Course |
LIT 3013 In Praise of Idleness: Literature and the Art of Conversation |
|
Professor |
Marina van Zuylen |
|
CRN |
16157 |
|
Schedule |
Th 4:00 -6:20 pm OLIN 101 |
|
Distribution |
OLD: B |
NEW: Literature
in English
|
The Useful, Schiller wrote in The Aesthetic Education of Man, is the great idol of our age. It divorces leisure from labor and turns
life into a series of utilitarian dead ends.
Conversely, the impulse to play,
to engage in gratuitous moments of
being, in seemingly evanescent conversations, might be our only chance to
convert specialized knowledge into self-knowledge. Since Socrates, conversation
has been admired for its seemless ability to perform thinking, to integrate knowledge into society, and
to supplement savoir (knowledge) with savoir-vivre
(the art of living). But conversation,
precisely because it clashes with the useful, has often been condemned as merely artful, dangerous for its
proximity to the decadent and the idle.
But what is so threatening about idleness? According to Nietzsche, because idleness leads to
self-reflection, we avoid it by mindlessly embracing work. The work ethic has become an excuse for not
thinking about the desperate human condition.. Paradoxically, work has become an
escapist diversion and the time to rest and to converse has being usurped by the false plenitude of
mechanical labor. Proust’s In Search of Lost Time adds a new twist
to this dichotomy: for the social-climber, conversation becomes work, a laborious exercise in appearing rather than
being. This course examines how these
tensions are played both on a rhetorical
(we will read diverse narratological studies on conversation, studying
the use of silences, repetition, dialogue, etc.) and on a thematic level. After reading a selection of critiques of
“pure” work (Aristotle, Schiller, Marx, and Nietzsche), we will examine
texts that expose the vanity of
conversation (Pascal’s Pensées,
Molière’s Misanthrope), novels that thematize the tensions between
work and conversation as social and cultural phenomena (Henry James, The Europeans, Updike Rabbit
Run), and works that offer up possible aesthetic theories of conversation
(Proust, Swann’s Way and Against Sainte Beuve). We will also scrutinize instances where
conversation becomes a mere filler (Beckett’s Waiting for Godot).
Students will also read Paul Lafargue’s In Praise of Idleness and Corinne Maier’s Laziness, the recent French bestseller attacking the dangers of
work.
Open for On-line
registration.
Course |
LIT 3023 Poetry and Society |
|
Professor |
Joan Retallack |
|
CRN |
16139 |
|
Schedule |
Tu 4:00 -6:20 pm OLIN 101 |
|
Distribution |
OLD: B |
NEW: Literature
in English
|
Cross-listed:
Human Rights
Poems are enactments of linguistic forms of life
with identifiable values intimately connected to specific cultural contexts. In
undeniably troubled times like our own, poets tend to explore (even worry
about) the political implications of their forms. Historically, such
preoccupations have resulted in poetic movements of various sorts. Many poets
today think of themselves as responsible to an enlarged vision of the human
community and to the natural environment via documentary and collaborative
forms as well as the idea of ecopoetics. There are also poetries whose
engagement with their contemporary moment is less obvious in terms of
socio-political stance, more about developing meaning via formal and material
principles seen as antidote to, e.g., consumerism, patriarchy, empire, war,
and/or just plain moral obliviousness. In this course we will look at examples
of poetry and related writing with socio-political implications (some
controversial) from around the world and from several historical contexts, to include
work of Whitman, Garcia Lorca, Akhmatova, Wittgenstein, Abba Kovner, Pound, Tom
Raworth, Juliana Spahr and others. This is a practice-based seminar. You will
have the opportunity to experiment with poetic forms, write numerous short
essays and research an area of contemporary social concern of interest to you.
The final assignment will be a poetic project accompanied by a detailed
statement of the principles that went into composing it. Admission by
permission of professor.
Course |
LIT 3033 Toward (A) Moral Fiction |
|
Professor |
Mary Caponegro |
|
CRN |
16144 |
|
Schedule |
Mon 1:30 -3:50 pm OLIN 308 |
|
Distribution |
OLD: B |
NEW: Literature
in English
|
Cross-listed:
Human Rights
The texts in this course each grapple with ethical
issues through fictive means. In navigating them, we will try to assess the way
in which literature can create, complicate, or resolve ethical dilemmas—or
eschew morality altogether. We will also attend to craft, investigating how
these authors’ concerns are furthered by formal considerations. Students will
read one novel per week, and write several short papers. The option of a final
creative project will allow students to find their own fictive path to a social,
ethical, or political issue. Readings will be chosen from among the following
mostly contemporary novels, with a few read in translation: Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein,
Kleist’s Michael Kohlhaas, Graham Greene’s The Heart of the Matter,
J.M. Coetzee’s Disgrace, Edie Medav’s Crawl Space, Martin Amis’s Time’s
Arrow, J.G. Ballard’s Crash, Elfriede Jelinek’s Wonderful
Wonderful Times or Lust, Russel Banks’s Continental Drift,
Norman Rush’s Mating, Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian, Doris
Lessing’s The Fifth Child, Tournier’s The Ogre, A.M. Holmes’s The
End of Alice, Houellebecq’s The Elementary Particles, DeLillo’s Ratner’s
Star, Will Heinrich’s The King’s Evil, Sebald’s The Emigrants,
Nicolson Baker’s Checkpoint. (Permission of instructor required). On-line
Course |
LIT / THTR 310F Survey of Drama
Theater of the Dissent |
|
Professor |
Thomas Keenan / Chiori Miyagawa |
|
CRN |
16415 |
|
Schedule |
Wed 9:30 - 11:50 am Fisher P. Arts |
|
Distribution |
OLD: A/B |
NEW: Analysis
of Arts
|
Cross-listed: Human Rights, Literature, & Theater
What is dissent and how does it manifest itself?
What counts as disagreement? Are there boundaries to legitimate dissent? How do
we recognize, and engage in, fundamental debates? We will explore the possibilities, strategies, and limits of
dissent in a wide range of plays, ethical and political statements, and
theoretical texts. We will spend most of the semester on four topics: ancient
Greece, recent tyrannies and repressive societies, war and the opposition to
it, and contemporary terrorism and counter-terrorism. After reading selections from Greek drama -- one of the oldest
known forms of dissent -- we will focus on politics and theater from the
twentieth and twenty-first centuries. We will discuss freedom of expression
(from samizdat to hate speech to jihadi internet sites), antiwar protests in
20th century America, and the distinction between speaking and acting, drawing
from extreme forms of expressions as well as texts in contemporary human rights
theory. In addition to analyzing dissent, the course examines the relationship
between oppositional belief and its manifestation in the form of performances.
We will be especially interested in what difference performance makes, in order
to understand the relation between content and form in dissent. Among the
authors considered are Euripides, Sophocles, Langston Hughes, Tony Kushner,
Ariel Dorfman, Vaclev Havel, Emily Mann, Arthur Miller, Naomi Wallace,
Suzan-Lori Parks, Athol Fugard, August Wilson, Susan Sontag, Arundhati Roy,
Emma Goldman, Michel Foucault, and Jacques Ranciejjre.
This course is open to upper college
students and some sophomores with a permission of the instructors. On-line
Course |
LIT 3205 Dante |
|
Professor |
Joseph Luzzi |
|
CRN |
16162 |
|
Schedule |
Tu 4:00 – 6:20 pm OLIN 205 |
|
Distribution |
OLD: B/D |
NEW: Literature
in English
|
Cross-listed: Italian Studies
This course will introduce
students to the world and work of the so-called “founder of all modern poetry,”
Dante Alighieri. Our close reading of the entire Divine Comedy (Inferno,
Purgatorio, Paradiso) will consider such issues as the phenomenology
of poetic inspiration, medieval theories of gender, Dante’s relationship with
the literary ghosts Virgil and Cavalcanti, the sources and shapes of the human
soul, and how the weight of love (pondus amoris) can save this same
soul. We will also read selections from Dante’s other works, including the
story of his poetic apprenticeship (The New Life) and his linguistic
treatise (On Eloquence in the Vernacular). Conducted in English,
readings in English translation; option of work in Italian if student wishes.
Course |
LIT 328 Ideology and Politics in Modern Literature |
|
Professor |
Justus Rosenberg |
|
CRN |
16146 |
|
Schedule |
Tu 1:30 -3:50 pm OLIN 301 |
|
Distribution |
OLD: B/C |
NEW: Literature
in English
|
Cross-listed: Human Rights
We examine how political issues and beliefs, be
they of the left, right, or center, are dramatically realized in
literature. Works by Dostoyevsky,
Ibsen, T.S. Eliot, Kafka, Thomas Mann, Brecht, Sartre, Malraux, Gordimer,
Kundera, Neruda, and others are analyzed for their ideological content, depth
of conviction, method of presentation, and the artistry with which these
writers synthesize politics and literature into a permanent aesthetic
experience. We also try to determine
what constitutes the borderline between art and propaganda and address the
question of whether it is possible to genuinely enjoy a work of literature
whose political thrust and orientation is at odds with our own
convictions. The discussions are
supplemented by examples drawn from other art forms such as music, painting,
and film.
Course |
LIT 331 Translation Workshop |
|
Professor |
Peter Filkins |
|
CRN |
16468 |
|
Schedule |
Mon 1:30 -3:50 pm PRE 101 |
|
Distribution |
OLD: B |
NEW: Literature
in English
|
The workshop is intended for students interested in
exploring both the process of translation and ways in which meaning is created
and shaped through words. It will explore the art of literary translation by
focusing on style, craft, tone, and the array of options available to the
literary translator in using translation as a tool for both interpreting
textual origins and the performative shape of the translation itself. Class
time will be divided between a consideration of different translators, and the students'
own translations into English of poetry and prose from any language or text of
their own choosing. Prerequisite: One year of language study or
permission of the instructor.
Course |
LIT 3362 The Essay |
|
Professor |
Luc Sante |
|
CRN |
16319 |
|
Schedule |
Th 1:30 -3:50 pm OLIN 303 |
|
Distribution |
OLD: B |
NEW: Literature
in English
|
This course will consider the essay form as well as
its style, with a particular focus on voice, viewpoint, and rhetorical technique.
Intensive study will be devoted to word choice, cadence, and even punctuation,
in the belief that even the most minute aspects of writing affect the impact of
the whole. The goal is to equip students with a strong but supple command of
their instrument, a prerequisite for personal expression. There will be writing
and reading (from Macauley to Didion) assignments each week, and exercises and
discussion in class.
Course |
LIT 349 Victorian Bodies |
|
Professor |
Deirdre d'Albertis |
|
CRN |
16120 |
|
Schedule |
Tu 1:30 -3:50 pm OLIN 307 |
|
Distribution |
OLD: B |
NEW: Literature
in English
|
Cross-listed:
Gender Studies; Science, Technology & Society; Victorian Studies
The very term “Victorian” is synonymous with an outmoded
sense of decorum, prudishness, and inhibition.
Yet as Foucault memorably asserted, we “other Victorians” remain
profoundly influenced by notions of the body and sexual difference established
in the nineteenth century. We will
study a series of Victorian texts—literary and non-literary—in conjunctions
with theories of the construction of sexuality from Freud to Foucault, tracing
the most recent origins of such “natural” categories of subjectivity as
male/female, heterosexual/homosexual, child/adult, and normal/perverse with
special attention to the registers of race and class. How do different forms of
narrative articulate or confuse these categories? We will also consider Victorian bodies in the aggregate. Why did the body come to be used by the
Victorians as a figure for the state? How did British imperial discourse
purport to classify and study subject bodies?
We will consider these and other questions through our readings of
Charlotte Bronte, Thomas Hughes, Richard Burton, Robert Baden-Powell, Oscar
Wilde, Robert Louis Stevenson, Bram Stoker, John Ruskin, Rudyard Kipling, and
Lewis Carroll, among others. Upper
College standing assumed; enrollment limited to fifteen. On-line
Course |
LIT 3743 Poetics of the Experimental Attitude: Gertrude Stein and John Cage |
|
Professor |
Joan Retallack |
|
CRN |
16140 |
|
Schedule |
Th 4:00 -6:20 pm OLIN 205 |
|
Distribution |
OLD: F |
NEW:
Practicing Arts
|
Cross-listed:
Integrated Arts
This course will look at work by the Mom and Pop of modernist and postmodern experimental arts with an emphasis on their respective interarts contexts as well as their relation to investigative methods in the sciences. Both Stein and Cage have remained controversial and in a remarkable way continuously contemporary as they have projected enormous influence on all the arts. We will begin by experiencing pleasures and puzzles of their work, starting with the writing but also exploring relations to other arts in their own practices as well as in their collaborations and conversations with other artists. Scientific exemplars with particular relevance to the work of Stein and Cage come from relativity theory, quantum mechanics, chaos theory and some recent developments in information theory and neuroscience. This is a practice-based seminar. You will have the opportunity to experiment with forms, write numerous short essays and research an area of contemporary experimental practice that is of particular interest to you. We will do some of our study of texts and music through performance. The final assignment for the course is an interdisciplinary arts project that carries out an approved proposal for use of media and genres of your choice, accompanied by a detailed statement of the principles that went into composing it. Admission by permission of professor.
Course |
LIT 3801 Indian Fiction |
|
Professor |
Benjamin La Farge |
|
CRN |
16071 |
|
Schedule |
Tu Th 10:30 - 11:50 am OLIN 309 |
|
Distribution |
OLD: B |
NEW: Literature
in English
|
Cross-listed: Asian Studies & SRE
In the days of British
colonial rule, the collision of East and West inspired a number of English
authors to write some of their best fiction, and since Independence several
Indian writers have re-imagined that collision from a post-colonial
perspective. The contradiction of writing about Indian life in the language of
the departed Britsh Raj has created a cultural hybridity which some of these
novelists turn to advantage. Indian fiction of the modern period may be divided
into three kinds: those written by English authors during the last hundred
years of Empire; those written by Indian authors during the first sixty years
of Independence; and those written by Indians in the diaspora. From the first
we will read Rudyard Kipling's Plain
Tales from the Hills and/or his novel Kim,
followed by E.M. Forster's novel A
Passage to India , plus a memoir by Leonard Woolf. From the second we will
read R. K. Narayan's novel The Guide, Salman Rushdie's early novel Midnight's Children, Arundhati Roy's only novel The God of Small
Things , and Pankaj Mishra's first novel The Romantics, plus a
selection of stories. From the third, we will read Jhumpa Lahiri's story
collection The Interpreter of Maladies. To contextualize these fictions, we
will read chapters from a brief study of Indian history, religion, and culture. On-line Students must speak to the
instructor before registering On-line.
Course |
LIT 390 Contemporary Critical Theory |
|
Professor |
Nancy Leonard |
|
CRN |
16134 |
|
Schedule |
Wed 1:30 -3:50 pm OLIN 308 |
|
Distribution |
OLD: B |
NEW: HUM
|
Cross-listed:
Integrated Arts During the last century major changes in the
ways works of art and culture were conceived took place under the influence of
modernism and poststructuralism. This course engages key texts in this
transformation of our knowledge of language and representation, either classic
texts in vigorous dialogue with the current moment or contemporary ones.
Reading full texts by major theorists and emphasizing student writing and
exchange, the seminar will introduce students to the aethetics and ethics of
modernist and postmodern debates about representation, and about the links
between ethics, politics and language. Perspectives to be introduced include
semiotics, deconstruction, Lacanian analysis, neo-Marxist and Foucauldian
history, debates on difference and universalism, and rhetorical critique.
Students will learn key terms and concerns, analyze arguments, and create
convincing responses. Theorists to be read include Benjamin, Adorno, Foucault,
Lacan, early and late Derrida, Levinas, Agamben, Badiou, Zizek, Butler,and
Foster. Admission by interview prior to
registration; Upper College standing is assumed. On-line