As we discuss the various roles literature plays in popular culture, this course will problematize and call into question our assumptions about: 1) what constitutes a literary classic? 2) how do beauty standards change when applied to people and to animals? 3) what counts as beastly behavior in both people and animals? The assigned readings will focus on blurring the boundaries that usually render “beauty” and “beastliness” as inherently incompatible qualities. By considering instances where humans and animals come into direct conflict, this course will analyze social assumptions about the significance of virtue and vice, humanity and beastliness. We will read a variety of texts from antiquity until the present which belong to different stylistic literary genres from the epic, to the lyric, short story, drama and novel among them, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Equus, The Metamorphosis and Midsummer Night’s Dream. This course also will include discussions of the interrelationship between visual depictions of humans and animals in painting, photographs, sculpture, film, websites and/or television.
Requirements: two 4-5 page papers, a midterm and final essay exam, and final project. Participation in class discussion is a must.