Topic: Italian Cinema and Literature.  This course will examine
important adaptations of literary texts by major Italian directors.
The literary texts will include both Italian works and works from
classical and contemporary literature outside Italy. The class will
focus upon the following films and the following texts:

Literary sources: Euripides, Medea (adaptation--Pasolini,
Medea); Petronius, Satyricon adaptation--Fellini,
Fellini Satyricon); Lampedusa, The Leopard (adaptation-
-Visconti’s The Leopard); Bassani, The Garden of the Finzi
Contini (adaptation--Vittorio De Sica’s The Garden of the
Finzi Contini); Carlo Levi, Christ Stopped at Eboli
(adaptation--Francesco Rosi’s Christ Stopped at Eboli);
Cortazar, “Blow Up,” (adaptation--Antonioni’s Blow Up);
Borges, “The Theme of the Traitor and the Hero” (adaptation--
Bertolucci’s The Spider’s Stratagem); James Cain, The
Postman Always Rings Twice (adaptations-- Visconti’s
Obsession and Antonioni’s Story of a Love Affair);
Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice (adaptation--Visconti’s
Death in Venice); Alberto Moravia's The Conformist
(adaptation--Bertolucci’s The Conformist).

Italian literary sources will be ordered in Italian for Italian
graduate students. All materials will be available in English at
least in the reserve room, although students who read Spanish or
German are urged to consult Borges, Cortazar, and Mann in the
original language. Requirements: several class presentations
(analysis of a film and a literary text) plus an essay of
approximately 15—20 pages involving research.

Important notice: there is no regular film series in this course.
Seminar participants are expected to see the films in the library
reserve or from other sources (West European Studies, Monroe Public
Library, various commercial rental services) before coming to class.