04:00P-5:15P TR (25) 3 cr.
COAS INTENSIVE WRITING SECTION. OPEN TO MAJORS ONLY. DECLARED MINORS OBTAIN AUTHORIZATION FROM BH442.
We read works of literature in solitude and then come together to discuss and argue about them. We begin with personal visceral response - "I loved this book," "I hated this character" - which we then try to translate into communication and a shared discourse. This introduction to the methods of literary interpretation will presume that to become a skilled interpreter of literature involves entering a critical community and a communal conversation. We will engage in close textual analysis of works from a variety of genres, cultures, and historical periods in order to sharpen and develop our critical reading and interpretation skills.
We'll begin with a consideration of the historical development of the concept of "literature," and will then consider how that concept applies to several great pre-modern texts - probably Aeschylus's Agamemnon, Dante's The Inferno, and a Shakespeare play. From then on, our readings will be drawn from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, probably including a Victorian novel, British and American lyric poetry, a novella by Franz Kafka, and a film by Orson Welles. Key concepts will include: genre (theater, epic, lyric poetry, prose fiction, film), literary mode (allegory, psychological novel, realism, mystery, satire), character, authorship (what is the difference between the author and the speaker or narrator of a literary work?), literary or figurative language, narrative (what's the difference between plot and story?), the relationship between a work of literature and its social context. Key skills and methods we'll work on will include "close reading" and the detailed analysis of language; developing an extended argument about a work of literature (using evidence, shaping a paper); discussing literature and working collaboratively to analyze a text. We will also do the occasional in-class staging/acting exercise or creative writing work. Assignments will include regular Reading Journals posted to the entire class; 3 or 4 papers; and a midterm and final.