles-127
An examination of literary imaginings of sexuality in the midst of a long and unsettled moment in its American history, 1850-1895 – a moment before it was assumed that every person, and every intimacy, could be assigned a hetero- or homosexuality, but in which the first stirrings of that great taxonomical division could already be felt. We will be especially attentive to the idiosyncratic, extravagant, naïve, and oblique imaginings of the very domain of sexuality, of its forms and extensions, by authors who worry over the encroachment of a new regime of sexual specification. Authors may include Whitman, Dickinson, Melville, and James, as well as critics ranging from Freud and Foucault to contemporary queer theorists Michael Warner, Beth Freeman, Christopher Nealon, and others.
314. Art and Politics in the New Millennium
Marilyn Reizbaum M 6:30 - 9:25 Mass-McKeen Study
This course explores the ongoing debate concerning the relationship between art and politics by looking at the more immediate sources for that debate in the twentieth century. Readings will include excerpts from Georg Lukacs, Fredric Jameson, Theodor Adorno, Emma Goldman, Pierre Bourdieu, Roland Barthes, Susan Sontag, The Aesthetic Subject. Works may include Michael Frayn, Democracy; J. M. Coetzee, Elizabeth Costello; Philip Roth’s, The Plot Against America, Grimoprez, “Dial History”; and Hanni Abu Assad, “Paradise Now.”

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