Syllabus

A. Required Texts:

(1) Philip Rice, ed., Modern Literary Theory: A Reader, Edward Arnold Publishers, 2002. (ISBN: 0-340-76191-1). Hereafter cited as MLT.

(2) David Damrosch, ed., The Longman Anthology of World Literature: Volume F: The Twentieth Century, Longman, 2004. (ISBN: 0-321-05536-5). Cited as AWL.

(3) Ross C. Murfin, ed., Heart of Darkness: A Case Study in Contemporary Criticism Bedford/St. Martin’s, 1996. (ISBN: 0312114915). Cited as HD.

B. Course Requirements:

(1) one paper [minimum of 800 words; two units]; topics and deadlines to be announced in class;

(2) one class presentation (one unit);

(3) a journal [3 units; minimum 40 pages of double-spaced type] in which students are to write on each text studied. This will be submitted in the penultimate week; each entry should be dated and typed. Students will be asked to read aloud from their journals in several classes;

(4) a final exam [2 units], Tuesday, May 4, 6-9 p.m.

(5) the quality of class participation counts for two units;

(6) anyone missing a reading or writing assignment, for whatever reason, should see me as soon as possible.

C. Course Description: A culturally diverse study of major trends in modern literature and their self-reflection in theory.

D. Weekly Class Assignments:

I. MODERN THEORY: CONTROVERSIES, FOUNDATIONS AND APPLICATIONS:

Week 1: Jan 20: Academy, Canon, and Theory: (1) Harold Bloom, The Western Canon (MLT, 405-409); (2) Edward Said, “Opponents, Audiences, Constituencies and Community,” (MLT, 439-447); Paul de Man, “The Resistance to Theory,” (MLT, 272-288).

Week 2: Jan 27: Foundational Texts: Marx and Engels, The German Ideology (MLT, 18-23); Freud, Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis (MLT, 24-33).

Week 3: Feb 3: Foundational Texts: Saussure, Course in General Linguistics (MLT, 34-40); Jacques Derrida, “Structure, Sign, and Play…” (MLT, 195-209); de Beauvoir, The Second Sex (MLT, 41-42).

Week 4: Feb 10: Applications: Colonial and Cultural Criticism: (1) Conrad, Heart of Darkness (HD, 17-95); (2) Edward Said, Culture and Imperialism (MLT, 369-379); Patrick Brantlinger, “Heart of Darkness: Anti-Imperialism, Racism, or Impressionism?” (HD, 277-296).

Week 5: Feb 17: Applications: Feminism and Deconstruction: (1) Conrad, Heart of Darkness (HD, 17-95); J. Hillis Miller, “Heart of Darkness Revisited” (HD, 206-220); Johanna M. Smith, “Too Beautiful Altogether…” (HD, 169-183).

II. THE DIALECTIC OF REALISM AND MODERNISM:POLITICAL AND NOT:

Week 6: Feb 24: Western Modernisms: (1) W.B. Yeats, poems (WL, 319-327); (2) T.S. Eliot, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” (WL, 225-228); (3) James Joyce, “The Dead” (WL, 150-176); (4) Georg Lukacs, The Meaning of Contemporary Realism (MLT, 108-113).

Week 7: March 2: Eastern Modernism-Realism: (1) Emile Habiby, The Secret Life of Saeed…(WL, 249-253); (2) Premchand, “My Big Brother” (WL, 122-126); (3) Vladimir Mayakovski, poems (WL, 301-305); (4) Fadwa Tuqan, poems (WL, 1030-1035); (5) David Lodge, “Analysis and Interpretation of the Realist Text” (MLT, 85-98).

III. FEMINISMS: WESTERN, EASTERN, WHATEVER:

Week 8: March 9: An English Werewoolf: (1) Virginia Woolf, “Mrs. Dalloway in Bond Street” (WL, 178-182); (2) A Room of One’s Own (WL, 186-211); Annette Kolodny, “Dancing through the Minefield…” (MLT, 163-168).

Mar 15-22: Spring Break

Week 9: March 23: (Spring) Breaking into the Harem: (1) Fatima Mernissi, “The Harem Within” (WL, 777-781); (2) Hanan al-Shaykh, “A Season of Madness” (WL, 792-797); (3) Mahasweta Devi, “Breast-Giver” (WL, 751-768); (4) Farough Faroghzad, “A Poem for You” (WL, 1051-1052); (5) Luce Irigaray, “Sexual Difference” (MLT, 236-238).

III. COLONIALISM AND POST(when?)COLONIALISM:

Week 10: March 30: Just Where Do We Fit in? (1) V.S. Naipaul, Prologue to an Autobiography (WL, 519-527); (2) Adonis (Ali Ahmed Sa’id), “A Mirror for Khalida” (WL, 528-529); (3) Faiz Ahmed Faiz, poems (WL, 1046-1047); (4) Chinua Achebe, “The African Writer and the English Language” (WL, 953-958); (5) Homi Bhabha, “Of Mimicry and Man: The Ambivalence of Colonial Discourse” (MLT, 380-386).

Week 11: April 6: Nowhere Person: (1) Nadine Gordimer, “The Defeated” (WL, 1020-1029); (2) Derek Walcott, “A Far Cry from Africa” and “Volcano” (WL, 1053-1054); (3) Salman Rushdie, “Chekov and Zulu” (WL, 1060-1069); (4) Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, The Post-Colonial Critic (MLT, 387-393).

IV. POST(really?) MODERNISM:

Week 12: April 13: The Nothing Itself Nots: (1) Jorge Luis Borges, “The Library of Babel” (WL, 537-542); (2) Naguib Mahfouz, The Arabian Nights and Days (WL, 576-591); (3) Jean-Francois Lyotard, “Answering the Question: What is Postmodernism?” (MLT, 329-337).

Week 13: April 20: The Others: (1) Abdelrahman Munif, Cities of Salt (WL, 1100-1111); Christa Wolf, Accident: A Day’s News (WL, 1094-1099); Patricia Waugh, “Postmodernism and Feminism” (MLT, 344-358).

V. RESURRECTING THE DIALECTIC:

Week 14: April 27: Class content to be determined by students (by consensus, by eighth week of course).

Week 14: April 27: An Alternative Lumpy Ending: Richard Rorty, “Texts and Lumps,” (MLT, 451- 464).

Week 15: May 4: Final Exam.