The Literature of Transformation: THE MODERN will focus on works of literature that reflect the loosening of the hegemony of Christianity as a world view, and will emphasize the influence on 20th Century Western Culture of ideas drawn from anthropology, historical materialism, and psychology. The course will open with a brief look at two 19thC poems that establish the cultural dilemma addressed in the 20thC: change as loss, vs change as liberation. We will then move to works that register the collapse of confidence in the unified, omniscient narrating voice dominant in pre-modern Western Literature. Lectures during weeks 2 through 5 will focus on the cultural impact of World War I as reflected in works of Eliot, Freud and Woolf; in weeks 6 through 8, on literature by Hurston, Plath, and Kingston that reflects the post-World War II emergence of emancipatory movements in the USA; and in week 9, on a play by Tom Stoppard that represents a postmodern interrogation of our ability to know the past.

During the course of the quarter students will be required to write papers as assigned and scheduled by their section leaders. All students will be required to take the final exam on TUESDAY, 12 JUNE, 8:30-11:30 AM.

In addition, each student will be requested to submit a posting to QUESTION OF THE WEEK, once during the quarter, in a sequence determined by birth sign. The question should address the week's reading, and must be posted by 6pm on Thursday. To find your assigned week, go to website home page, click on QUESTION OF THE WEEK, and look for the sign that contains your birthday.

Week 1: 4 & 6 April.

• Wednesday 4 April. Change as loss, change as liberation
  Texts on handout & on website: "Dover Beach" by Matthew Arnold, and excerpt from "Song of Myself" by Walt Whitman.
  
  
• Friday 6 April. What is literary about literature? A look at the glossary.
  Abrams: The Friday lecture will assume familiarity with Abrams's entries on Marxist Criticism (147-153); periods of English literature (see list, 210)-- modern period (216-217); modernism and postmodernism (167-169); structuralist criticism (300-303) and poststructuralism (238-243).

Week 2: 11 & 13 April.

• Change as loss: What has been lost?
  T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land (1922), "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" (1911/1917)
  Abrams: dramatic monologue (70-71), free verse (105-7), point of view (231-236)

Week 3: 18 & 20 April.

• Image & Theory I: Eliot & Freud
  T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land (1922), Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents (1930); Abrams: figurative language (96-100)

Week 4: 25 & 27 April

• Image & Theory II: Freud & Woolf
  Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents (1930), Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's Own (1928)
  Abrams: psychological and psychoanalytic criticism (247-253), feminist criticism (88-94)

Week 5: 2 & 4 May.

• Change as liberation: What has been liberated?
  Virginia Woolf, A Room of One's Own (1928), To the Lighthouse (1927)
  Abrams: stream of consciousness (298-300)

Week 6: 9 & 11 May.

• Sexual liberation, formal liberation, continued
  Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
  Abrams: dialogic criticism (62-64); discourse analysis (66-67); Harlem Renaissance (114); review modernism and postmodernism (167-169)

Week 7: 16 & 18 May.

• Wednesday 16 May. Impediments to the Marriage of True Minds
  Sylvia Plath, Poems 1959-1963: "Ode for Ted"(29), "Two Sisters of Persephone"(31), "Wreath for a Bridal"(36), "Electra on Azalea Path"(74), "The Colossus"(78), "The Hanging Man"(96), "Morning Song,"(107), "In Plaster"(110), "The Moon and the Yew Tree"(120), "Elm"(151), "Event"(156), "The Applicant" (189), "Daddy"(191), "Words" (234)
  
  
• Friday 18 May. Impediments to the Marriage of True Minds
  Ted Hughes, Birthday Letters (1998): "Fulbright Scholars" (3), "Visit"(7), "St Botolph's"(14), "Fidelity"(28), "A Pink Wool Knitted Dress"(34), "The Badlands"(82), "Black Coat"(102), "A Dream"(118), "Daffodils"(127), "The Rag Rug" (135)"Apprehensions"(140), "Perfect Light"(143), "The Hands"(184), "Fingers" (194) Abrams: author and authorship (14-18)

Week 8: 23 & 25 May.

• Translating Consciousness
  Maxine Hong Kingston, The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts (1976); Abrams: biography, autobiography, memoir (22-3); myth (170-172)
  On Wednesday, 23 May, Maxine Hong Kingston will take part in a public conversation about The Woman Warrior with DM during the lecture period.

Week 9: 30 May & 1 June.

• Carnal knowledge
  Tom Stoppard. Arcadia (1996)
  Abrams: post-modernism (168-9)

Week 10: 6 June.

• Discussion of the course in preparation for the final exam

12 June, 8:30-11:30 a.m.: FINAL EXAM

Readings for Spring Quarter:

• Continuing use:
  
  • M.H. Abrams, A Glossary Of Literary Terms
  • Ovid, Metamorphoses

• T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land and Other Poems. Penguin USA.
  ISBN: 0141180722

• Sigmund Freud, Civilization and Its Discontents. W.W. Norton & Company.
  ISBN: 0393301583

• Ted Hughes, Birthday Letters. Farrar, Straus & Giroux.
  ISBN: 0374525811

• Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God. HarperCollins.
  ISBN: 0060931418

• Maxine Hong Kingston. The Woman Warrior: A Memoir of a Childhood Among Ghosts. Vintage Books.
  ISBN: 0679721886

• Sylvia Plath. Poems. Alfred A. Knopf.
  ISBN 0375404643

• Tom Stoppard. Arcadia. Faber & Faber.
  ISBN: 0571169341

• Virginia Woolf. A Room of One's Own. Harcourt Brace.
  ISBN: 0156787334

• Virginia Woolf. To the Lighthouse. Harcourt Brace.
  ISBN: 0156907399